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Yelp, the popular online review platform, has announced a series of new updates aimed at improving user experience. Among the updates are an enhanced AI-powered search experience, the ability to add videos to reviews, and a new satisfaction guarantee program called “Yelp Guaranteed.”
One of the major updates is Yelp’s improved AI-powered search, which now better understands a user’s search intent and highlights relevant information from reviews in new snippets that appear under each business listing in search results. For example, if you search for “tennis courts” on Yelp, you will now see review highlights about tennis courts under each park or facility listed, such as “there are tennis courts that you need to book in advance.” This feature aims to provide users with more accurate and useful information when searching for businesses.
Yelp is also using AI to provide better search suggestions based on a user’s search intent that are not bound by their location. This can be helpful for planning future trips or events that are not near the user’s home. Yelp now suggests businesses across the U.S., expanding the options for users looking for recommendations beyond their immediate location.
In addition, Yelp is introducing a new “Surprise Me” feature that generates a unique highly-rated recommendation near the user’s location. If the user doesn’t like the first recommendation, they can click again for a new suggestion. This feature is designed to be useful when users want to quickly find a nearby place to eat but are unsure of where to go.
Yelp is also making it easier for users to refine their search with clickable category tags on business listings for restaurants, food, and nightlife searches. These categories can help users better narrow down their search and find businesses that meet their specific criteria.
A significant update is the ability to add videos to reviews. Users can now post high-resolution videos up to 12 seconds long alongside their text review and photos on Yelp. This allows users to provide a unique look into their experience, such as showcasing a hike they discovered in a local park or the view from their recent hotel stay.
To help users craft their reviews, Yelp is launching new interactive review topics that track what has been covered and remind users of other topics they might want to address. These topics include food, service, and ambience, and once a topic is addressed, it will be automatically marked with a checkmark at the top of the draft review. Yelp plans to expand relevant review topics to other categories such as services, beauty, health, and shopping.
Yelp is also adding four new review reactions to its existing three (useful, funny, and cool). The new review reactions are helpful, thanks, love this, and oh no, allowing users to express a wider range of emotions and feedback in their reviews.
In addition to these updates, Yelp has announced “Yelp Guaranteed,” a new satisfaction guarantee program. Users who hire an eligible business through Yelp’s Request a Quote feature will be automatically enrolled in the program, allowing them to submit a claim if they encounter challenges resolving an issue directly with the business. The program offers up to $2,500 in compensation and is currently available for eligible Request a Quote-enabled advertisers based on certain qualification factors.
Yelp is also improving the navigation experience on restaurant, food, and nightlife business pages with a new navigation bar that allows users to quickly find information such as a business’s menu, amenities, reviews, and other helpful details. Additionally, Yelp has redesigned the photo viewing experience on business pages by introducing AI-driven photo categories for food and nightlife businesses, as well as a new sort feature that allows users to easily view recently added photos.
Lastly, Yelp is introducing a new login experience that eliminates the need for users to remember their password every time they log into their account.
