A brief introduction to Qype
According to their "About Us" Qype was founded in 2005 and has grown to become the largest user-generated local review site in Europe, with several million unique users a month.
It covers over 6000 cities across Europe and is the brainchild of Stephan Uhrenbacher from Germany.
Qype has grown so fast because it is based on the premise that people make their decisions from others' experiences - particularly if those experiences are produced as reviews and aggregated. Which is true.
Qype has a mobile version like rival Yelp but whereas you would be hard-pushed to find a review outside of London on Yelp, Qype seems to have reviews available everywhere.
Users are able to upload photos of what they are reviewing such as a restaurant, cinema or pub and it links nicely with Google Maps. It's also possible for users with an iphone to do this from their mobile.
Being available for mobile makes the site very useful if you're out and about and need a good restaurant for a client or other local service.
Qype isn't just a user-generated review site, it also provides business listings, so that, even if your business hasn't received any reviews it can still feature in a search query.
Overall Yelp makes a better job of the features available to both, (the google map integration plots a set of results and also shows which is the easiest to get to from your current position).
However, Yelp really is poor outside of London, so whilst Qype will give you reviews and listings for recruitment agencies in Torridge for example, Yelp currently may draw a blank.
Sites like Qype will grow in importance to Social Media Marketing in the coming years as users find their mobile phones to be the indispensible information resource on the go, (they do already don't they?).
When a consumer needs to make a quick decision, if your business is competing in a tough market against local rivals, the competitive edge will go to the business that manages what is being said about it good or bad and where.
