Yelp was founded in 2004, making it 10 years old this year. In the decade since being founded, Yelp users have contributed over 57 million local reviews to the site.
Today, Yelp announced that they will be giving everyone a look at ten years worth of review content with a new tool called Yelp Trends.
From food trends to popular slang to short-lived beauty fads (Brazilian blowout anyone?), Yelp Trends searches through words used in Yelp reviews to show you what’s hot and reveals the trend-setting cities that kicked it all off.
The wealth of data availabile in Yelp Trends is made possible by surfacing the information about consumer trends and behavior shared in user contributed reviews.
In the announcement of this new tool, Yelp emphasizes how it can be used to assess the popularity of certain trends in particular cities:
For example, are San Franciscans still sipping PBR or craving craft beer? Is the CrossFit fad still going strong or losing steam? Are Londoners loving bob hairstyles or feeling more fringe (that’s bangs, for you Americans) these days?
While it could be fun to play around with Yelp Trends the way they suggest, I believe there’s a lot more value in how it can be used by SEOs and search marketers.
Using Yelp Trends you can explore what your local market is loving right now, find out what trends are on the decline, and use the data to determine what the next big trend will be in your city.
Yelp Trends offers search capabilities in 98 cities throughout 20 countries around the world, you can check out the new tool right here.
