Ranking transparency

In short

• Paid placements appear at the top and carry the label “Ad”.
• Next come all listings with a Premium plan. They carry the label “Sponsored”.
• In both groups, listings whose main category matches the list or your search term come first, then the rest.
• Within that, listings claimed by the business come before the others. Then distance counts when a place is given; without a place, how complete a listing is.
• Google stars do not change this order.
• If you choose a sort order yourself, for example by distance, only that order applies.
• We do not sort by personal characteristics: everyone sees the same order for the same search.

This page fulfils the obligation under § 5b(2) of the German Act against Unfair Competition (UWG) to state the main parameters of the ranking and their weighting. For businesses, the same information is in the Business terms (Art. 5 P2B Regulation).

Where we sort

The following rules apply to lists of businesses on place and category pages, to search and to the wholesale section. We sort other lists more simply; this is explained further below.

Which listings appear at all depends on your selection: place (including its districts) or radius around a point, category (including subcategories), your search term and your filters, for example “Open now”. Filters and the search term decide whether a listing appears. Its position follows the points below.

We look for a search term in the name, categories, place, description and services, and we also recognise spelling variants, word forms and translations (for example “Friseur”, “cabeleireiro”, “hairdresser”). If a listing only matches through a related word in its description, we show it only when there would otherwise be fewer than five results.

Paid placements

Businesses can book a featured placement for a place, a category or a language. If a booking matches your list, the listing appears above all other results and carries the label “Ad”. If there are several ads, the rules below apply among them.

Premium: listings with the Premium plan appear in all lists for their category and their city or region (category and city pages, search results) directly after the ads and before all other listings. There is no fixed number of slots: if 5 of 80 listings in a list have Premium, those 5 are at the top. Among them, the rules below apply. They carry the label “Sponsored”. On the home page they may also appear in the section for sponsored businesses.

On the home page we show featured businesses in a separate section marked as paid.

There are also advertising spaces: above lists and, in longer lists, after the third listing. An ad there also carries the label “Ad” with the advertiser’s name and has a fixed size. It is not a result of the list and does not move any listing. “Why am I seeing this?” next to the ad explains why it appears.

Main parameters and weighting

Default order in lists and in search:

1. Ads, see above. Weighting: overriding.
2. Premium: first all listings with a Premium plan, labelled “Sponsored”, then all others. Points 3 to 7 apply in both groups. Weighting: overriding, right after the ads.
3. Match: listings whose main category matches the list come first, including its subcategories. Under “Restaurants” these are Brazilian cuisine and churrascarias; café, açaí, bar, bakery and sweets follow. In a search, the main category matching the search term counts, or the search term in the name. All other results, for example through another category or the description, follow after that. Weighting: high.
4. Claimed listings: within the match, listings that the business has claimed and maintains itself (with an account with us) come before the others. Claiming is free. Weighting: high.
5. Distance: with a place, the closest listings come first within each group. We measure from the centre of the city or district, the centre of the postcode or your location, if you share it. For listings without a public street address we use the distance rounded to whole kilometres, as we display it. Weighting: high.
6. Completeness: without a place, and at equal distance, the more complete listings come first. There is one point each for opening hours, a way to get in touch (phone, WhatsApp, website, email or Instagram), an own text, an own photo and a link to Google Maps. The stars on Google Maps do not count. Weighting: medium.
7. Name in alphabetical order, if everything else is equal.

On the overview of a place without a category, for example “Businesses in Cologne”, we show a selection by completeness.

Sort order you choose: if you sort by distance, rating, recency (most recently added) or name, only that criterion applies. Ads and Premium listings then no longer appear first.

Listings with a Premium package carry the label “Sponsored” in lists. With the “Premium” filter you can show only these listings; their order follows the same rules.

How reviews are taken into account

Reviews on EloYellow Brasil only count for the order when you sort by rating yourself. So that a single review does not determine the order, we pull the average towards 4.0 stars when there are few reviews. We calculate as if every listing had five additional reviews of 4.0 stars:

Examples: a single 5-star review results in 4.17. Forty reviews with an average of 4.8 stars result in 4.71. A listing without reviews counts as 4.0 and therefore comes before listings whose balanced average is below 4.0.

All published reviews count equally, regardless of their age and of the business’s package. How we check reviews is explained in the Review policy.

What plays no role

• personal data, your previous behaviour or your location, unless you share it or choose a radius yourself,
• whether a listing is verified or whether the business replies to reviews,
• how often a listing has been viewed or clicked,
• how new a listing is,
• stars and number of reviews on Google Maps, shown on some listings with source and link: they count neither for the match nor for completeness,
• commissions: we receive no payment from businesses for enquiries or bookings.

Other lists

• Events: by start time, the next one first.
• Deals: those ending soonest first; optionally the newest first.
• Similar businesses on a profile: same category in the same city, then the parent category in the same city, each by match, claimed status and completeness, without ads and without priority for Premium; then the same category within 50 kilometres, by distance.
• Few results nearby: many translators, lawyers, online shops, language courses and parcel services also work online or by post. If there are fewer than three results in a place, we show more from all of Germany below, the closest first.
• New listings: most recently added first.
• Reviews on a profile: newest first; you can also sort by best or worst first.

Why we weight this way

Someone opening a list like “Restaurants in Cologne” is looking for a restaurant first and then for one nearby. That is why the matching category and the distance count most. Complete listings help with the decision because they show opening hours and ways to get in touch. We show the stars on Google Maps as extra information with their source; we do not use them for the order. Claimed listings are maintained by the business itself, so their details are usually more up to date. Packages and ads finance the free directory. We disclose their effect here and label paid placements.

Where our listings come from

Listings come from the businesses themselves or from publicly accessible sources that we check. Details are under Data sources and licences. A listing is wrong? Report content. A listing should disappear? Remove a listing.