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Amazon still hasn’t fixed its problem with bait-and-switch reviews

arstechnica.com

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Re: Amazon still hasn’t fixed its problem with bait-and-switch reviews

#111

Post by CapmCrackaWaka »

TravisLS wrote: post #18

There's a somewhat pervasive idea that advertising and brand recognition are coercive tools that will ultimately die out, replaced by better objective information about products. I'm kind of partial to this idea myself. But increasingly we seem a long way from achieving this. Amazon reviews have become such garbage, I've fallen back to pretty much relying on name brands as my placeholder for product quality. There's…

I know my comment will be lost in a sea of voices, but I need to share my experience _somewhere_ else other than amazon reviews. I got my fiancé two Christmas presents this year - both bought off Amazon. One was an electronic keyboard that was dead on arrival, the other was a snuggie type blanket that started falling apart yesterday. Both items had thousands of 5 star reviews.

I usually go somewhere (anywhere) else besides Amazon because I have had bad experiences in the past, but this was the only place I could find the niche keyboard because it's an older model. I now have a firm rule that I will never order from Amazon again.

Re: Amazon still hasn’t fixed its problem with bait-and-switch reviews

#112

Post by open-source-ux »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #46
TravisLS wrote: post #18

There's a somewhat pervasive idea that advertising and brand recognition are coercive tools that will ultimately die out, replaced by better objective information about products. I'm kind of partial to this idea myself. But increasingly we seem a long way from achieving this. Amazon reviews have become such garbage, I've fallen back to pretty much relying on name brands as my placeholder for product quality. There's…

I myself am convinced that brand recognition is on borrowed time - that is, recognition of old brands may still work as useful filter, but new quality brands will be near-impossible to establish. The reason for that: we're being DDoSed with brands on e-commerce sites. For an increasing amount of product categories, you're going to find 10+ "brands" on Amazon that are selling the same white-label garbage class product…

The popularity of drop shopping has probably played some part in the spread of low quality no-name products on Amazon.

YouTube is stuffed with videos on drop shipping. Many drop-shippers have no interest in the product they are selling or it's quality. They're only interested in whether they have picked a profitable niche. When that niche gets too crowded, they move to another product space before the wider drop shopping crowd swarm to the same product. And so the cycle continues. Rinse and repeat.

Re: Amazon still hasn’t fixed its problem with bait-and-switch reviews

#113

Post by jquery »

epistasis wrote: post #83

> As a result of Amazon's action, the top-ranking drone, which previously had more than 6,000 reviews, now has only about 50 reviews and its star rating has dropped to three and a half stars. But the other two listings I mentioned above—both of which I also mentioned in a Monday email to Amazon—still have thousands of positive reviews, including a bunch of obviously bogus ones. The result of blatant fraud and manipul…

This is the core of the problem. Amazon simply doesn’t understand how trust works.

Re: Amazon still hasn’t fixed its problem with bait-and-switch reviews

#114

Post by chrononaut »

djohnston wrote: post #12

Perhaps I'm in the minority of frequent amazon users, but I don't buy anything from 3rd party sellers anymore. There is simply too much fraud. In practice, this means that I often need to skip past amazon entirely and go straight to the product manufacturer, sometimes paying more, just to be sure I'm not being screwed.

> In practice, this means that I often need to skip past amazon entirely and go straight to the product manufacturer, sometimes paying more, just to be sure I'm not being screwed.

You're not the only one. Depending on the item and it's use I would probably pay upwards of a 20% premium just so I know there's a far less chance of the received item being fraudulent.

Pandemic aside, these issues also have made me much more likely in the last 4 to 5 years to purposefully go shopping in-person at stores since they seem to have a higher chance of having a proper supply chain established.

Re: Amazon still hasn’t fixed its problem with bait-and-switch reviews

#115

Post by solarkraft »

mason55 wrote: post #58
TeMPOraL wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I myself am convinced that brand recognition is on borrowed time - that is, recognition of old brands may still work as useful filter, but new quality brands will be near-impossible to establish. The reason for that: we're being DDoSed with brands on e-commerce sites. For an increasing amount of product categories, you're going to find 10+ "brands" on Amazon that are selling the same white-label garbage class product…

What you’re describing is exactly how brands work. The garbage brands will continue to cycle because there’s no reason to keep the brand name (in fact it’s better to change it so that people who got burned don’t know it’s the same). But the good brands are investing in the brand name and so they will stick around and you’ll start to recognize them. Look at a company like Anker. They operate in spaces filled with garb…

An example for not producing anything themselves (afaik) but only putting their name on actually decent products is Blitzwolf. A brand like that can be built on the most basic due diligence (and thus not significantly higher prices). A bonus would be actually delivering some technical detail on a product, but even "manufacturers" like TaoTronics seem to be having a really hard time doing that.

I'd say Aliexpress is probably a better way to find somewhat established (or trying, which is what matters) brands than Amazon.

Re: Amazon still hasn’t fixed its problem with bait-and-switch reviews

#116

Post by frontiersummit »

xxs wrote: post #63
sdflhasjd wrote: post #48

Bait-and-switch doesn't matter if Amazon doesn't care about fake and paid-for reviews. I was looking for dashcams and came across this: https://www.amazon.co.uk/iiwey-Channels-included-Dashboard-D... 91% 5-star reviews, a lot of the reviews are from "Top XXX reviewer", and almost every one seems to be reading off a script. If you check out all the profiles of these "Top XX" reviewers, they all seem to be non-stop pur…

A simple test for quality - if the clam shell/body is made of ABS (instead of polycarbonate or nylon), it's very likely bad. The dashcam appears ABS, judging from the pics. You can return stuff back when bought online in 14days, I think this part remains after the 1st of Jan.

ABS is not a low quality material. It is a tough polymer which maintains its toughness over a wide range of environmental conditions. That is why it is widely used in applications like automotive interior and exterior panels. It's probably a good choice for a product like a dashcam which will be exposed to a wide temperature range.

Re: Amazon still hasn’t fixed its problem with bait-and-switch reviews

#117

Post by fuball63 »

bombcar wrote: post #32
TravisLS wrote: post #18

There's a somewhat pervasive idea that advertising and brand recognition are coercive tools that will ultimately die out, replaced by better objective information about products. I'm kind of partial to this idea myself. But increasingly we seem a long way from achieving this. Amazon reviews have become such garbage, I've fallen back to pretty much relying on name brands as my placeholder for product quality. There's…

Amusingly enough if you trace the history of brand names ... this is why they started! And this is the strength that the major retailers have against Amazon - if Amazon won't police (and they have problems with commingling counterfeit brands, too) then Walmart and Target will jump ahead.

I was of a similar mind this year, but when I went to Walmart's website, they had 3rd party sellers on there too. It is really annoying, especially with the pandemic, trying to sift through all the trash online.

I ended up buying we webcam from BestBuy.com, because a webcam I got from Amazon was pay-for-review and was utter garbage.

Just more evidence, to me, that the era of internet business models being "get everything online" (Amazon, Spotify, Steam) is closing, and the era of online aggregation as a product is just beginning.

Re: Amazon still hasn’t fixed its problem with bait-and-switch reviews

#118

Post by exhilaration »

whatisthiseven wrote: post #71
GavinMcG wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always look at negative reviews. From those you can tell if there's a consistent concern, if someone got a fake, or if there was just a preference mismatch for someone.

This also used to be my strategy, but now I am concerned that competing brands are sabotaging each other by just leaving poor 1-star reviews. I say this as I have read some low reviews that just made no sense, or didn't reference aspects of the product that existed. I still trust 1-star reviews more than 5-star, but I don't take them as gospel. As you said, if there is a consistent message across all the negative rev…

I find the 3-4 star reviews the most helpful. I feel like the positive fake reviews are all 5 stars (based on what the little notes I get in my Amazon packages, the vendors will only reward you for 5 star reviews) and I'm guessing the negative fake reviews are all 1 star. So that leaves those reviews in the middle as the only ones worth paying attention to.

Re: Amazon still hasn’t fixed its problem with bait-and-switch reviews

#119

Post by symlinkk »

loloquwowndueo wrote: post #26
lesinski wrote: post #24

Here’s why Wirecutter can make an entire business out of credibly reviewing products

And then wreck it by putting most reviews behind a login wall (sure it’s free but I don’t want another account). Reader mode to the rescue!

I have never seen a paywall for Wirecutter
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