Yelp Now Allows Customers To Leave Feedback About Pandemic Related Health Precautions

Local Marketing  |     |  

Your customers may soon be leaving feedback on Yelp about how your business is handling the COVID-19 pandemic. This comes as we are nearing the end of the first year of the pandemic and as vaccines have begun getting administered.

According to a new release, Yelp users can now tell Yelp if they observed social distancing being enforced and mask wearing being enforced. The new features require several Yelp users to input before they are displayed on a businesses profile and a user’s input drops off after a 28-day period to keep from displaying old information.

yelp health safety covid-19 feature screenshot

When a business has enough recent feedback to form a consensus and that consensus is that mask wearing or social distancing is not enforced OR if the feedback is mixed in nature, Yelp will display an orange question marking informing users that mask wearing / social distancing may not be enforced at the specific location.

When the feature launched on Yelp a few days ago (January 12th, 2021) their release said this:

“At launch, the orange question mark is only displayed on a couple hundred businesses out of the millions of businesses on Yelp – making it relatively uncommon as of today.” – Akhil Kuduvalli, Head of Consumer Product

This makes it sound like Yelp is testing the feature with an eye on a broader rollout either happening slowly over the next few weeks or in a bigger update later on.

The new healty and safety feedback section isn’t the only change coming to your Yelp profile. Busiensses can also add new service offerings to highlight how they are handling the pandemic and doing their best to keep customers safe. Those new options include:

  • Staff checked for symptoms (available to all businesses)
  • Disposable or contactless menu (available to restaurants, bars, and nightlife)
  • Heated outdoor seating (available to restaurants, bars, and nightlife)
  • Covered outdoor seating (available to restaurants, bars, and nightlife)
  • Indoor dining (available to restaurants, bars, and nightlife)
  • Private dining (available to restaurants)
  • DIY meal kits (available to restaurants)
  • Outdoor services (available to fitness and beauty businesses)
  • 1:1 sessions available (available to fitness businesses)
  • Limited group sessions available (available to fitness businesses)

Seeing one of these notices on your Yelp page? Read the article above to find out why.

  • Social distancing enforced
  • Staff wear masks
  • Social distancing might not be enforced according to most users
  • Staff might not wear masks according to most users
  • Social distancing might not be enforced according to some users
  • Staff might not wear masks according to some users