Handsome Logic

In a recent post, I outlined the basics of how to use reviews to leapfrog your competitors on Live.com. I also promised a post with some details on the network of trusted review sites that Live.com pulls from and how it ranks their trustworthiness.

Live.com does not publish their own reviews, but instead pulls snippets and star ratings from other review sites. Some of these sites are user-generated reviews, some are editorial reviews, some are both. Some will allow anonymous reviews and some will not.

Most importantly, the star ratings only transfer and count towards your review rating on Live.com for some of the sites.

These are the sites, as far as Live.com is concerned, where your site should be listed and reviewed.

Live.com pulls its review content from the following sites:

1. Citysearch.com
2. Yelp.com
3. Judysbook.com
4. Dine.com
5. Menupages.com
6. Frommer’s

Now, you can take that list and go ask everyone you know to start posting reviews on your behalf, but if you choose not to read the guide below you’ll be wasting a lot of time.

The sites in this list which allow anonymous reviews are, predictably, not trusted by Live.com. Therefore, the number of stars given to a business on these untrusted sites do not transfer to Live.com’s reviews pages — only a snippet of the review transfers. For whatever reason, star ratings from Frommers also do not transfer. The good news is that reviews from untrusted sites are not figured into the average star rating of a business.

Translation: If your business has three 5-star reviews from Live.com trusted sites and ten from untrusted sites where the stars don’t transfer, your rating average is calculated using only the three reviews from trusted sites.

1. Citysearch.com

Review Type: User & Editorial

Anonymous Reviews: No

Trusted Site: YES

Citysearch is a division of media monster IAC. They purchased local reviews startup Insider Pages back in March to use their reviews to compliment Citysearch’s offerings. It’s important to note, however, that posting a review on Insider Pages does not mean it will appear on Citysearch. Live.com does not draw from Insider Pages, so if getting reviews on Live.com is your goal, stick to Citysearch.

2. Yelp.com

Review Type: User Only

Anonymous Reviews: No

Trusted Site: YES

Yelp.com is one of the latest Web 2.0 darlings of local business reviews. Accounts and listings are free and stars given in reviews transfer their weight over to Live.com. Yelp has been a curse for some businesses though, who have found that the Yelp crowd is more prone to nit-picking and negativity than glowing endorsements. Remember that you and your SEO consultant are not the only people who are going to be posting reviews of your business on these sites.

3. Judy’s Book

Review Type: User Only

Anonymous Reviews: No

Trusted Site: YES

Judysbook.com has the lowest traffic of the sites in Live.com’s trusted reviews network, but this doesn’t make their reviews any less valuable. The site is not nearly as robust as Yelp.com or Citysearch, but their star ratings do transfer over to Live.com and are not as frequently utilized as their higher-trafficked competitors.

4. Dine.com

Review Type: User Only

Anonymous Reviews: Yes

Trusted Site: NO

Dine.com is a restaurant and eatery review site whose content is used by Live.com in the form of review snippets. The star ratings do not transfer, and therefore do not count towards the overall rating of a business on Live.com. Positive reviews, however, are still valuable both to Live.com searchers who read the snippets and to Dine.com visitors who read the full reviews.

5. MenuPages

Review Type: User Only

Anonymous Reviews:Yes

Trusted Site: NO

MenuPages is another restaurant review site and only accepts / publishes reviews of businesses in New York City. Due to their policy of allowing anonymous reviews, snippets transfer to Live.com but star ratings do not.

6. Frommers

Review Type: Editorial Only

Anonymous Reviews: No

Trusted Site: NO

Frommer’s is a well-known travel guide along the lines of Fodors and Lonely Planet. Their website publishes editorial reviews of local attractions for travelers, but star ratings do not transfer to Live.com. Not an issue, really, unless your spouse happens to work at Wiley Publishing or you manage to bribe an editor.

As you can probably imagine, restaurants and other dining establishments are the most commonly-reviewed business type. This has no bearing, however, on what local searchers will be looking for when using Live.com maps. Think about how many types of businesses you’ve asked for a referral to in the last year… Salons? Plumbers? Auto repair?

If you’ve made it this far down the post, I’d like to hear your opinion:

Do you think the added trust generated by the openness of local business review sites makes it worth the risk of negative reviews (from customers or devious competitors)?

Does the value of this added trust (as opposed to on-site testimonials controlled by the business owner) outweigh the risk?