I responded twice and it said "response cannot be blank." And wiped everything off.

Short version is you cannot review Yelp or the BBB. I wonder why???
Best

Miriam, 
This is why Moz is still worlds apart from so many online organizations whether SEO, SEM, directories, SaaS, Etc. Honesty. Frankly, I would not care if Yelp showed some favoritism to their paying clients: Just let me know you will occasionally work with a paying client to ameliorate a bad situation. (Yes, even keep it a bit obtuse. Then at least it is no harm no foul...somewhat.) If more companies would understand that you selling a trillion in whatever does not always have to be negatively affected by doing the right thing.

At some point we all must ask ourselves as business people: What are we going to stand for. To this day, I give Rand and the Moz crew huge credit for all they did to get their beliefs out early and to stand by them when it was surely not expedient. Just be nice.

Thanks,

Hello Miriam,

Thanks for posting the "We is soooo Good" blurb from Yelp. I hesitated to do so. The issue with overstating is it comes off as less than genuine and Yelp way overstates. I know that when there are review issues that are pointed out, you can talk with your rep, show them a problem, and they in some way deal with it. It is disingenuous for Yelp to say there is zero relationship between Yelp Sales and other departments.

1. Agreed on the close manual management. The issue is it is a ___ management firm. (Left blank as I prefer not to identify them here as I am in ongoing talks on a major issue and at this time there has been positive change so far on that side.) They have changed some management, but that should not allow you to carte blanche say: "We got rid of the bad actors and the new team are all well dressed. Take down bad reviews." Obviously, Yelp would have no way of knowing the new "team" will be any different. Also, if that works for one, it should be done for anyone with a bad review.

2. On this, you know that I would not cut and paste. I did make multiple negative reviews, but all were different. Given they are the same complaint, one could say spun, but they were spun by me in a way that was, IMO, legit. The one thing here is they could say that the ones where I am not located are not reasonable and I would say OK. But, they should have the courage to tell their Reviewers, members, etc. that we took this down for this reason. Or, with someone who posts reviews and assists their property in doing so, at least realize that if you posted 50 plus reviews with all types of stars, good bad and mediocre, etc. that it is unlikely you have now become a review spammer.

I will share whatever I receive from Yelp, but I am not holding out any hope they will even respond. On other much less problematic issues, I have emailed, used contact form, etc. and failed to get even a response.

Thanks Miriam,

Best

With yelp, when you sign into your account you can access any review or update you have ever posted. I checked and prior to my "unhappy" review I had posted at least a dozen times in the previous 4 months. So, not a piker.

So instead of having, say 34 reviews, I have 33 and the unhappy no longer exists. Not even a note that says, we removed due to _______. Just hey, let's take it down, he can go pound sand. After all..."You Cannot Pay To Have Reviews Fixed or Removed from Yelp!"

Whatev.

Actually, there are instances where Yelp does work for the business in a positive way: As a respected citation source, for Restaurants (especially new ones) it can be invaluable, etc. It is just when you start no longer being truthful people will lose faith. Frankly, right now, because someone took some action, I was going to amend the review and that is how I discovered it had been removed. Go figure....

Again, I really do appreciate your input. The LA Times article is really more about  businesses who complain about reviews being incorrect and somewhat about the "you cant pay to have reviews removed." comment they try to repeat to a point of it becoming true. I agree, it will not. 
I do think there is a possibility since I placed it on the business in multiple locations they could have flagged it, but on the locations outside of where it occurred, I noted this occurred at other location and named it and stated that I was putting this on the non service location as a public service. 
So, one would think it would be reasonable (or at least within reason) to remove from locations of a national business that were not involved. Unfortunately, in some, they are allowing truly asinine "positive" reviews. I know the HQ location of the firm hired someone to handle the gazillion complaints and she is living on Yelp. Go figure.

I wrote yelp and told them I want an explanation. I am a Yelp semi regular and had posted a glowing review about a restaurant within a week of the negative about a "management firm." I have over 30 reviews, well written, several hundred words on many over 2 years. My thinking is that should give a reasonable signal. But, we shall see. I am truly bugged given people had written about them removing bad reviews from this company and then, boom, they remove mine.

Thanks,

Prestashop,

While I appreciate the response, I never find name calling or creating derogative terms for people, companies, etc. to provide the clarity that we all need. (Calling them scummy or saying they should be damaged -sued- doesn't help things.)

I have clients who do have success with them and in most instances, when there has been an issue, I have found them to be mid range helpful. Certainly, if there is an erroneous review about a client company and you have the proof, they have removed them. My concern came when I was investigating an issue of my own and saw several people complaining about their reviews being removed.

I have been a regular Yelp contributor for a while and had a very serious $30K issue with the company who I was going to review. After I posted the review in several of their locations, the company began trying to resolve the issue for the first time. (It is still not fully resolved at all.) But, I just found Yelp had removed the bad reviews and I am positive they are valid as I wrote them and have the proof to all I wrote. But, just like the customers without my resources to fight back, my reviews were removed too.

I have written Yelp and requested a response from them. I am simply wanting to know if others have experienced the same or similar.

Thanks

Since we all work with Yelp on a local basis, I believe many are aware that if a review is placed by a non customer about a company, Yelp will typically remove them if you show that it isn't valid, etc. We all know they made a show of outing those who posted fake reviews as well. Here is a question I have though: Have any of you been aware of Yelp taking down valid negative reviews for companies?

I have just run into this and find it somewhat perplexing. If you know of this, I would love to hear how it happens? Thanks,