Live data from Hacker News

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

arstechnica.com

211–220 of 438 posts

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

#211
post #58

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…

The million dollar question is, how do we know which brands are the good ones?

Is there a community which tackles this sort of problem alone? The best I have found so far is to find the community surrounding a type of product, especially on Reddit - there is a community around almost every interest imaginable - and figure out which brands they recommend, via search or just asking.

Often they even have advice in a stickied thread or wiki article.

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

#212
post #149

Somewhat related due to comments / reviews being for a product, but sometimes on Amazon one page has a set of different options (with the little boxes). So you can pick like a color or model. But then they group all the reviews together despite what buttons you've picked. This is so frustrating! At least they've added a little thing that says which SKU the review is for. But I wish they would just separate out the re…

I agree it's frustrating, but there is a way to do what you want.

After you've selected the color/model, go to the reviews section, and click to see all reviews, which brings you to a new page. There, you can filter to select reviews that are only for the single color/model.

It's annoying, and it's even dumber that the filter dropdown only lets you toggle between all reviews and reviews for the single color/model (when I'd like to compare reviews easily for different colors/models), but at least it is there if you hunt for it.

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

#213
post #164

Presumably you've all stopped using Amazon because of this issue, so they're motivated to fix it..?

Right now it doesn't seem to have a competitor. I think the market is now primed for an ethical competitor to come along and steal its business however, a lot of people are getting irritated with Amazon and would happily chose an alternative.

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

#215
post #149

Somewhat related due to comments / reviews being for a product, but sometimes on Amazon one page has a set of different options (with the little boxes). So you can pick like a color or model. But then they group all the reviews together despite what buttons you've picked. This is so frustrating! At least they've added a little thing that says which SKU the review is for. But I wish they would just separate out the re…

I agree it's frustrating, but there is a way to do what you want. After you've selected the color/model, go to the reviews section, and click to see all reviews, which brings you to a new page. There, you can filter to select reviews that are only for the single color/model. It's annoying, and it's even dumber that the filter dropdown only lets you toggle between all reviews and reviews for the single color/model (wh…

Thanks for that! Super helpful. <3

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

#216

What I like, are the companies that create a separate listing for every variant of a product, within a price range, so searches get overwhelmed. A couple of weeks ago, I was looking for a Mag-Safe stand for my new iPhone 12 Mini. When I searched for it on Amazon, look at what the search returned[0]. Now, scroll down, until you get to the "Cheetah" pop stand. Keep scrolling. But don't touch that dial! It goes on for 4…

That is certainly a suboptimal shopping experience. One page with variants wouldn't seem to work very well for this either, with nearly 10,000 variations.

Interestingly, they are all sold by amazon directly and are printed on demand so it doesn't seem to be a case of a 3rd party trying to game the site.

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

#217
This is one of those areas where "breaking up the tech giants" might actually work - Amazon is basically an e-commerce platform, a global post office, a seller in its own right, and a discovery engine.

There really is little reason they all need to be together.

Putting a discovery engine in place that won't make a profit unless the right and decent thing arrives surely suggests they will have incentives aligned with the customers?

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

#218
post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've come full circle and only order books (usually used) or things I don't care if they're Chinese bargain-version off Amazon anymore. Target, or occasionally Walmart, gets what used to be Amazon's business from me.

B & H photos has done right by me so far. CDW seems okay. Newegg appears to have vendors reselling stuff from Amazon with markup. And while you can filter third party out, you quickly discover Newegg doesn’t have much inventory.

Newegg went down the toilet in 2016 when Liaison Interactive bought it out.

Adorama is also good and, like B&H, you can't do any business with them on Saturday.

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

#219

Here's one solution: don't buy cheap garbage. Yes, someone makes a $23 drone. It is cheap plastic shit from China. Do you really need to buy it, and then throw it in landfill a week (or two days) later after it breaks? Did OP reeeeeally expect a $23 drone to be on the up-and-up and NOT end up as landfill? OP is a bit oblivious to his impact on the environment. This race to the bottom for the cheapest crap is what ins…

It’s a children’s toy meant to be played with for a few hours. So $23 makes since since this is a simple toy. The thinking that people shouldn’t pay low amounts leads to companies selling the same junk but for $100 instead. Cheap things should be cheap, I think.

Amazing mentality. Of course, no concern for the externalities...

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

#220

What I like, are the companies that create a separate listing for every variant of a product, within a price range, so searches get overwhelmed. A couple of weeks ago, I was looking for a Mag-Safe stand for my new iPhone 12 Mini. When I searched for it on Amazon, look at what the search returned[0]. Now, scroll down, until you get to the "Cheetah" pop stand. Keep scrolling. But don't touch that dial! It goes on for 4…

That is certainly a suboptimal shopping experience. One page with variants wouldn't seem to work very well for this either, with nearly 10,000 variations. Interestingly, they are all sold by amazon directly and are printed on demand so it doesn't seem to be a case of a 3rd party trying to game the site.

> Interestingly, they are all sold by amazon directly and are printed on demand so it doesn't seem to be a case of a 3rd party trying to game the site.

Eek. I didn't even notice.

That makes it even worse.

Post reply on HN