Qype

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Qype

logo
legal form GmbH
founding 2005
resolution 2013
Seat Hamburg , Germany
management Ian Brotherston
Number of employees approx. 70
Website qype.com

Qype [ kwaɪp ] was an online community whose primary content was user-generated, location-based reviews on a local basis. The name is derived from the slogan “Quality or Hype?”. Qype ​​was closed on October 30, 2013 and most of the content was transferred to the Yelp service, which has taken over the portal.

history

Qype ​​was founded by Stephan Uhrenbacher on November 1st, 2005 and initially only went online for German cities in summer 2006. Qype ​​GmbH was initially financed as a startup by the venture capitalists Advent and Partech . In March 2007 Qype received the “ Red Herring 100 Europe Award”. At the end there was Qype in 9 languages. The English version was the second language of Qype and started in June 2007. In January 2008, Qype started in France. Other versions existed in Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Polish, Dutch and Turkish. Qype ​​is also active in Ireland, Austria, Switzerland and Brazil. There was content for places in 166 countries. In August 2012, Qype was able to record over 2.8 million contributions to places worldwide, in Europe alone over 860,000 places were rated.

Founder Stephan Uhrenbacher left the operative business in 2009.

In March 2011, Qype took over the group discount website cooledeals.de and converted it to QypeDeals.de. On this page, users from city to city can buy different vouchers for services from various providers. You can directly view and submit the corresponding ratings.

Qype ​​followed the same concept as the website Yelp.com , which was founded in October 2004. In October 2012, the US market leader Yelp took over all shares in Qype. The purchase price was 50 million US dollars for the last two million reviews and 15 million visitors. With the acquisition, Yelp says it wants to expand its position in Germany and Great Britain in particular . In the course of the takeover, the group discount division QypeDeals will be discontinued.

In October 2013 it was announced that the Qype brand would be discontinued on October 30, 2013. Most of the existing ratings and data will be transferred to Yelp.

The platform was finally shut down on October 30, 2013 at 1:00 p.m. When you visit the website, you are automatically redirected to the Yelp homepage. This also happens when calling up business listings.

Functions

Registered members were able to rate businesses, places and services on Qype, for example restaurants, hotels, sights or even fitness studios and sports clubs. The entries included the address, opening times, telephone number, position on a map, a link to the website and other information. The entries were provided with personal ratings and recommendations - by users for users. The entries were rated with a text comment and up to five stars from 1 (not good) to 5 stars (excellent). Photos and videos could also be uploaded.

Qype ​​used a category system and displayed the best-rated bars, restaurants, fashion stores, car repair shops, etc. in a city in a ranking that was based on user ratings.

The community

Like comparable services, Qype had a system for displaying users' “online activities”. This was done in the form of medals that users could collect. Medals were awarded when the user wrote a certain number of contributions or rated them in certain categories. There was also a group function with forums so that users could exchange ideas with one another. Users could also send each other contact requests, write private messages, upload photos and publish their recommendations on Facebook and Twitter. If a user liked a rating particularly well, they could also give the author a virtual compliment. Users also had the option of saving their personal favorites and sharing them with other users, for example in the form of personal guides on specific topics or cities. It was also possible to "follow" places, that is, to be informed about updates on this place. Users were also able to find out about events in a city and create them themselves on Qype.

Mobile

For the iPhone as well as Android , Blackberry , Windows Phone and Nokia devices, there were free applications that could be used to display restaurants, banks or the like in the vicinity with the help of location services . This function was linked to Google Maps to make it easy to find the desired location. In addition, users could check in at the destination, see whether there are friends nearby, and submit reviews directly. The Qype app was voted Best Travel App 2009 for the iPhone by cnet UK .

Qype ​​was also included in the free offboard navigation software Nokia Maps from version 3.04. Since 2011, users of the BMW ConnectedDrive Service have also been able to access Qype via their navigation device.

B2B

Companies could also use the rating portal for advertising and marketing purposes. Qype ​​offered various options for this. On the one hand, companies could register for free with an entry on Qype. They could be assigned to the corresponding categories and thus present themselves online.

In addition, a wide range of display options were available for a “fee”. With the so-called Qype Premium Membership, companies were able to use numerous additional functions. Premium members were not only able to present their Qype presence in more detail (e.g. through video, logo and news upload), they were also more visible in the Qype community because they were the first to be displayed in the search results. In addition, companies could create individual Qype premium banners and thus start their own banner campaign.

statistics

In August 2008, the online research working group determined 0.89 million unique users per month and a slight increase in the number of users. Qype ​​was thus just ahead of offers such as Tagesspiegel.de (0.88 million unique users) or n24.de (0.86 million unique users).

The information community for determining the distribution of advertising media (IVW) counted almost 7.7 million visits and 18.8 million page views for Qype in October 2009. According to the old counting method, this was Qype's best result so far, which in October 2008 still achieved 4.2 million visits and 13.5 million page views. Since the introduction of the new IVW counting with effect in November 2009. Qype reached Europe, according to Google Analytics , although more than 17 million unique users per month, while the portal for the first eight months of 2010 was on average only 5.6 million unique visits per month due to a Show changes in the internal page structure and the new IVW count. For August 2010, Qype recorded approx. 7.2 million unique visits. In August 2012, Qype was used by 20 million unique users, according to Google Analytics, with a total of 25 million visits. The Qype app generated 4 million unique visitors alone. According to its own statement, the company broke even in November 2008.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ New CEO at Qype ( Memento of the original from June 7, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Qype blog from June 1, 2010, accessed June 29, 2010. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / de.blog.qype.com
  2. ↑ Stephan Uhrenbacher: Places, recommendations and contacts . qype
  3. ↑ crunchbase entry on qype
  4. ↑ herringevents.com ( Memento of the original from July 25, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.herringevents.com
  5. ↑ de.blog.qype.com ( Memento of the original from February 2, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / de.blog.qype.com
  6. ↑ de.blog.qype.com ( Memento of the original from August 17, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / de.blog.qype.com
  7. ↑ http://www.breakingtravelnews.com/news/article/qype-goes-dutch-to-expand-european-presence/
  8. ↑ http://www.gruenderszene.de/news/tamyca-box-napster-control4-qype-tuerkei
  9. ↑ a b Archived copy ( memento of the original from March 29, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.hamburg-media.net
  10. ↑ http://www.gruenderszene.de/news/grunderszene-today-uhrenbacher-avocadostore-cobocards-reduti-citydeal Gründerszene
  11. ↑ business-on.de
  12. ↑ kress.de
  13. ↑ http://www.deutsche-startups.de/?p=42557
  14. ↑ Yelp's European Counterpart Qype Continues Global Expansion .
  15. ↑ Ingrid Lunden: Yelp Pays $ 50M To Acquire Its Big European Rival, Qype, To Beef Up Its Recommendations And Listings Business. In: TechCrunch. October 24, 2012, accessed October 24, 2012 .
  16. ↑ Lars Budde: Yelp buys Qype: $ 50 million for 2 million reviews. In: t3n magazine . October 24, 2012, accessed October 24, 2012 .
  17. ↑ Steve Haak: Off for Qype. In: Golem. October 20, 2013, accessed October 20, 2013 .
  18. ↑ Qype. Rating platform . In: Gründerszene. Without a date. Retrieved November 14, 2013.
  19. ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from May 10, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (offline on November 14, 2013). @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / de.blog.qype.com
  20. ↑ qype.com (offline on November 14, 2013).
  21. ↑ Alexander Hüsing: Qype ​​checks in and inspires the scene - personalized recommendations as a killer application . In: German Startups. July 19, 2010. Retrieved November 14, 2013.
  22. ↑ Stuart Dredge: Best iPhone Apps: CNET UK's Home Screen Awards . In: cnet.co.uk. November 9, 2011. Retrieved November 14, 2013.
  23. ↑ Christian Wolf: Nokia: Ovi Maps 3.04 integrates Qype recommendations . In: onlinekosten.de. May 27, 2010. Retrieved November 14, 2013.
  24. ↑ BMW is expanding its internet services significantly  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Toter Link / dmm.travel   . In: The Mobility Manager. September 2, 2011. Retrieved November 14, 2013.
  25. ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original from September 24, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / de.business.qype.com
  26. ↑ deutsche-startups.de
  27. ↑ deutsche-startups.de
  28. ↑ Alexander Hüsing: Visits are the new key currency. German Startups, December 9, 2009, accessed on September 22, 2010 .
  29. ↑ deutsche-startups.de
  30. ↑ Alexander Hüsing: Qype ​​is back on track in terms of access numbers after a downturn. German Startups, September 13, 2010, accessed on September 22, 2010 .
  31. ↑ meedia.de