“There have been a small number of businesses that don’t want to be on Yelp because they don’t want to see the reviews that people leave on them,” Sollitto added. “While some businesses may not want the spotlight shown on their customer relations, consumers have that right. I understand that some businesses wish that there weren’t conversations about them, but that’s not reality and that’s not the law.”
He also disputed that Yelp had been harassing Botto Bistro.
“I went back and checked the log, and we have called his business once in the last two and a half years—June 2013,” Sollitto said.
Later, Sollitto e-mailed to clarify:
“Looking back at our records, it shows that our Sales team called his business on average a little more than once a week, for a few months in 2012, before his business purchased search advertising in June of 2012,” he wrote. “We have called his business one time since then, on April 17, 2014.”
“Many of those phone calls appear to have lasted long enough to have had an engaged conversation, including give and take on the ad product offered. These conversations presumably encouraged our rep to believe that the owner was open to considering purchasing advertising, which was borne out when he did so in June.”
“If the business owner did not wish to be called ever again, all he had to do was ask not to be called again and he would have been placed on our ‘Do Not Call’ list. If he said he was not interested ‘at this time, maybe later’ then our rep would very likely call again later at another time.”
Clearly, that message was never communicated to Davide Cerretini. For his part, he feels that now that there are several hundred one-star reviews on his Yelp page, the point has been made.
“Honestly, I’m not expecting anything,” he said. “Apparently they don’t have to explain to me and now there are lots of people waiting to hear why they removed their review. We went way beyond far of our expectation. Our place now has all the attention of the planet, what else can I ask for? Thank you Yelp for whatever you do in the future and whatever you did in the past.”
After our interview, they recommended that I order a house special, the peppered venison sausage pasta. It was so terrible with its unique balance of flavor, texture and deliciousness, I gave it a one-star review.