survey respondents surveyed 85% said they prefer written reviews to stars //

A recent survey by Yelp was conducted by Material and asked 2,000 Americans to rate the reliability of reviews. Respondents said that they read five reviews per business to help them make spending decisions. 77% of respondents say they are reading more reviews online than ever before.

These are the key findings. Yelp’s survey revealed the following:

• Respondents stated that they use online reviews to find out more about restaurants (67%), home repairs/work (57%), cars repair/services (55%), and medical needs (51%). (42%).
• Respondents who believe they have spotted a fake online testimonial will either read additional reviews (49%), ignore it (34%), find another company (27%), or report it (24%).
• Only 28% are interested in incentivized review, while 71% said they wouldn’t visit a business if they found out that the business had compensated or fake online reviews.
• Respondents trust written text reviews more than star ratings by 85%.
  • Yelp requires ratings to be accompanied with actual reviews text.
• 88% of respondents said it was important to understand how online review sites determine which reviews are trustworthy and which are not.
• 79% of respondents said they would like to see all reviews about a product or business, even those that are untrue or fake.

Fake reviews can be stopped Respondents who believe they have seen a fake review will still read reviews about the company to get additional information. 34% ignore the fake review, 27% locate another business and 24% report it to the respective platform.

85 percent of respondents trust written text reviews over star ratings.

The controversy surrounding exortion. The blog article mentions a Google Reviews extortion scheme which affected many restaurants in major cities. These restaurants saw an influx in one-star Google reviews, without any review text. Scammers attempted to extort $75 Google Play gift card vouchers to remove the fake reviews. Because of our mandatory review text policies, this did not happen on Yelp.

Yelp had to deal with similar controversy years ago as well as inconsistencies regarding its review rules.

Dig deeper. The full Yelp study can be found on their blog.

Why we care. Yelp local businesses should ask for reviews using ethical and legal methods. Businesses can also use paid ads to appear higher in search results. They can respond to negative reviews and keep their pages up-to-date to optimize their business listings.

The post 85% Yelp Survey Respondents Say They Trust Written Reviews Over Stars Only was first published on Search Engine Land.