User:Triton120/sandbox

As of February 2014, the local advertisements on Yelp Inc. contribute to over 75% of its stock value. Yelp Inc. not only allows businesses to pay for their promotion, but also has a platform for deals and collects a fee for transactions made through it. Since reviews are user-generated, some customers may be skeptical of positive reviews, in case businesses can pay to receive higher ratings or remove negative reviews. In response to this concern, Yelp Inc. reminds it users that "money doesn't buy anything but ads." An independent academic study was conducted which revealed no connection between advertising and reviews that are recommended, and news organizations such as the Wall Street Journal published an article regarding the dismissal of lawsuits filed against Yelp Inc. (under an accusation that Yelp Inc. is distorting businesses). In April 2014, Yelp Inc. shared this information on its advertiser FAQ page, asserting that there is a reason why searches do not simply display a ton of 5-star rated businesses; their owners cannot pay to remove negative reviews, and Yelp Inc.'s advertisers do not get special treatment on top of the feature they pay for.

By crowdsourcing its business reviews to its online community of users, Yelp Inc. allows for a wide range of reviewers and requires monitoring of its user-generated content. When Yelp Inc. first launched its platform, it experimented with a $1 per review stipend for each review in a new market. However, due to the poorly written content in some of these reviews, the $1 per review approach was quickly withdrawn. In addition to the risk of poorly written reviews, Yelp Inc. works to prevent fake reviews as well.

Like many other user-driven platforms, Yelp Inc. allows for its account holders to interact with one another. This can be done in the form of commenting on existing reviews, or marking them as "useful," "funny," or "cool" by pushing a button—similar to the concept of "liking" posts or comments. Though some reviews will be filtered out to prevent a distorting of data through fake reviews, users can feel free to write positive, neutral, or negative reviews on the website or mobile application. Peers can then choose to share a specific review (via e-mail, Facebook, twitter, or an URL), as well as compliment, send a message to, or follow the reviewer.

Yelp Inc.'s users can engage in social networking by adding to their profile, inviting and adding friends, following other users, searching for events in their area, and sending messages to one another.

These members may be a part of a community of reviewers, in one of the 60 Elite Squads throughout North America and Europe. They obtained their Elite status by being nominated online, being selected by a council in San Francisco, and receiving a red badge on their profile. These Elite members may post hundreds of restaurant reviews, receive thousands of compliments, and be read by tens of thousands, without having to own a restaurant, work for a food publication, or be a chef.