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- Current and former Yelp employees said they have felt pressured by the company to use misleading sales tactics.
- Business Insider spoke to 21 current or former Yelp workers about the company's hyper-aggressive approach to sales and its high-pressure corporate culture.
- Some sources said they knowingly sold to small business owners who they didn't think understood what they were buying, saw colleagues act in misleading ways, and regularly heard complaints from business owners about unexpected bills.
- Since the pandemic closed Yelp's offices, sales calls largely haven't been recorded, prompting concerns about sales reps' conduct without oversight.
- In a statement, Yelp said that it requires "employees to behave in a professional manner and to follow our policies and procedures," and takes disciplinary action against workers who are unethical.
- Not all complaints mean Yelp was in the wrong: A business owner might fail to understand something that was explained in good faith, or lie in an attempt to get a refund.
- Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
Melanie's plant shop in San Diego, Calif. was doing surprisingly well when a Yelp salesperson called her in July.
After months of coronavirus lockdowns, local residents were eager for new hobbies and diversions, and sales of her store's succulents, cacti, and other houseplants were thriving. Even so, she told the Yelp salesperson, she had no budget for advertising.
Yelp was here to help, the voice on the other end of the line responded. The company was offering a $900 advertising credit as part of its efforts to support small businesses during the pandemic, Melanie recalls being told.
Then on August 1, Yelp billed Melanie for $47.
Surprised, she immediately reached out to Yelp to ask for a refund; she even cancelled her bank card for good measure. Yelp's response 18 days later explained that the $900 credit was bonus advertising to supplement a pre-arranged budget she had — apparently unwittingly — agreed to. By the time she figured out how to cancel everything, it was the start of September.
And by then she had another bill from Yelp: $570.
Her complaints of being misled were dismissed by Yelp, and the company said it had no recording of the call. It wasn't until Melanie publicly complained to the Better Business Bureau that she received a refund from Yelp, which denied (and still denies) any wrongdoing.
"I think it's really cruel to take advantage of a small business during Covid," Melanie said in an interview, noting that the time spent repeatedly calling Yelp distracted her from her work, and cancelling her bank card made it difficult to resupply inventory during the busy period.
"At first I thought this is very kind of them, they're offering me $900 because of Covid, but no. They're predatory," she said.
Melanie's not the only person with concerns about Yelp's sales tactics.
Business Insider spoke to 11 current Yelp employees working on its small business-focused local sales team and another 10 former employees who left the company in the last 12 months, all of whom raised concerns about the company's sales practices.
More than a dozen sources said they personally felt pressure to mislead business owners, from loosely explaining how Yelp's products function and exaggerating those products' efficacy, to purposefully obfuscating how billing works, and inventing stories about their own identities and backgrounds. Some admitted that they had knowingly sold to people who didn't understand what they were buying. Others said they witnessed their colleagues act in ways they considered duplicitous. And more still said they fielded regular complaints from angry business owners who felt misled by other Yelp employees.
It's "not uncommon to hear people leave out certain pieces of info … not uncommon for managers to encourage you not to explain the program fully," said one employee, who like all of the Yelp insiders, requested anonymity to discuss their experiences with the company candidly.
"It doesn't matter if the Second Coming of Christ is today ... You need to find a way to make the Second Coming of Christ less important than Yelp ads."
The sales tactics, which some sources said were part of a longstanding pattern at Yelp, have taken on increased significance amid the coronavirus pandemic. At a time when Main Street businesses are suffering the economic pain of the virus and the lockdowns, some sales reps say they face ever-more pressure to do whatever it takes to sign up clients for advertising packages they might not want, need, or even understand.
"I can't tell you how many times I've dealt with crying business owners on the phone saying, 'This is the reason my business is failing right now, this credit,'" said a current employee.
A Yelp spokesperson said that salespeople are required to behave in a professional manner. "We have policies in place which clearly state that communicating with businesses in a dishonest or unethical manner is not acceptable, and we regularly train our sales reps and distribute materials to ensure that our entire sales force is clear on these policies," they said in a written statement.
The company has "robust systems in place to monitor and manage our sales employees to ensure they meet our standards of professionalism. Those that don't adhere to our policies are subject to disciplinary action, up to and including termination," the statement added.
Sales "scripts" that spell out hyper-aggressive sales tactics
If a business owner receives a cold-call from a Yelp sales rep while driving, they might receive an unusual instruction: Pull over now.
Multiple sources said they were instructed to tell business owners who answer the phone while behind the wheel to stop the car, open Yelp on their phone, and start buying Yelp ads. "I've had someone say 'My son has autism, I have to go pick him up right now' … and [my manager said], 'Ask her to pull over,'" said a current employee.
It's just one example of what sources described as an array of hyper-aggressive tactics employed by Yelp's sales reps in pursuit of business. As an online directory of hundreds of thousands of companies and services across the US and abroad, Yelp's lifeblood is advertising revenue from small businesses — and some sales reps go to eyebrow-raising lengths when cold-calling businesses to close these deals.
Current and former staffers said that if a business owner says they have no money or can't afford it, sales reps are sometimes told to stress that the owner doesn't have to pay anything until the end of the month — giving them an opportunity to make money off the ads first. But there's no guarantee ad clicks will generate income for a business, and Yelp employees said some features are billed for even if a business gets no views.
"They do not care if someone is saying five times, 'I don't have the money … it's either food on the table for my family or Yelp ads,'" said a current employee. "[Your manager will] make you ask again [for the credit card]."
One piece of training material seen by Business Insider instructs sales reps to "ask for the close 8X" — that is, try to close the sale eight times — if a business owner rejects them before the rep can accept their refusal.
"It doesn't matter if the Second Coming of Christ is today," said a current employee. "You need to find a way to make the Second Coming of Christ less important than Yelp ads."
Yelp said it was aware of the "8X" document, but said it was a "checklist" shared with some reps by managers a few years ago rather than an official, company-sanctioned "sales script," and is not part of any current training materials. The company also said it does not condone or encourage behavior such as asking drivers to pull over, ignoring business owners' claims they have no money, or any of the other the practices described.
That time a sale rep signed up a 16-year-old dog walker
Some of the tactics described by sources are extreme versions of the persistence and persuasion that are common in the sales business. But other tactics that sources said are company-approved veer into more problematic territory.
Sales reps are encouraged to try to sell to "non-decision makers" (NDMs), sources said, even if the rep knows the person has no authority to allow advertising. These might be bartenders, receptionists, cashiers, relatives of the owner, or anyone else.
Sources said that Yelp sales rep sometimes urge NDMs to use their personal credit card if necessary, telling them they can show the finished ad to the business owner later and switch out the card. In the meantime however, the NDM's credit card is responsible for charges, leaving them on the hook if the business owner doesn't want Yelp advertising and refuses to recoup them for their costs.
Yelp said this is inaccurate, and that sales reps can only interact with NDMs for the purposes of building relationships. However, 18 sources from multiple Yelp offices said they had either themselves sold to NDMs, been pressured to by their managers, or witnessed others doing so. A sales script for new hires seen by Business Insider also gives pointers on how best to convince NDMs to sign up and enter their credit card.
"You can say whatever you want to a business owner, without really being held accountable."
One Phoenix sales rep signed up a 16-year-old with a dog-walking business to Yelp advertising in 2019, a source familiar with the incident said. The $500-plus bill prompted a furious call from the boy's father, but Yelp refused to refund them. (Yelp said it had no record of this incident and it refunds customers who are under 18 if requested.)
"We are trained to pitch and close anyone that answers the phone. If they have a credit card, we're signing them up for Yelp ads," said a current employee. "I mean everyone."
Numerous sources said Yelp's sales reps routinely ignore business owners' requests to stop contacting them. They said the company maintains a "do not call" list of businesses that don't wish to be contacted, but unless the business owner said a specific set of words — "put me on the do not call list" — otherwise unambiguous requests to stop reaching out are not honored.
"I can't tell you how many times I've been cussed out by a business owner to 'fuck off' or 'never call me again,'" said a former employee, but if the wording wasn't exact the request wouldn't be respected. (A current employee admitted that they personally do not always honor even valid do-not-call requests.)
Yelp said that business owners do not have to use precise wording not to be contacted, but that they need to make clear they never want to be pitched by Yelp again.
Some sources confirmed that they had seen employees be disciplined or fired for being misleading. Others however said they hadn't seen people fired for what they considered inappropriate sales tactics, or that they believed rules were enforced inconsistently.
"There's people who've been influenced by their managers to be misleading, absolutely, and I've seen some of those managers get fired, and I've seen some of them get promoted," one current employee said.
The vast sales machine that turns user reviews into a billion dollar business
Many people know Yelp as the go-to website for reading customer reviews about restaurants, auto shops, plumbers and pretty much any local business. With its more than 200 million user-submitted reviews, Yelp's website is a fixture in America's local economy — a comprehensive and free-to-use directory that helps consumers find businesses in their vicinity and research the company's reputation.
For the businesses themselves, the relationship with Yelp is more complicated.
Yelp makes money by selling advertising and premium features for businesses to promote themselves on its platform. Any business can be included for free in Yelp's directory, but by signing up for a premium plan firms can rise to the top when users search the site, have their page feature extra bells and whistles, or appear prominently when a consumer is reading reviews about a competitor.
For many small businesses, Yelp's premium services can be a powerful driver of new customers and sales. Yelp's website is brimming with positive testimonials and the company's revenues have grown steadily over the past decade, surpassing $1 billion in 2019.
Making it all possible is a vast sales operation that employs thousands of staffers in offices all over the country — from San Francisco to New York City, DC, Chicago, and Phoenix. These sales reps are tasked with cold-calling local businesses — some of whom may not be familiar with Yelp, others who may be upset about negative user reviews posted on the site — and convincing them that paying for Yelp's premium services will lead to more cash in the register.
It can be tough work in the best of times. With a pandemic in full swing, and small businesses throughout the country closed or operating under severe restrictions, it can be an especially difficult and stressful job.
"These people are really struggling," a Yelp salesperson said about the prospects they call to pitch. "I am hearing business owners … cry to a stranger about how afraid they are."
Yelp's revenue plunged more than 31% in the second quarter of 2020 and the company has laid off and furloughed thousands of employees in a scramble to bring its operating expenses inline with the new reality. (The furloughed workers have since returned to work.)
Yelp's spokesperson cited various company efforts, including $32 million worth of relief efforts, that Yelp has provided to small businesses during the pandemic.
Why Yelp employees say the phone-assisted sales process is ripe for abuse and how they do it
For one Chicago sales rep, the first of the month means one thing: Complaints.
Like multiple other sources, the Chicago rep said they routinely receive calls after a billing cycle from upset customers who have discovered unexpected Yelp charges for hundreds of dollars on their credit cards.
"I am hit on the first of the month with a barrage of calls from angry business owners who either did not understand the program or were underwhelmed by the results," the person said.
A big reason for the confusion, multiple sales reps said, is the way that Yelp sells its premium services, using a cost-per-click ad model that even some Yelp sales reps can struggle to explain, and a phone-based sales process that many current and former employees feel is ripe for abuse.
Since around 2018, the company has used a model called "Rep-Assisted Self-Serve," or RASS, in which the business owner completes the entire sale on their phone or computer — from selecting the ad package on Yelp's app or website, to entering their credit card — while a Yelp sales rep talks them through the process over the phone.
"As long as I can show my managers revenue, my job is safe."
Yelp offers various vouchers and bonus codes to give users free supplemental ads as an incentive to sign up. Reps will sometimes describe these bonus codes in such a way that can make them sound like free advertising, 18 sources said. This might lead businesses to believe that they're getting a free trial of Yelp advertising, rather than just additional advertising on top of their committed spend — as was the case with Melanie's San Diego plant shop.
"The language can be so manipulative in the sale," said a current employee. "Just saying enough to not cross the lines so you don't get dinged for it."
Sales reps can also pile on premium add-ons like an "Enhanced Profile" page that the customer might not realize they'll be paying for. Some sales managers "encourage you not to mention the 'Enhanced Profile' at all … click 'Enhanced Profile,' click 'Next,'" a former employee said, describing how a rep can gloss over the feature while coaching a customer through the online sign-up process. "If they don't ask you what the enhanced profile is, don't tell them."
Add in factors like business owners who aren't native English speakers, or are older and less technologically-savvy, and the opportunities for abuse can be even greater.
"[If] you get a young business owner, or someone who's an active Yelp user, sure, they get it, but I'm calling 50-year-old contractors who have flip-phones or don't do things online," said one current employee. "This is an easy mark for some people."
More than half a dozen sources said they had knowingly sold to business owners that they didn't think fully understood what they were buying due to a language barrier. "I sell non-English speakers on Yelp ads at least twice a month. We are encouraged to direct and command these clients by management, effectively using the business owner's misunderstanding to our advantage," said another current employee. "When they receive the bill, they are often confused and will likely never invest in Yelp again. This destroys trust in our company, but as long as I can show my managers revenue, my job is safe."
The algorithmically determined cost-per-click can also fluctuate after a business owner has agreed to an ad package, meaning they might get significantly less clicks for their money than they might be expecting — a process some current and former employees view as opaque and potentially misleading.
The maximum monthly cost is displayed on customers' screens before they press purchase. But sources said some reps will run through the payment process quickly so that customers don't pay attention, and they won't proactively discuss it. A follow-up email itemizing the maximum potential bill is sometimes overlooked or not clear to users, Yelp insiders said.
"It's all about the speed of the sale, got to get to them in the moment … don't even address the [final bill] number," said another current employee. "Most managers don't even bring it up, that's the way I was taught." Yelp said sales reps are required to explain billing.
Yelp employees will sometimes lie to make sales, 11 sources said — fabricating stories about anything from their personal backgrounds to their job titles and how they might have used Yelp personally to find businesses to patronize. (Some sources said this was common across the sales industry and not unique to Yelp.)
"We regularly provide extensive training, materials (such as scripts), and mentorship to our Local Sales team to ensure that they clearly and correctly describe our ad products and associated costs, and are effectively prepared to help businesses succeed on our platform," a Yelp spokesperson said. "Our reps are trained to walk business owners through their Yelp for Business account, the free tools available to them, and our advertising products."
The sign-up flow "clearly" explains Yelp's products and pricing, the Yelp spokesperson said, and "it is ultimately up to the business owner to decide whether to purchase our products."
Yelp said it won't sell to businesses in regions or industries that it doesn't believe will benefit, and that sales reps are required to explain billing. "Additionally, business owners can suspend their Yelp ads at any time."
"No means no … does not exist in our sales tactics."
Inside Yelp's sprawling local sales organization, sources painted a picture of a culture that's part boiler-room and part fraternity house, where a stifling pressure to hit sales targets is always in the air.
"Everything is dependent on my success with revenue," said a current Yelp employee. "If I'm not closing, I'm treated like I mean nothing to this company and my self-worth suffers immensely."
A dozen current or former employees felt that the stress of working at Yelp had serious deleterious effects on their mental health, including depression, anxiety, or breakdowns.
When a business owner told a female Yelp employee on the phone that he planned to masturbate while thinking of her, her manager urged her to continue with her pitch, she said.
He said it was "all the more reason you should … take his money, because he's gross," the employee recalled. Multiple other sources also said they either felt pressure to interact with sexually inappropriate business owners or witnessed other reps doing so. Earlier this summer, Yelp announced a plan to blacklist abusive businesses after years of reps experiencing racist and sexist abuse.
"If I'm not closing, I'm treated like I mean nothing to this company."
Sources said that an aggressive make-the-sale mentality manifests itself in other facets of the culture, where — at least before the pandemic — the ranks of young, single employees would sometimes blow off steam in after-hours bacchanals marked by heavy drinking, hookups and sometimes inappropriate behavior.
In New York in 2019, a male rep had sex with a manager from another team and, without her knowledge, recorded a video of the act and circulated it around the office. He was fired after Yelp became aware of the incident, a spokesperson confirmed. (Videos of two employees from Phoenix engaging in a sex act and of a San Francisco employee masturbating have also been shared among employees. Yelp previously said it had no record of these incidents.)
A long-time training manager responsible for on-boarding new hires in the Chicago office was let go in 2019 after a group of women came forward with claims of repeated sexual advances towards new employees.
"The sales tactics and the training … play hand-in-hand with sexual harassment, and party-hard atmosphere, that exists in company culture," another current employee said. "No means no … does not exist in our sales tactics."
In early 2020, workers in Yelp's Chicago office became embroiled in a "pyramid scheme" called the "Blessing Loom." Some managers were asking employees to give them $100, with the promise they would make $800 themselves down the line by soliciting donations from others. The managers were disciplined, including demotions and pay cuts, though none were fired, Yelp confirmed.
Some Yelp employees have also apparently defrauded their employer. A few reps have been accused of signing up businesses using their own credit card (or a friend's), then cancelling the advertising package before it gets charged, while pocketing the commission for a "successful" sale. At least five people have been fired after being accused of this behaviour in the Phoenix office over the last year and a half, including the top performing rep in the office, and employees have also been accused of doing it in Chicago and DC, sources said.
Yelp said it has no tolerance for fraud and fires employees who engage in this behavior, and that sexual harassment and other violations of its code of conduct are also not tolerated.
"Most sales reps at Yelp operate with the utmost professionalism and many have built thriving careers at the company lasting years, with some elevated to leadership and executive roles," Yelp's spokesperson said. "However, as with any company that has thousands of employees, there are instances of violations to our Code of Conduct. We take these violations seriously, investigate any such reports, and take necessary disciplinary action, up to and including termination."
The spokesperson added that Yelp also takes mental health very seriously and offers employees a range of support.
"Sales can be a challenging job, but it can also be rewarding if it's something you love to do. While many people thrive in sales, we recognize that it might not be the right career path for everyone. That holds true for any type of sales role anywhere, not just at Yelp," the spokesperson said.
Yelp's ad products do work, and happy customers swear by them
Not every customer complaint means that Yelp was in the wrong. A business owner may have simply not understood something that was clearly explained in good faith by a sales rep. Or they might lie in an attempt to get a discount or refund.
"I think some [business owners] … don't get the results they expected, and then they complain," said a current employee. The cost-per-click ad model means that businesses pay for clicks, not guaranteed customers — a distinction that can be lost on some small business owners, especially given some sales reps' loose language.
Some employees stressed that Yelp's advertising products can and do work for many businesses — building their brand and attracting new customers. "I saw Yelp advertising work tremendously for hundreds of businesses throughout my tenure," said a former employee.
Advertiser retention rates have increased steadily, Yelp said, rising by a mid-teens percentage rate last year and increasing by 25% year-over-year in February. And its internal customer satisfaction survey showed that its sales reps consistently received a four out of five rating over the first three quarters of 2020.
To help small businesses affected by the pandemic, Yelp has delivered $32 million worth of relief efforts such as providing free access to services like its Connect feature, which lets restaurants post social-media-like updates for special menus and hours, as well as waiving advertising fees. Yelp continues to offer relief and refunds to businesses that are particularly affected by the pandemic, a spokesperson said.
And Yelp vowed at the start the pandemic to protect small businesses from unfounded, reputation-damaging user reviews, such as claims of contracting COVID-19 at a restaurant. (Yelp salespeople do not control which user reviews appear on a business's page, a longstanding gripe of many small business owners.)
Still, some sources said there was little recognition that the product may not be a good fit for all businesses, especially those in less populated, rural areas or in certain niche industries.
A former Yelp employee described trying to convince a struggling small business owner who had advertised on Yelp before with no success to give it another shot. "I was talking to a woman who was behind on her bills and her rent and she had children to feed, and didn't have any money, and I was still forced by my manager to keep pushing her to put down a credit card, saying, 'this time it'll work for her,'" she said. "And when she tried to cancel later on, my manager said, 'Don't pick that up, customer service will take care of that.'"
That was, she said, "the moment I felt very disgusted with myself."
Sources say working from home has turned an already aggressive sales process into "a Wild West"
In September 2020, Yelp published a sobering data point: 60% of businesses in the United States that have been forced to close as a result of the pandemic won't ever reopen.
The grim prognosis is not reflected in the internal expectations that Yelp sets for its own sales staffers, with most sources confirming that their sales targets have not decreased since the start of the crisis. (Yelp said this is because its reduced workforce means there's more potential for each employee to make sales.)
The disruption caused by the pandemic has had another important impact on Yelp's sales operation, according to sources: The phone software Yelp uses in its offices to record phone calls has only worked intermittently since employees began working from home.
Ten sources said they were concerned about the lack of oversight because of the phone situation. "I'm dialing on my cellphone," said a current employee."It's kind of a Wild West right now. You can say whatever you want to a business owner, without really being held accountable."
Another former employee said they were told by their manager that "we didn't have monitored phone calls … do whatever it takes to make a sale." They interpreted this as being told to lie, if necessary, to close the sale.
Yelp said that it never instructs employees to mislead or lie to business owners, and it will take action against those who do. The company said it has systems in place to monitor employees, but did not address when the call-recording software will be fully functional again.
Dentist Vogtle Ninh said he was left on the hook for a $500 bill he never expected because recordings of his phone calls with Yelp were missing.
A few months after Ninh launched his own dental practice in Ashburn, Virginia in March, he received a call from a Yelp salesperson pitching Yelp ads. The rep told him he'd "get amazing results," and was offering him a $300 credit in free ads, Ninh said.
He said the ads didn't result in many leads for his businesses, but "I was like 'alright, no big deal, because it's a $300 credit."
But at the end of the month, he received a bill for around $500. He said he was told by Yelp that the $300 "credit" was actually a "Bonus Ads promotional offer" that only gave him extra ads, rather than a discount on the underlying ad package.
Ninh said Yelp told him it didn't have a recording of the conversation, but denied all wrongdoing and refused to budge. (Yelp told Business Insider that the terms of the promotion were clear at checkout, and that Ninh received leads as a result of the ads.)
In the end, he begrudgingly paid the bill, but is trying to dispute the charges with his credit card.
"We could've used it towards payroll, we could've used it towards rent," he said of the $500 Yelp charged him. "But it was completely unexpected."
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