It is difficult for an independent company to what Yelp does.

As an advertising-based business, it is easy to imagine--rightly or not--why Yelp might want to massage its reviews to make its advertising more sellable. If Yelp were funded solely from user subscriptions--like --Yelp would immediately become more credible.

Likewise, it would help if Yelp had a corporate parent for whom messing with the reviews wouldn't be worth the potential downside. Google would have been such a company, Microsoft another, but after that the list is pretty small.

Nevertheless, business owners would be far better off if Yelp were to change its business model or find an owner for whom the company would be but a sideline.

(I would be interested in hearing about any self-defense tactics against bad Yelp reviews that readers may have discovered. Please send me an e-mail using the link below.)