# Yelp

Yelp is an Internet Services based in San Francisco, United States.

## Overview

- **Organization type:** Internet Services
- **Headquarters:** San Francisco, United States
- **Region:** North America
- **Address:** San Francisco, CA, United States
- **Founded:** 2004
- **Assets under management:** Undisclosed
- **Website:** yelp.com
- **LinkedIn:** https://www.linkedin.com/company/yelp-com

## Regulatory record

- **Reports private funds:** No

## About

Yelp is a platform that connects consumers with local businesses. It allows users to find and review local services and businesses, including restaurants and salons. Yelp was founded in 2004 and is based in San Francisco, California.

## Sectors

- Media & Entertainment
- Enterprise Software

## People

- Jeremy Stoppelman — Chief Executive Officer

## Questions

### How does Yelp generate revenue?

Yelp's primary revenue stream is performance-based advertising sold to local businesses, which includes enhanced profile placement, CPC search ads, and request-a-quote tools. The company also earns subscription income from Yelp Guest Manager (restaurant front-of-house software) and from Yelp Audiences, a programmatic advertising product that targets users off-platform using Yelp's first-party data. Advertising accounted for nearly all of the company's $1.34 billion in 2023 revenue (per the firm's official communications).

### What is Yelp's review integrity system and how does it affect the platform?

Yelp uses an automated recommendation engine to classify reviews as recommended or not recommended. The system suppresses roughly 20% of submitted reviews that it determines to be solicited, biased, or unhelpful based on user behavior signals and content analysis. This filtering is central to Yelp's value proposition to consumers — it trades review volume for perceived reliability — and has been a persistent source of friction with business owners who see positive reviews filtered.

### Who controls Yelp's voting power?

Jeremy Stoppelman, Yelp's co-founder and CEO, holds majority voting control through a dual-class share structure even though he owns a minority economic stake. This arrangement has allowed him to resist activist pressure, most recently in early 2024 when TCS Capital Management called for a sale or strategic combination (per Reuters, January 2024). Stoppelman's control has made external acquisition attempts unlikely without his support.

### What is Yelp's relationship with larger platform ecosystems?

Yelp provides business data — reviews, photos, hours, and menus — to third-party platforms including Apple Maps. It competes directly with Google's local search and reviews product. Yelp has been a vocal antitrust critic of Google, alleging that Google prioritizes its own local-business content in search results to the detriment of Yelp's organic traffic and ad business.

### How large is Yelp's review corpus and user base?

By the end of 2023, Yelp had accumulated over 280 million user-generated reviews across millions of business listings, primarily in the United States. The company reports roughly 80 million unique monthly visitors across its desktop and mobile platforms. Reviews are contributed entirely by users — Yelp does not pay for or acquire review content.

### Has Yelp been a target of activism, and what was the outcome?

In January 2024, TCS Capital Management, which held over 4% of Yelp's shares, sent a public letter urging the board to explore strategic options including a sale (per Reuters, January 2024). TCS argued the company was undervalued in the public market. Stoppelman and the board resisted, citing the dual-class voting structure that concentrates control with the CEO. No sale resulted from the campaign.

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Last updated: 2026-06-03T20:00:00.000Z

Canonical page: https://altss.com/profile/yelp

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