Yelp Renames a Company and Destroys its Reputation

If you needed any more confirmation that a business owner’s best move is to render Yelp irrelevant, look no further than this Business Insider story. It tells the tale of a woman whose business underwent a devastating name change on Yelp: from “Pure Power Boot Camp” to “Puke Power Boot Camp.”

Pure Power Boot Camp didn’t just deal with the ramifications of this negative name change, however. Yelp also downright refused to remove false, defamatory reviews that clearly came from a competitor’s efforts to tear down this business and its owner.

If anything should have convinced Yelp to pay close attention to these reviews it would have been the $246,000 law suit with the competitor who stole PPBC’s business model and customer information before opening a new location 15 blocks away. Yelp was made fully aware of the situation by PPBC’s lawyer. They refused to respond either to the flagged reviews or to complaints about the name change.

Finally, it took a call by the FBI Cyber Crime Division for Yelp to change the name back to Pure Power Boot Camp. You’d think, of course, that Yelp would have done this without so much arm twisting, simply because it would have been a matter of courtesy and common sense.

But Yelp was trying to sell her some advertising at the time. Take that as you will.

While the “Puke” case is a rare one, it does demonstrate how vulnerable business owners have become to third-party review sites. It highlights the need for the creation of a virtual firewall that keeps the results of Yelp and other sites largely irrelevant.

Vicious competitors may even try to hack into your claimed business listings so that they can trash you online. And while Yelp is willing to sue businesses who fake good reviews, they are absolutely indifferent to fake bad reviews which trash honest businesses and ultimately work in Yelp’s favor.

Are you tired of Yelp holding your business hostage? Then it is time to get proactive, even aggressive, about online reputation management. Third-party review sites are not here to help your business. You’ve got to position your business in a way that keeps you safe from them. Help yourself by finding out what a trustworthy reputation management company can really do for you.