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Ask HN: What motivates users to write Amazon reviews?

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Re: Ask HN: What motivates users to write Amazon reviews?

#11

Post by tjr »

wallflower wrote: post #10

> I'm wondering how so many reviews get written on a site like Amazon I'm sorry to burst your bubble. The well-respected consultancy User Interface Engineering has come up with the magic number of 1 review for every 1,300 purchases. "While only one in 1,300 purchasers of the product writes a review, the number who indicate a review was helpful is even fewer. For the Harry Potter volume, which is Amazon's best selling…

Not everyone who buys a copy even bothers to read the review. If it's a book that the customer already knows they want (which is probably often the case with the Harry Potter books), why read the review? Just buy the book.

And I know that I for one usually don't upvote a review, even if I did find it helpful. I don't mean to be intentionally rude, I just somehow haven't gotten in the habit of doing that. So the number of votes on a review isn't an indication of the number of people who found the review helpful, but rather, the number of people who both found the review helpful and took the time to vote it up.

That said, yes, Amazon's immense customer base makes even tiny percentages of users contributing out to be useful. But they weren't always so large. I've heard that the main way they became the prominant online bookseller was precisely because they offered a review mechanism, at a time when other online bookstores did not, or offered a more feeble review system. Since it's so easy to add a nice review system to an online store today, that feature alone won't be enough anymore.

Re: Ask HN: What motivates users to write Amazon reviews?

#12

Post by alexbosworth »

A large number of reviewers on Amazon are rewarded for good reviews by publishers sending them free stuff.

That's what an Amazon engineer told me: the real name program and the top 1000 badges were designed to encourage this, even though it creates a reward for very shallow, positive reviews.

Re: Ask HN: What motivates users to write Amazon reviews?

#14

Post by NathanKP »

michael_dorfman wrote: post #2

I think Amazon reviewers are people with opinions, who relish the idea of sharing their opinion with the world. I don't think these people need any more motivation than that-- no badges or flair required. However: I think that the reviewer-to-reader ratio is tiny, and this is masked a bit by Amazon's absurd popularity. And, to make matters worse, this absurd popularity is one of the driving motivators (cf above, "sha…

Don't forget that there are also a lot of Amazon reviewers who are nothing but trolls. They are making it harder to post reviews like that, but I still see plenty of cases where people have hijacked Amazon comments or reviews for the lulz.

Re: Ask HN: What motivates users to write Amazon reviews?

#15

Post by ydant »

I write reviews for things I purchased occasionally if I think there's not enough good information about the product in the reviews section, there was something I couldn't figure out until I'd purchased the product, or I really like (or hate it). I'm not expecting much, although the idea that other people might read it and find it useful makes it worth it.

Re: Ask HN: What motivates users to write Amazon reviews?

#16

Post by balding_n_tired »

I've posted maybe two. The one I'm sure about was for a very handy O'Reilly book that got a bad review that was undeserved on the merits and made a passing reference to the author's politics. I thought the book better than that and the politics (confined to the dedication) not relevant to the book's worth.

Re: Ask HN: What motivates users to write Amazon reviews?

#17

Post by rjett »

michael_dorfman wrote: post #2

I think Amazon reviewers are people with opinions, who relish the idea of sharing their opinion with the world. I don't think these people need any more motivation than that-- no badges or flair required. However: I think that the reviewer-to-reader ratio is tiny, and this is masked a bit by Amazon's absurd popularity. And, to make matters worse, this absurd popularity is one of the driving motivators (cf above, "sha…

"If anyone knows any way out of this besides increasing the number of users by several orders of magnitude, I'd love to hear it"

Disclaimer: I have never run a reviews site so this might just be a wild idea.

What if you implemented a karma system like HN/Reddit/Digg and rewarded users for their relative karma score for particular comments to other users commenting on the same thing. For those who achieve a certain relative score, you can give them prizes, discounts, etc. I mention relative score since this would curb the incentive to game the system.

Re: Ask HN: What motivates users to write Amazon reviews?

#18

Post by lkrubner »

I do not think people participate on Yelp to get badges. That is ridiculous. I have a friend who recently fell in love with Yelp. She uses it to figure out what restaurants she wants to go to in New York City. She likes reading the reviews, good and bad. She feels like she's become good at figuring out what places she will like, even when they have bad reviews. Reading between the lines on Yelp has become a kind of sport for her. Even more recently, she began contributing reviews. I think for her it is a way of sharing with others what she likes, and participating in the Yelp community, which is a community that she likes. The question is sort of similar to "Why do you have the friends that you have?" Why are any of us drawn to one group of people, and not some other group of people? Or why do we go to some show, some party, follow some musicians? We get something out of it, but it clearly isn't badges or money, or merit points, or anything ridiculous like that.

Re: Ask HN: What motivates users to write Amazon reviews?

#19

Post by wallflower »

tjr wrote: post #11
wallflower wrote: post #10

> I'm wondering how so many reviews get written on a site like Amazon I'm sorry to burst your bubble. The well-respected consultancy User Interface Engineering has come up with the magic number of 1 review for every 1,300 purchases. "While only one in 1,300 purchasers of the product writes a review, the number who indicate a review was helpful is even fewer. For the Harry Potter volume, which is Amazon's best selling…

Not everyone who buys a copy even bothers to read the review. If it's a book that the customer already knows they want (which is probably often the case with the Harry Potter books), why read the review? Just buy the book. And I know that I for one usually don't upvote a review, even if I did find it helpful. I don't mean to be intentionally rude, I just somehow haven't gotten in the habit of doing that. So the numbe…

> Since it's so easy to add a nice review system to an online store today, that feature alone won't be enough anymore.

It's not the feature. I'm convinced it is is the sheer volume. Much like Arn from MacRumors says to monetize a website - first you need traffic. Traffic then monetization. Not monetization then traffic.

Target has the exact same software Amazon.com has - as the result of a 2000-era licensing agreement.

I had to sort by highest rated to even get a Harry Potter item with reviews:

http://www.target.com/Potter-Half-Blood-Prince-Widescreen-Du...

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