Strategy question
How should Yelp get the business owners to claim their businesses?
- Yelp
- Strategy
- Medium
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What this question tests
Tests growth strategy for the supply side of a local marketplace, identifying why business owners don't claim listings and how to remove that friction.
How to approach it
- Clarify the goal: raise the claim rate broadly, or target high-value unclaimed businesses (popular but unmanaged listings) first.
- Identify why owners don't claim: they don't know the listing exists, don't see the value, or find the claim process itself confusing.
- Segment unclaimed businesses by review volume and traffic, since high-traffic unclaimed listings are the highest-value targets.
- Propose direct outreach (email or mail) to owners of high-traffic unclaimed listings, showing them their existing review activity as proof of value.
- Simplify the claim flow itself: fewer verification steps, with a fast phone or postcard verification option.
- Define success as claim rate among high-traffic unclaimed listings and time from outreach to claim completion.
What a strong answer includes
- Prioritizes high-traffic unclaimed businesses instead of treating every unclaimed listing equally.
- Uses existing review activity as the value proof point in outreach, which is concrete and specific to Yelp's data.
- Uses illustrative numbers as assumptions: assume 40% of local businesses remain unclaimed, with the top 10% by traffic worth targeting first.
- Separates the awareness problem (owners don't know) from the friction problem (claiming is hard), proposing a distinct fix for each.
Common mistakes
- Treating all unclaimed businesses as equal priority instead of targeting by traffic or review volume.
- Assuming the only barrier is awareness and ignoring claim-flow friction.
- Not defining a way to measure outreach effectiveness.
Likely follow-up questions
- How would you verify a business owner without slowing down the claim process?
- What would you offer as an incentive to claim?
- How would you measure the ROI of an outreach campaign?
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Learn the skill behind it
Chapters of the AI PM course that teach what this question tests.
- Chapter 4: Discovery and strategy for AI products
- Chapter 9: Prove it paid off: outcomes, economics, and pricing
- Chapter 14: Get the job: the AI PM interview loop