Will AI-Powered Search + Short-Form Videos + Satisfaction Guarantee = Big Things For Yelp?

Yelp is making some “significant” changes. Three to be specific.

The local business review site said it is now using artificial intelligence (AI) and large language models (LLM) to improve search results for its community members.

Short-form videos will help to further bring user reviews to life.

Yelp Guaranteed is a new satisfaction guarantee provided by the service when its users hire a local professionals through the site.

“We’re always innovating on ways for consumers and businesses to connect in more seamless and meaningful ways,” said Craig Saldanha, chief product officer at Yelp, in a press release. “Millions of people rely on Yelp to make important spending decisions with local businesses, and their trust is at the center of everything we do. With the new updates we’re announcing today, we want to help consumers more easily discover businesses that meet their needs in a way that is both precise and personal, as well as give our users more engaging ways to share their experiences with the community.”

Mr. Saldanha, on a company blog, writes that Yelp has been using AI  for years to recommend dishes, organize photos and automate content moderation. Advancements in LLMs will make it easier for users to receive more relevant responses to their searches.

Features include improved keyword searches with LLMs better able “to understand the nuance  of what consumers are looking for, and highlight relevant snippets from reviews under each business listing in search results.”

Mr. Saldanha said the speed and scale at which LLMs are able to parse data makes it the right tech to find more accurate results from the more than 265 million reviews on the site.

Yelp is also introducing a “Surprise Me” feature to help members generate restaurant recommendations from the site’s home feed or on the search results page. This is currently available on iOS devices with plans for Android in the coming months.

The site is now enabling users to add short-form videos, up to 12-seconds in length, to provide added visual context to reviews. Yelp has added new reaction buttons to provide feedback to users writing reviews.

Yelp is also introducing Yelp Guaranteed. As its name implies, Yelp Guaranteed is a new satisfaction guarantee from Yelp when its users hire eligible home service professionals through its “Request a Quote” service. Yelp will pay up  to $2,500 back to members if something goes wrong with the project going through its quote program.