for other uses see yelp disambiguation . it has been suggested that yelp reservations be merged into this article . discuss proposed since october 2016 . yelp inc. type public company traded as nyse yelp founded october 2004 ; 12 years ago 2004 10 headquarters san francisco california united states key people jeremy stoppelman co founder & ceo russel simmons co founder jed nachman coo industry local search business ratings and reviews online food delivery products online advertising revenue us 550 million 2015 1 employees 4 050 july 14 2016 2 slogan s we know just the place website www.yelp.com native client s on ios android windows yelp is an american multinational corporation headquartered in san francisco california . it develops hosts and markets yelp.com and the yelp mobile app which publish crowd sourced reviews about local businesses as well as the online reservation service yelp reservations and online food delivery service eat24 . the company also trains small businesses in how to respond to reviews hosts social events for reviewers and provides data about businesses including health inspection scores . yelp was founded in 2004 by former paypal employees russel simmons and jeremy stoppelman . yelp grew quickly and raised several rounds of funding . by 2010 it had 30 million in revenues and the website had published more than 4.5 million crowd sourced reviews . from 2009 to 2012 yelp expanded throughout europe and asia . in 2009 it entered several negotiations with google for a potential acquisition . yelp became a public company in march 2012 and became profitable for the first time two years later . as of 2016 yelp.com has 135 million monthly visitors and 95 million reviews . the company s revenues come from businesses advertising . according to businessweek yelp has a complicated relationship with small businesses . 3 criticism of yelp focuses on the legitimacy of reviews public statements of yelp manipulating and blocking reviews in order to increase ad spending as well as concerns regarding the privacy of reviewers . contents 1 company history 1.1 origins 2004 2009 1.2 private company 2009 2011 1.3 public entity 2011 present 2 features 2.1 features for businesses 3 relationship with businesses 3.1 astroturfing 3.2 alleged manipulation by yelp 4 community 5 see also 6 references 7 external links company history edit origins 2004 2009 edit jeremy stoppelman co founder and ceo of yelp two former paypal employees jeremy stoppelman and russel simmons founded yelp at a business incubator mrl ventures in 2004 . 4 5 stoppelman and simmons conceived the initial idea for yelp as an email based referral network after stoppelman caught the flu 6 and had a difficult time finding an online recommendation for a local doctor . 5 7 8 the co founders former colleague from paypal and founder of mrl ventures max levchin provided 1 million in initial funding . 5 mrl co founder david galbraith who instigated the local services project based on user reviews came up with the name yelp . 9 according to fortune magazine yelp s initial email based system was convoluted . 5 the idea was rejected by investors and did not attract users beyond the cofounders friends and family . 10 usage data showed that users were not answering requests for referrals but were using the real reviews feature which allowed them to write reviews unsolicited . 5 according to the san francisco chronicle the site s popularity soared after it was re designed in late 2005 . 11 yelp raised 5 million in funding in 2005 from bessemer ventures and 10 million in november 2006 from benchmark capital . 5 the number of reviewers on the site grew from 12 000 in 2005 to 100 000 in 2006 . 10 by the summer of 2006 the site had one million monthly visitors . 10 it raised 15 million in funding from dag ventures in february 2008 . 12 13 in 2010 elevation partners invested 100 million ; 75 million was spent on purchasing equity from employees and investors while 25 million was invested in sales staff and expansion . 14 yelp grew from six million monthly visitors in 2007 to 16.5 million in 2008 and from 12 to 24 cities during the same time period . by 2009 the site had 4.5 million reviews . 15 by 2010 yelp s revenues were estimated to be 30 million and it employed 300 people . 10 private company 2009 2011 edit yelp introduced a site for the united kingdom in january 2009 16 and one for canada that august . 15 the first non english yelp site was introduced in france in 2010 ; users had the option to read and write content in french or english . 17 from 2010 to 2011 yelp launched several more sites in austria germany spain and the netherlands . international website traffic doubled during the same time period . 18 an australian website went live in november 2011 . 4 it was supported through a partnership with telstra which provided one million initial business listings 19 and was initially glitchy . 20 yelp had a presence in 20 countries by the end of 2012 including turkey 21 and denmark . 22 yelp s first site in asia was introduced in september 2012 in singapore 6 which was followed by japan in 2014 . 23 in december 2009 google entered into negotiations with yelp to acquire the company 24 25 but the two parties failed to reach an agreement . 26 27 according to the new york times google offered more than 500 million but the deal fell through after yahoo offered 1 billion . 28 tech crunch reported that google refused to match yahoo s offer . both offers were later abandoned following a disagreement between yelp s management and board of directors about the offers . 29 in june 2015 yelp published a study alleging google was altering search results to benefit its own online services . 30 31 yelp began a service called yelp deals in april 2011 32 but by august it cut back on deals due to increased competition and market saturation . 33 that september the federal trade commission investigated yelp s allegations that google was using yelp web content without authorization and that google s search engine algorithms favored google places over similar services provided by yelp . 34 35 in a january 2014 agreement google was not subject to anti trust litigation from the ftc but did have to allow services like yelp the ability to opt out of having their data scraped and used on google s websites . 36 public entity 2011 present edit the 140 new montgomery building in san francisco home of yelp s headquarters in november 2011 yelp filed for an initial public offering ipo with the securities exchange commission . 37 38 on march 2 2012 the company s stock began public trading on the new york stock exchange at a share price of 15 valuing the company at 898 million . 39 40 in 2012 yelp agreed to acquire its largest european rival qype for 50 million . 6 the following year ceo jeremy stoppelman reduced his salary to 1 . 41 yelp acquired the start up online reservation company seatme for 12.7 million in cash and company stock in 2013 . 42 yelp s second quarter 2013 revenue of 55 million exceeded expectations but the company was not yet profitable . 43 in 2012 13 yelp moved into its new corporate headquarters occupying nearly 150 000 square feet on 12 floors of 140 new montgomery the former pacbell building in san francisco . 44 the company was profitable for the first time in the second quarter of 2014 as a result of increasing ad spending by business owners and possibly from changes in google s local search algorithm . 45 it is dubbed as google pigeon which helped authoritative local directory sites like yelp and tripadvisor in getting more visibility . 46 over the course of the year yelp websites were launched in mexico japan and argentina . 47 also in 2014 yelp expanded in europe through the acquisitions of german based restaurant review site restaurant kritik and french based cityvox . 48 49 in early february 2015 yelp announced it was buying eat24 an online food ordering service for 134 million . 50 51 in late 2015 a public services & government section was introduced to yelp and the general services administration began encouraging government agencies to create and monitor official government pages . 52 for example the transportation security administration created official tsa yelp pages . 53 54 later that year yelp began experimenting in san francisco with consumer alerts that were added to pages about restaurants with poor hygiene scores in government inspections . 55 research conducted by the boston children s hospital found that yelp reviews with keywords associated with food poisoning correlates strongly with poor hygiene at the restaurant . researchers at columbia university used data from yelp to identify three previously unreported restaurant related food poisoning outbreaks . 56 in 2016 yelp invested in nowait an app that allows users to see how long they would have to wait at a restaurant that does not accept reservations as well as put their names on the waitlist without being physically present at a restaurant . when their table is ready users get a text message . customers can also text back to say they re running late and restaurants can decide whether or not to hold the table for them . 57 features edit yelp.com web address www.yelp.com slogan we know just the place 58 commercial yes type of site local online reviews registration optional available in 15 languages 59 users 142 million unique visitors per month written in python java and a custom framework owner yelp inc. launched 2004 alexa rank 158 global 31 in the united states august 2016 update 60 current status online yelp s website yelp.com is a crowd sourced local business review and social networking site . 5 its user community is primarily active in major metropolitan areas . 10 the site has pages devoted to individual locations such as restaurants or schools where yelp users can submit a review on their products or services 61 using a one to five star rating system . 10 businesses can also update contact information hours and other basic listing information or add special deals . 10 15 in addition to writing reviews users can react to reviews plan events or discuss their personal lives . 5 according to sterling market intelligence yelp is one of the most important sites on the internet . 22 as of q2 2016 it has 168 million monthly unique visitors and 108 million reviews . 62 78 percent of businesses listed on the site have a rating of three stars or better 63 but some negative reviews are very personal or extreme . 10 many reviews are written in an entertaining or creative manner . 11 users can give a review a thumbs up if it is useful funny or cool . 64 each day a review of the day is determined based on a vote by users . 65 as of june 2016 72 percent of yelp searches are done from a mobile device . 63 the yelp iphone app was introduced in december 2008 . 66 in august 2009 yelp released an update to the iphone app with a hidden easter egg augmented reality feature called monocle which allowed users looking through their iphone camera to see yelp data on businesses seen through the camera . 67 check in features were added in 2010 . 68 69 yelp users can make restaurant reservations in yelp through yelp reservations a feature originally added in june 2010 . 70 71 yelp s reservation features were initially done through a 2010 partnership with opentable 72 but yelp became increasingly competitive with