Yelp provides a suite of tools connecting people to local business through community contributed reviews is at the frontier of motivating to users to contribute. They currently boast about 25 million unique hits per month, and growing quickly, thanks in part to the efforts of their Community Managers.
SOCHI was privileged to hold a brown-bag lunch with two such community managers, Mariah Cherem and Colleen Curtis from Yelp.com. Mariah is the current Metro Detroit Community Manager, and Colleen was the Chicago Community Manager. They provided a great view of what's it like to work for one of the country's best known social media companies. They talked about how they foster the sense of community and keep their users happy and reviewing.
Part of this connection is fostered by creating events for Yelp users to engage in. There is generally one monthly event for the elite squad (reviewers with the most reviews) and two yearly events for anyone with a Yelp profile. They vary in size from the some large open parties that have had as many as 3,000 people in Chicago, to the closer to 100 a month in smaller markets, with approximately 60-80 people showing up at the elite squad parties. Communities are different, and this is reflected in the types of events: the events are more laid-back in Austin, more formal in New York City and Los Angeles. In Detroit, they have held everything from pizza and divey bowling at the Garden Bowl, to a game night at a great but not well known deli, to formal Cocktails and an Art Exhibition at the Scarab Club in midtown. The object is to help get the elite users to gain a sense for each other in person, helping to bring the online community offline. This gives the users and community more authenticity, more sense of connection - its both a marketing initiative and community building.
Besides fostering community out on the streets, they also work hard to keep things open and transparent on the site. While Community Managers can flag things that look inappropriate, there is actually very little moderation, as they tend to let things roll and let the reviewers self moderate. Yelp will never remove negative reviews unless it violates terms of service. Business Owner Tools (new) allows businesses to post public comments, in response to reviews, as well as posting business information.
