Why Yelping matters

@marcoRecorder
Yelping matters. That’s right. Reviewing businesses at the local level helps both customers understand how to make sensitive choices when purchasing goods, services or meals and it mutually helps businesses improve themselves. Only those businesses that apply positive constructive critiques to their work and their investments are able to survive and develop a demanding market.

Yelp does all that. Many ask “Why not using Tripadvisor instead?” Tripadvisor is a terrific community that helps travellers planning their holidays and not get ripped off when booking a hotel or ordering a meal. The opinions you find on Tripadvisors are mostly from tourists to tourists. Yelp connects locals to locals and locals to tourists. It provides the image of the local people of local businesses. Whether you value more the opinion of one-off consumers or regular community connaisseurs is up to you but the grassroot community building that Yelp brings up is pretty extraordinary, especially in big cities.

The case of Brussels is very interesting. A trilingual community (French, Dutch and English) in a very international environment with tourists, expats, businessmen and locals communicating at the same level.

I started being engaged on Yelp some months ago and I’m happy to see that my continuous reviewing has paid off. I was made yesterday an Elite Squd Member of the Brussels community. I mainly stick to my field of expertise: food.

I love food, I love eating, I love watching my nutrition. As a lad from Parma (yes, one the world capitals of some of the most recognized foods in the world) I’m happy about the improvement that Brussels has displayed over the past few years in terms of food services, making in Forbes Top 10 Cities for Street Food.

Belgium is not a well-know and recognized place for its cuisine. Undeniably, Brussels is standing out lately. Possibly the huge inward immigration fluxes from all over the world have helped raising standards, variety and food culture. I am loving this trend.

Introducing @marcoRecorder, a fresh #YelpElite 2015. Who else is Yelping the #eurobubble? 😉 pic.twitter.com/RRUtLHABrv

— YelpBrussels (@YelpBrussels) January 14, 2015

 

Check out my Yelp profile and follow Yelp Brussels on Twitter.

@YelpBrussels