Yellowpages.com vs. Yelp: User reviews compared

This week Yellowpages.com added user reviews to their directory service. Much like Yelp, the new system allows registered users to post one- to five-star reviews of local establishments. I decided to compare experiences using both sites to see how they stack up.

Round 1: User registration and benefits

Registering with Yellowpages grants you a few small perks, such as 100 slots to save your favorite establishments. You also get to save personal addresses and keep track of your last 20 searches. Yelp goes a little bit further with a friends list, a small counter under your name with how many reviews you've written, and a profile page with all your reviews. You can also list your favorites, but Yelp breaks it down into what's in your neighborhood and categories for your favorite places to eat, drink, and shop.

Winner: Yelp

(Credit: CNET Networks)

Round 2: Browsing and writing reviews

Oddly enough clicking on a business listing after a search in Yellowpages pops up in a new window. Clicking the Review button opens up yet another window. If you're keeping track, that's three separate windows you need to manage to get to the review page. From there you can rate it using the star system and add your 2 cents. Searching on Yelp is made easy by letting you search by city or ZIP code. You can also see your recent search locations or add your own location presets, helpful features if you're using the service for work and home.

Searches aside, Yelp provides a much richer writing template, letting you see other users' reviews and adding a spell-check button to (almost) idiot-proof your reviews. When you're done, registered users can tag your review as funny, cool, or useful. The cream of the crop gets featured on Yelp's front page and noted on your profile. Yellowpages has a neat feature to directly respond to a review, essentially making it a forum. Both services have maps, but Yellowpages has a neat bird's-eye view feature that lets you see satellite photos at a slight angle.

Winner: Yelp

In the end, Yelp provides a social network combined with a system that rewards users for sharing their experiences. The reviews on Yellowpages just seem tacked on. You could review 100 places a day on the service and get no real sense that other people appreciate it, whereas with Yelp you have the option to make friends and get a reputation for your work. It goes without saying that Yellowpages can (and likely will) improve their rating community, but if I were to pick from the two right now, Yelp is the clear winner.

[dmann200]

Avoid advertsing with Yellowpages.com

This is by far the worst company I have ever worked for. Less than 50% of the time do I get a call back. Usually it takes 5-7 days for them to resolve an issue. After that time I find out the issue is not fixed and I have to wait another 5-7 days for another response. They posted my ad incorrectly and its been over two months now of calling and emails with no results. Every person says they don't have access to make my changes, then passes me to another person who also doesn't have access to make my changes. I tell them I want to cancel but they say that I have a contract. Frankly a contract is two ways--you provide me with products, I provide money. I have not received the correct ad I attempted to purchase even though its been two months.

Don't put yourself through this.

[netman206]

I agree I had a similar problem. Wrong posting on my add also I told them to not run the add but it was run anyways. Also I did not get any response from the add a total waste.

[a_yanir]

liked your comparison. I have looked on it from a different direction and got the same conclusions (see http://bizbee.typepad.com)

[l8rdrew]

The link didn't wok. Ahh! Please revise?

[eggmarketing]

I am having the same situation! 4 months ago I started an ad, which has been incorrect in many ways. I keep trying to cancel it and get told I can't. I don't believe it's impossible, and have contacted the Better Business Bureau and Attorney General to no avail. Any advice on this would be appreciated.

I would highly suggest anyone considering using YP.com stay away!

Susan Payton
Egg Marketing & Public Relations
www.eggmarketingpr.com

[laseralliance]

I experienced the same problem with yellowpages.com. I moved my company and requested YP to change the phone and address for our ads in yellowpages.com. It has been 6 months and still no change. Forget about calling them. They are very apologetic but then nothing will be done.
I wrote a nasty review in their own website and gave them a 1-star (the lowest I can choose) and the next thing I noticed is that they removed my comments from the site. You cannot even find a "write a review" on their site now. Very clever.
Don't sign that contract because they will not let you out. Their collection department is very effective in calling you for payment but the tech support and customer service departments are no useless.


Laser Alliance LLC
www.laseralliance.com

[Tech_Dude_California]

I have to add my advice to NEVER use AT&T Yellow Pages: I was called by a representative to place an ad. I was told that I would have a week to cancel if I changed my mind. After a couple of days, I did change my mind (I was shutting down that business), but was told that my representative was not available and that the new rep did not have authorization to cancel. I told them then and there that I would stay on the phone and escalate the call until my cancellation request was honored as advertised. The rep talked to her manager and then said that "I guarantee you that it will be taken care of today". She dropped the ball, and the ad appeared anyway. I was afraid of getting a lot of calls for a non-existent business, but during the whole year, I only got one call - someone looking for a job. Then the battles over the bill began, and are continuing. I cannot call my rep or their supervisor, and nobody is returning calls. In short: DON'T USE AT&T YELLOW PAGES - YOU'LL BE SCREWED, YOUR AD WON'T BE WORTH THE MONEY, AND YOU WILL BE DEALING WITH AN EXTREMELY SLIMY COMPANY.

[netman206]

all the yellow pages are a waste of time and money. I did not recieve many rsponces but were charged rediculous prices.

[Tesseract257]

Take my advice, stay away from yellowpages and yellowpages.com. Yellowpages.com works out to $55 per click! My (FREE) google business listings and my (FREE) craigslist ads have consistently out performed yellowpages.com by a factor 50 or more. Last month my website had one hit from yellowpages.com, but 350 hits from craigslist and 200 hits from google searchs.

Yellowpages.com is bad business unless you like to burn money!