The free Yelp page earns its keep. The ads did not.

The Yelp salespeople found my number through my own website, which I thought was funny for about a week. The rep was friendly and fast, and he asked me one question that landed. "What if people are searching for your business right now and finding your competitor?" I signed a three month advertising contract at $350 a month that same week. This post is what that thousand dollars bought, so you can keep yours.

So here's the thing. Yelp for Business is two products wearing one logo. The free business page is a listing with real traffic behind it, and it costs nothing. The paid ads are a machine I will never sign a contract for again, and my own math is the reason.

What it costs

1. The business page itself, $0. You claim it, fill in hours, photos, and services, and answer what customers write. This part is real and I tell every client to do it.
2. Yelp Ads, starting at $150 a month, about five dollars a day. That is the floor, and it is thin enough that you will learn almost nothing from it.
3. The upgrade package, about $180 a month, or both bundled around $270. Most businesses I found in my research spend between $300 and $1,500 a month.
4. Contracts. They push a full year. I talked mine down to three and I should have pushed harder.

Mine ran $350 a month for three months, $1,050 all in, softened by a $300 ad credit up front. Keep that number in your head for the next section.

What I got for the money

About ninety clicks across the run, and a good lead the first week, which is exactly how this hooks people. Then the targeting fell apart. Clicks turned into calls about things I have never done in my life. One man wanted his treadmill repaired. One woman wanted a logo redesigned by Friday for a hundred dollars. I build websites. I do not fix treadmills.

Three months, two leads worth the name, and my cost per real lead was north of five hundred dollars. The independent reviewer whose experiment I trust most ran almost the same test, three months near $325 a month, and landed a few dollars from where I did. His first month looked great too. Then it quit.

Here is the part I need you to hear. Their rule is written cancellation notice thirty days before the contract ends, or you roll into a month to month agreement. My reminder was set three days late. The phone calls that month were not fun, and the fee talk was worse. I got out. I have not paid Yelp a dollar since and I do not plan to.

One more complaint I hear from owners constantly, and I believe it. Yelp's software decides which reviews count. Owners call the filter a bouncer. A real customer leaves four stars and the bouncer files it under not recommended, while something uglier stays up. Yelp says the filter catches fakes, and sometimes it does. Sometimes it buries your best ones. There is no fix. You just have to know it is there.

The vending machine at the supply house

There is a vending machine at my plumbing supply house. Same fittings the hardware store stocks two blocks east, triple the price. It sells all day anyway, because it sits ten feet from the counter when you are on a deadline. Paid placement is that machine. The listing already exists for free, and Yelp is charging you for the ten feet. Some businesses get their money's worth out of those ten feet. Mine never did.

Who I would tell to test it anyway

LuAnn's place, my restaurant client, is the exception I will make out loud. People pick restaurants off Yelp, and the traffic there wants exactly what she sells. Some home services do fine too. If that is you, take their $300 test credit, set the lowest budget they allow, and judge it on phone calls, not clicks. Clicks are what they sell you. Calls are what pay you. And never sign a twelve month anything for a video on your profile.

What to do Monday

Search your business name on Yelp tonight. If the page is not claimed, claim it and fill in every box, hours, photos, services, and it costs you nothing but twenty minutes. That page gets traffic whether you ever pay Yelp or not. Be standing behind the counter when it does.