Whether MojoPages can challenge or supplant Yelp is another question. (“Complement” seems to be answer. Read on.) Yelp has done a great job of building a community of credible reviewers. Though Yelp’s very name is suggestive of a relationship to the yellow pages, Yelp positions itself effectively as “Real People. Real Reviews.” The problem with the notion of “community” is mostly getting credible and persuasive reviews and enough people to sign up to write them. Much as people like to parade the power of social networking, outside of the big sites like MySpace and Facebook, your friends don’t really sign up. As long as you can draw enough individuals, give them a means to express their personality, and offer an infrastructure for “social networking” it will eventually happen. Yelp wisely focused on drawing hip urbanites –- a high proportion of them opinionated women – and having them focus on key subjects such as food and entertainment. With this enthusiastic core, Yelp has a growth path for more types of people and subjects.

So it is against this background that we must evaluate MojoPages. As MojoPages is under pre-alpha wraps, we have to piece together their position. From the VEOH video glimpse of the website, the functionality seems to mirror Yelp’s. Not that Yelp is necessarily the target of plagiarism. The functionality of good social review site is a platonic ideal of sorts. The aethestic seems to be a bit more masculine. Yelp definitely has a feminine feel -- that’s a good thing as women tend to be more creative and thoughtful reviewers and make a necessary base for any healthy social function. The MojoPages entrepreneurs are pushing the yellow pages analogy really hard and suggesting that they will target services such as movers that currently lack information “transparency.” Other currently “opaque” services would be auto repair, drycleaning, kennels, dentists, etc. In Washington, DC, we rely on the Washingtonian magazine or the Consumer Checkbook for these reviews. These publications send out surveys, compile results, and publishing them periodically in special issues. MojoPages would carve out this niche and serve a space complementary to Yelp’s. I can see them colliding someday but that’s a long way off from this early market.

Perhaps they will pay for reviews like Yelp did to bootstrap. They certainly seem intent on building buzz with their blog and video activity. I find it annoying but you can’t blame them for seeking a big marketing ROI on the slim marginal cost of taping themselves doing silly things. CEO John Carder on video reminds me of Owen Wilson. The rest of the team comprises Jager Fornal, Ray Drasnin, Rand Pipp, Rodney Rumford, Frank Asaro, and Pam Bickel.

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