I probably wouldn’t have posted a review about one bad experience, especially when it’s a place that has been consistently good previously. I’d give them at least one more shot at winning back my loyalty. I figure most places can have a really off night.
StG
I’d like to know how any malicious postings are scrutinized. We’re talking about the livelihood of small business here.
The average Joe is not a connoisseur of fine foods and doesn’t have the credibility to be a back-seat restaurant critic.
Pretty simple.
I’d put the emails on the review. I hate hate HATE when people throw their religion in things where it doesn’t matter. I wouldn’t care if they’re Christian or worshiped rocks, their costumer service sucks and their emails are unprofessional.
I’d want to know if a place was like so I could avoid them.
You think that’s weird, there are other people who actually do multiple posts about those people doing multiple reviews of one place. Weird as it may sound, they have the time and patience and actually care to do that.
If it lives or dies on the basis of one yelp review, we’re better off without it. This is the invisible hand of the market, man! Capitalism and all that jazz.
I hear ya.
ETA: In response to** Left Hand of Dorkness**.
Really? People who eat food aren’t qualified to say in public their opinions on restaurants in an organized forum specifically for the purpose of sharing experiences with other diners?
Or is it that small businesses should be protected against their own shitty service and/or products being advertised so that other people can avoid them? As a person who does not even use the service being discussed, maybe you can tell us more about the myriad libelous postings ruining the dreams of small business owners everywhere.
“small business” isn’t a saintly title that entitles one to treat customers poorly. Yes, I understand it’s difficult to start and run your own business, but that doesn’t excuse you from screwing up. And as Diosa said in the OP, it’s not like the place was packed (which would IMO entitle them to extra consideration on time,) there was one occupied table. So yeah, saying a carryout order will take 15 minutes then not having it ready in 35 minutes, all the while ignoring the customer who is there to pick up the order is a major fuck-up. Small business or otherwise.
Oh please. Diosa’s not excoriating the place because her falafel smoothie was slightly less crunchy than she would have liked.
I don’t know. I really don’t know.
Am I wrong to be concerned that legitimate businesses might me harmed by malicious posts from competitors?
Am I wrong to assume that people who’ve had one bad experience might harm the reputation of an otherwise fine establishment by posting something publicly?
If I owned a restaurant and was doing everything I could think of to provide a decent dining experience for my customers, and then saw an unfair attack on Yelp or any other of the multitude of review sites, what would be my recourse?
How would you react if it was your restaurant?
Here’s a neat idea. Go find out! You’re the one who cares, so get off your duff and do the work!
This in no way excuses the restaurant, but could help explain their crazy treatment of you.
You would not believe how different ideas of customer service can be in different cultures, I mean in some places they literally act like you should thank the heavens above they allowed you the pleasure of walking into their greasy spoon, makes the soup nazi look tame.
Its very, very hard to break the habit.
Things I learned in this thread:
People shouldn’t post their thoughts or opinions online, especially multiple times about the same topic (unless of course they are named leaffan and are posting on SMDB).
People who go out and eat at restaurants have no business talking about their experience at that restaurant. (I guess leaffan has never talked to his friends about places that are good to eat)
Restaurants who treat their customers like crap, yell at them, send them threatening emails and the like are just “giving it a go” and deserve to succeed.
Knowledge is power!
If you’ve got one bad post and 100 good ones, chances are you’re going to be fine.
Well, customers complaining about their experiences is something all restaurant owners have to deal with. Yelp has been around for a while now. Somehow restaurants have managed to survive.
Seriously though, do you have these same qualms about any other site that allows customers to post reviews about products or experiences?
"I was very sorry to read about [username]'s experience at [restaurant name]. We strive to maintain a pleasant experience for our guests and unsatisfactory service is not acceptable. Feel free to call [phone number]. email [restaurant email] or stop by and let us know of any concerns, suggestions or experiences you wish to share. "
Or whatever polite managerspeak you can grind out yourself. What is your recourse? What kind of question is that? What if a tagger spraypaints the wall across from your restaurant with, “Leaffan licks his fingers and then sticks them in the food,”? Should all walls and spraypaint be banned in case someone writes something libelous? What if Mrs. Johnson tells Mrs. Harris that she got a terrible case of indigestion after eating Leaffan’s 4 Star Chili when you know darn well she won’t admit to a celery seed allergy? Should talking be banned? I think you’re getting a little bit shrill about a rather innocuous thing.
Sigh.
It’s been a long day and I accept your responses.
Hey, I felt compassion for the restaurant owner and didn’t think one bad experience needed to be shared with the world.
What do I know?
Carry on.
When I read the title my immediate reaction was to go to the press, but this is much more mild than other review harassment stories I’ve seen. So I’d just let it go.
I think it’s pretty common now for business owners to contact people who post bad reviews on Yelp, in this case they just didn’t do it very well. They should have offered you a strong sorry and a free meal.
Whatever, not everyone is good at running a business, let it go.
For one, you can look at the posters history. If all they ever do is post glowing reviews for Kung Pow Hut and trash Dim Sum Stop, it will be fairly obvious. When you see a review from someone that has posted for a variety of businesses in their area and isn’t all love love love or hate hate hate, it is safe to assume they are for real and not a shill or a nut job.
I had a sort-of similar strange thing happen to me with another review site (Urbanspoon), except I wasn’t even the person who left the review. When I first got my iPod Touch, I downloaded the Urbanspoon app. I signed on to the site using Facebook rather than just creating an account. When looking up restaurants in my neighborhood, I noticed that it still listed a pizza place that had closed, and did not list the Chinese place that had taken its place. So, through the app, I told Urbanspoon that the pizza place was closed, and that the Chinese place was open. When the Chinese place was put on the Urbanspoon site, I did not leave a full review, but I clicked that I liked the restaurant (Urbanspoon lets you click “like” or “don’t like” for each restaurant, and you have the option to leave a review as well.)
What I did not know was that Urbanspoon would credit me with having added this Chinese restaurant to their site. Since I signed in with Facebook, this meant that my full real-life name was there on the site. I did notice this later, but I wasn’t extremely concerned about it at the time.
Fast-forward several years later. The Chinese place got new management, and the quality of the food changed. IMO, some things were better, and some things were worse. Someone (not me) posted a bad review.
Around this time, I got repeated friend requests on Facebook from a person with a Chinese last name who had no picture and whose name I did not recognize. A click-through to the profile revealed that this person was a student at the local middle school. I clicked “ignore” a few times, and then after a couple requests, Facebook finally gave me the option to click “I don’t know this person.” I didn’t really think anything of it at the time.
Well, months later, I was looking at private messages on Facebook, and there was a message from this kid that apparently I did not notice at the time it was sent (Facebook, in one of their gazillion changes, now puts messages from non-friends in a separate inbox). It said, “Cancel my comments and everything else for the [Blank] chinese restaurant you did not get the my permission to create a account for [Blank] SENT ME BACK A MESSAGE TO MY EMAIL AT [email address].”
It took me a while to even figure out what this kid was talking about! But, there it was, my real name on Urbanspoon as the person who added the restaurant, which you would think they would appreciate, but I guess not in this case. The person who posted the bad review, of course, used an alias.
I considered removing my Urbanspoon account entirely, because I felt a bit “stalked”, but I eventually contacted them to change my account to have an alias, which is now what appears on the restaurant Urbanspoon listing. (It looks like, from their FAQ, that their policy is to not remove listings even if the restauranteur himself asks, so, really, there’s nothing I could have done for the kid even if I had wanted to.) Thankfully, there has been no further contact between me and the Chinese kid, so all is well, I suppose.
I am now more careful about linking things to Facebook, though.
Did you say anything to her when she came out? It sounds like they dropped the ball but I’d try to at least ask where my food was before leaving.