Yelp Elite Privileges

So, I spent some of my time from May to August this year trying to become Yelp Elite. Why would I want to do that? Well, partly because it was a challenge (although in hindsight, I think almost anyone could get Yelp Elite in about one month, instead of the nearly four months it took me) and partly because Elite members get invited to several events every month that are JUST for Yelp Elite.

Once I became Elite, I had access to the special page of Elite events and started receiving emails about events I could sign up and bring a guest to. We were too late for a special preview of the San Francisco restaurant, Prana, a free event with free menu samples, free Lotus vodka and free Tiger beer. Basically, all the events are free, and almost always include free food and free wine and/or spirits, if it is a venue that wouldn't normally provide alcohol, like The Cartoon Art Museum, then outside vendors will come in and there will still be alcohol.

We were too late for the Jones Restaurant in September, too. I asked my bf if he wanted to go to the Mars Bar and Restaurant with a bunch of Yelpers for free food and wine and he was like, "uh, no."

What?

Why not?

Because my bf is the voice of reason, that's why. Who cares if it's free? I actually signed up and got us put on the list for an event taking place at Charles Chocolates Factory, and my bf says "okay, I'll go if you want to" (which I might mention was extra sweet because he had a really crazy weekend that weekend and the last thing he needed to do was spend time in Emeryville) "but...you know they give tours at other times, too, right? Not just when there is a Yelp Elite event?", "Yes", I say, "but...they are also pairing the chocolate with wine and champagne!", "Okay", he says, "but, we could go to this place, get some chocolates and bring them to Savvy Cellar and pair them with wine and champagne".

He has a point. Here you have a business that is going to give you some stuff for free and probably give you extra special treatment and try to be EXTRA nice to you because they want you to give them a good rating on Yelp. This MIGHT be really cool sometimes, like when a cool new restaurant opens up and you get to eat there before they are open to the public, but really the getting something free part is not that exciting and you have to wonder how that affects the validity of Yelp ratings.

Actually, I thought at first that restaurants/bars/chocolate factories were really brave to host an event. Brave to face the criticism of a community of people eager to give you the real scoop on businesses everywhere. I've changed my mind about that, though, since reading reviews people have written about businesses that have hosted Yelp Elite events. Charlie's Chocolates is a really good example. The event they hosted produced TONS of five star reviews, but if you really read ALL the reviews you will find a few more truthful sounding gems like this one from Beth B:

A star for good graphic design and clever branding - otherwise, blaaaaahhh. The cocoa-powder-covered nuts lacked crunch, and everything else just lacked goodness. The so-called factory tour was a disappointment - it was a bunch of harried on-display confectioners being watched like lab rats. Sad, sad, sad.

Dignity and integrity are lacking from these hand-crafted chocolates that taste generic.

(This is a rating of the chocolates only, but since others mentioned the event: the Yelp Elite event was a promotion of products, disguised as a party. I'd hoped it would be more like a gathering of people who are genuinely interested in quality food tasting & production, and thought the factory tour would be educational. And the sparkling wine was foul. I'd feel bad for dissing free stuff, but advertisements aren't gifts.)

Reading her review, and a few others like it, I realized the power of a Yelp event to generate positive reviews. Wow, even Jones restaurant, which was doing pretty poorly in its Yelp ratings managed to raise themselves to an average of three whole stars by hosting an event. It kind of seems like the events become simply exercises in creative writing for the Elite Yelpers who feel obligated to give a place five stars if they pretty much liked the event and four stars if they had a pretty good time with their friends and staff were nice to them and three stars if they thought it sucked but at least they got free stuff.

I really think overall Yelp is great. I have used it many times the same way I use the reviews on Amazon to choose a product/restaurant, and I think that overall the system works quite well. However, the same way Amazon's results get skewed by authors writing reviews of their own book and getting their friends to do the same, Yelp Elite events skew the results, too. If Yelp really wanted people to give honest reviews, Yelp Elite would get a secret reimbursement to eat someplace or tour someplace or whatever, and it would be subsidized by the restaurant that wanted more reviews. Yeah, that might be a little harder sell with most businesses.

I can't say we'll never go to a Yelp Elite event, and I do hope to hold onto my elite status when 2008 rolls around, but for the moment I'm a bit disappointed in their system, although I do realize they need to make money and getting Yelpers together for fun and free parties is pretty cool.

Thursday my bf and I are going to a Commonwealth Club event featuring the founders of Yelp, and I think/hope it will be quite interesting. I'll probably write another entry about Yelp then. Hopefully the talk will renew my enthusiasm. Of COURSE because this involves aforementioned Yelp founders, the event is followed by a whole Wine and Hors d'oeuvres Reception from its sponsor. Free wine, free food, that's Yelp for ya.

Meanwhile, I'm busy trying to increase my Amazon reviewer ranking. Who knows, if I do okay at it I may end up being sent free books or something by people hoping for a review by me. Probably take a lot longer than on Yelp, but if someone wanted to send me free cookbooks, that's something free I could really enjoy. Their system is wacky, though. Today I checked and although I wrote a few more reviews and got two more "useful" points, my ranking actually went down! What up, Amazon? Sheesh.