111–120 of 198 posts
Besides companies - and small time authors - paying for good ratings, you have a similar amount of people that genuinely bought the book, giving 1 start ratings because of whatever quality of the book manufacture, be it physical or digital.
One of these two alone would not be difficult to manage, but having to deal the two makes it almost unbearable to find out the proper rating. We should start giving ratings ratings.
Similarly, what can you possibly do if someone with deep pockets decides to trash your competing product’s reviews?
Also, in my experience at least, the overwhelming majority of real customers do not submit reviews at all. Thus I am skeptical of any product that has miraculously convinced thousands of people to contribute positive feedback.
At this point, every single review system acts more like a tool to help scam people, instead of helping them to avoid bad products. It pushes bad products to the top of search, whereas unrated products would be forced to scam a handful of people in obscurity.
And the worst part is that I still think twice about any low review, even knowing that in all likelihood the reviews I am reading may not even be real! It really messes with your head.
As well they should. This is a game of cat and mouse. Consumers were ahead for a little while, but companies have really gotten a grasp on the internet, and they're winning the information war. It's no mistake that I've come to rely on brand name again. It's the best heuristic available to me. When all this first started (mid-2000s) I was actively avoiding basing ANY decision on brand name. For a brief window, I had…
I used to trust Amazon for just about anything I needed to buy, but I'd guess maybe in the last 6-8 years I'll mostly only order something if I recognize the brand name selling me the product. Tried to buy a pair of cheap-ish bluetooth headphones off there a few months ago. Three different pairs and none of them even worked out of the box. Gave up and bought a more expensive pair from a known brand.
If your business is selling low margin items at massive scale then Amazon probably continues to win (in the US.)
A fun anecdote from my wife: 6 years ago she reviewed a nursing bra on Amazon. Gave it five stars. Fast forward to now and she when pulls up her review history that same review (with the exact text!) now appears on a consumer electronics device.
I invite people to checkout BestBuy's online shop. Just about every single item has a rating from 4.0 to 4.8 out of 5. I have yet to see a single listing under 4 stars. There are of course, unrated items, but can you honestly believe that virutally every product they carry is nearly perfect? Who actually writes a 5 star review for a no-name brand of tape and cable ties? When everything is perfect, nothing is, and I d…
This is a problem with nearly every online rating place. 4.0 means TOTAL GARBAGE and 5.0 means it didn't burn by house down. Totally useless.
Maybe re-phrase the question - I ONLY trust negative reviews now. The key is to see how many people have negative reviews and then scan them. Let's say I am interested in a BBQ Grill. 10 reviews about an open box/returned box? I'll probably go to a local CampingWorld and pick it up instead of Amazon and pay the extra $50. 4 people say the grill grate is bent but there are 1200 other reviews that don't seem to have a…
That won't last long, negative reviews will get flooded by glowing reviews with trivial complaints. "This thing is perfect except I don't like green so 1/5"
Maybe there should be a "return rate"% per product? :-)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, we've gone back to having to trust the brand name of the distributor - if it says it came from Amazon it is basically assumed to be counterfeit chinese crap; Costco and Home Depot (and even Walmart in store) are a bit more secure there.
Does Walmart (online) co-mingle their inventory with third party inventory like Amazon?
Unfortunately, I've never seen information about how Walmart handles this. Given their massive shift to 3Ps providing most of their products online...I'd imagine they use a similar strategy (it improves same/next day availability and lowers cost). I follow the same strategy with Walmart (try to only buy directly).
It is a sad time for online purchasing :(
As well they should. This is a game of cat and mouse. Consumers were ahead for a little while, but companies have really gotten a grasp on the internet, and they're winning the information war. It's no mistake that I've come to rely on brand name again. It's the best heuristic available to me. When all this first started (mid-2000s) I was actively avoiding basing ANY decision on brand name. For a brief window, I had…