What is Yelp?

Yelp is an online directory for businesses that was founded in 2004. It allows web users to search for businesses by industry category, location and reviews. It also allows users to leave comments and give ratings to businesses they’ve previously bought from or interacted with.

Benefits of advertising your business on Yelp

According to Yelp for business, advertising your business on Yelp promotes several benefits. Here are some examples to help you weigh the potential positive outcomes for your business:

Provides targeted advertising based on location

When you advertise on Yelp, they use your location data to help your business ads appear in searches users complete for specific services in your area. This allows your business to engage with a local audience, which is especially helpful to small businesses in expanding their customer base. This may also be helpful to connect you with potential employees.

Helps guarantee premium placement

By signing up for Yelp advertisements, your business advertisements will appear on competitor pages. This is important because it increases the chances of Yelp users clicking on your advertisement from a competitor’s page and potentially buying from your business over others. Signing up for Yelp advertisements also enhances your chances of appearing in search engine results.

Ensures optimization across devices

Yelp advertising appears on web, mobile and desktop applications. This is helpful because it means you can reach customers regardless of what device they use to access Yelp.

Overview of advertising on Yelp

Here’s an overview of the specific aspects of advertising on Yelp to give you an idea of what to expect, according to Yelp Ads:

Free tools

Yelp offers several free tools that allow you to set up and monitor your business profile to the public. These free tools include informational tutorials and profile features like:

• E-book for claiming your business page
• Account information
• How-to’s for updating your business page
• The Yelp Guide to Success for managing your business on the platform
• Best practices for responding to comments and reviewers on Yelp

Self-service ads

Self-service ads allow businesses to determine the cost-per-click rate for their advertisements and offer the following:

• Yelp deals and gift cards to entice users to buy from your business
• Photo and video slideshows to showcase your business
• Business analytic tools to track the amount of web traffic to your page

Custom ads

Custom ads allow businesses to access advanced Yelp advertising tools and cater them to their specific company. Custom ad features include:

• Distance targeting allows you to gauge how far away visitors to your page live from your business location.
• Custom ad text allows you to maximize your creativity by coming up with your own ad copy.

How to start advertising your business on Yelp

Here are six stepsto help you start advertising your business on Yelp:

1. Claim your business on Yelp

Claim your business on Yelp if you haven’t already by completing the following steps:

• Go to "Yelp for Business Owners."
• Type in your business name and address in the search engine.
• Click "Claim this Business."
• Fill out your contact information.
• Gain full access upon approval.

2. Update your profile

Make sure your business’ contact information is correct before adding photos and a short description of your business. You can also add your store hours if you have a walk-in location.

3. Make use of Yelp’s deals and gift certificate feature

This feature allows you to set up a discount or dollar amount for random site visitors. Yelp typically keeps a portion of the profits, but offering discounts and promotions can give you a better chance of attracting new and existing customers to your business.

4. Choose an advertising plan that works for you

Yelp offers both free and monetary advertisement plans for business owners. You can choose to go with standard self-service ads or you can select a more advanced plan that pairs you with a Yelp sales representative. This feature also allows you to remove competitor ads from your page and set up a marketing budget.

5. Use business analytics

As part of your advertising plan you have access to the business analytics feature, which allows you to track the level of customer engagement with your page. From this, you can determine whether a particular deal or post generated significant customer interest.

6. Link to your website

If you have a business website or social media accounts, be sure to put links to those platforms on your Yelp business page. This might increase your social media following and drive traffic to your website for customer engagement.

Yelp advertising FAQs

How much does it cost to advertise on Yelp?

Yelp uses acost-per-click strategy for those looking to advertise on their website. The amount you pay Yelp to advertise your business is mostly determined based on the budget you set to pay them for advertisements each month. Because of this, the cost-per-click rate may be different for each Yelp user.

Is advertising on Yelp worth it?

Advertising on Yelp may be worth it for your business as it provides a platform for web users in your area to discover your business. You can also set a low advertising budget to test out whether Yelp advertisements provide substantial benefits to your business.

How long does Yelp take to approve a business?

According to Yelp, the amount of time it takes for them to approve a business for their website may depend on whether they can easily verify its legitimacy.