Yelp Me Yelp You

Great for reviews, gold for research.

Where else can you find such timely, honest and accurate insight into the user experience?

Where else can you gain such an intimate perspective about what really happens in a store, at a home or on a job site?

Recommendation websites are veritable smorgasbords for cutting straight to the heart of the many problems customers are waking up with every morning.

I just read two pages of angry reviews from customers of a landscaping company. Fascinating stuff. One woman said she sent five emails and still couldn’t get through to schedule an estimator to come to her house.

That’s huge.

Once we have those problems, the real work can begin. By defining the problems, we’re forcing our brains to flex the muscle that solves them. We’re unlocking our ability to think without thinking.

It’s just how we’re wired. Humans can’t think about problems without thinking about solutions.

Which means, we’re free to solve the problems clients can’t see past.

We can spend two hours on a review website blowing our own minds.

Because we’re not encumbered by the day to day things that create those problems in the first place.

If I was trying to approach that industry as an innovator or supplier or consultant or vendor, that’s where I would start.