Lou MC Yelps a Lot

This was my first time to host a Chinatown Crawl event within 24 hours and away from home. It only took me 20 minutes to plan an improv event and post it on Facebook . During my vacation to San Jose Bay Area last August, family members got interested with my food crawl style meetup in Houston. But there is no way for them to experience it. So, I decided to host a Chinatown Crawl in San Jose to give them a firsthand experience. It also gave me an opportunity to test this concept. After the successful Asian Heritage Celebration @ North Golden Sun Plaza  being outside of Chinatown, I knew this would be a breeze. First, I asked my nieces and family friends where they would like to eat. I told them about my fond memories from a longest running crawl event - Year of the Dog UYE @ 75+85 ChinatownCrawl . My focus would be about BBQ and Hotpot in San Jose. Originally, we planned to crawl Silver Creek Market Place on Story Road. We can dine at Q Pot Korean BBQ & Hot Pot  ...

For those of you familiar with my #ChinatownCrawl UYE (Unofficial Yelp Event), there is a scenery change. You won't see my UYE on Yelp Event page at the beginning of my announcement. In a perfect world, my Yelper friends receive notification on the app when I create an event and interested in an event. But lately, I don't see any response after the UYE page sitting there for 2 weeks. I guess there are too many notifications on their app. You may not know this. It's very time consuming to use Yelp Event page to invite my Yelper Friends. On average, it takes about 2 to 3 hours to "share" my event to everyone lives in Houston from Event page. This share actually sends an email to their personal email address. But some people are invisible most of time or they don't check emails as often or get notified with incoming emails. Then, I have to use another method to get their attention - private message, compliments or check-in message. Other than that, they are ...

I'm addicted with #Yelfie. I wrote a blog last December about Take a Yelfie . Since then, there are so many good things happening. So, let's start with how to use it. First, you need Yelp app on iPhone or Android phone. Second, check in at a biz. Click on the rectangle on the upper left side. 4 easy steps on Android phone. Easy to use on iPhone as well. Third, point at an object what is a least 5 feet away and tap on the circle button on the bottom of screen. Fourth, take a selfie of you or something within 2 feet (flip the camera). Fifth, edit your Yelfie with the features available. see below. Feature  on  Android phone - move biz name & selfie photo Feature on iPhone - change font on biz name & move selfie photo. Finally, tap "check in" or the check mark. Your Yelfie will be shared to the destinations of your choice. Yelfie shared on Facebook from iPhone & Android phone. Yelfie shared on Twitter from iPhone (below) an...

All of the sudden, my Yelp friend list got so big. Wait, who the #%$* and that *#@$ from my Facebook are now my Yelp friends. Then, I went checking on my settings. Oh, no, I don't like this idea. I want this feature to be permanently un-checked. Not everyone on my Facebook with a Yelp account is Yelp active. In fact, my Yelp friends on Facebook is more active than those Facebook friends with Yelp account in general. I keep my Yelp friend list small is because the ease of sending invitations to my UYE's and other events. The current process is very time consuming, unless HQ changes the invitation style. I created a  step by step instruction on my blog . I guess HQ was responding to some people complained about they still having trouble to invite FB friends. Then, I noticed the request screen has changed. Below is a capture from desktop compared to the app, The request from Facebook appeared differently. I'm happy to get my control back.

I have a few Yelpers asked me how to link their Facebook friends to a Yelp account. I remember I set this up once long time ago. Try these steps: Go to a computer and log in to www.yelp.com Go to the upper right side of page and look for your avatar. Click on the vertical bar next to your photo on the upper-right side. Select Account Settings and you may need to login again. Click on  External Applications link. This is the only way to manage settings for Facebook and Twitter.