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Yelp for iOS finally lets you post reviews from the app

Lewis Leong

Lewis Leong

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Yelp has finally caved and has given iOS users the ability to create and upload reviews directly from the mobile application. Previously, Yelp refrained from allowing users to post reviews from a mobile device due to worries of lower quality reviews. While the company is still concerned about low quality reviews written in shorthand, it is marking shorter reviews as “tips” instead of full reviews.

Vice President of consumer and mobile products at Yelp, Eric Singly, wrote back in 2009 that the quality of content on Yelp is of the utmost importance. Here’s what he said:

Yelp for iOS finally lets you post reviews from the app

“We occasionally hear from other passionate Yelpers on why we haven’t enabled review publishing from our mobile applications. There are several reasons why we do this…Well imagine what it would be like if reviews were done in SMS shorthand: ‘OK so, IANAE, but AFAIC this place has THE best Cfood. It was gr8! ADBB’

Um, yeah.

We love the witty quality of the reviews and the insight that Yelpers share in their detailed accounts of their experiences. We’ve found that Quick Tips and Draft Reviews [two pre-existing short features] are mobile features that provide eager Yelpers with an outlet to catalog their immediate experiences or jot notes that they can then add to or edit when they get back to a computer. While we’re not saying that writing Yelp reviews on your mobile device is out of the question, we feel very strongly about maintaining the high level of content you all provide.”

Yelp will have to be careful about the content that is going to be generated from mobile devices. There’s still a risk that users will use shorthand or post reviews in a fit of rage. Restricting users to only posting reviews on the website gave Yelp users some cooling off time to think of what to write. With this restriction gone, the company will have to battle misuse of posting reviews on the go.

yelp ipad map

Still, this is a good move for Yelp, as it will get users to stay within the app longer and (hopefully) produce more high quality content. Yelp is facing increasingly stiff competition from services like Foursquare, Google Maps, and most recently, Facebook. Yesterday, Facebook updated its iOS app to allow users to create reservations using OpenTable from directly within the app, a feature that Yelp already has.

The latest Yelp for iOS is rolling out now to all 22 countries where the service is available. To download the latest version of Yelp for iOS, click here.

Source: TechCrunch

Lewis Leong

Lewis Leong

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