Internet Entrepreneurs Blog

Last week I wrote about fake user reviews and how they are generally easy to spot and basically harmless for sites with good review flow. Today I wanted to talk about how consumer review website managers can resolve online reviewer disputes while minimizing editorial intervention.

To make this discussion a bit more concrete I’ll frame this with an actual situation we dealt with on our mountain biking website. Our site includes reviews of local bike shops (among other things) and from time to time folks use the reviews to rant about poor customer service experiences. In this particular case a reviewer wrote about a very specific dispute he had with a shop owner and ended his review with the standard “I will never shop here again” postscript.

Shortly after this review was posted the shop owner contacted us with a different take on the dispute and asked if we could remove the review. Of course we didn’t know who was right and who was wrong in this case and we politely informed the shop owner that we could not remove the review. We considered offering to edit out the details under dispute (the amount of money spent, the number of days the bike sat in the shop, etc.) but ultimately decided to give the shop owner a chance to reply to the allegations through a “review of the review.” You may have seen these on other sites like Digg or eBay where the “review of the review” is visually attached to the review under dispute. But of course this begs the question: When does it end? Do you allow a review of the review of the review?

Fortunately this situation ended peacefully and the originally reviewer did not seek to post a reply to the reply. In the end we found out from the shop owner that this customer had been posting the same comments on half a dozen other mountain bike sites to get even for his perceived slight. In the process of working with this shop owner we gained the respect of a potential customer (advertiser) by simply giving him a voice in the review process.

When building your consumer review website it is important to consider your policies for managing and policing online reviews. Consider ways to make your site an unbiased source of fair and useful information and your reviewers (and reviewees) will thank you.

The Bed Breakfast Traveler posted a provocative question on their blog this week: Do fake online reviews hurt businesses? Admittedly I hadn’t given much thought to fake reviews since in my own experience they are few and far between but it’s an interesting question to consider.

Online reviewers can be motivated to post reviews for a number of reasons as we’ve discussed on this blog before. But sometimes a reviewer’s motivation can be deceitful as he or she uses online reviews to harm a competitor’s business. Of course we’ve also talked about the effects of negative online reviews here before (not as detrimental as one might think) but the fact is that the internet makes it very easy to share unfair or untrue comments about people and businesses with a wide audience.

Fake reviews aren’t all negative either - some business owners may use online reviews to paint a glowing picture of their business while posing as a satisfied customer. Admittedly these types of fake reviews often walk a fine line between self-promotion and deception but it takes just one dissatisfied customer who is duped by a glowing review to come back and give online readers the real scoop. A 5-star rating quickly becomes a 3-star rating after just a single bad review.

Just how prevalent are “fake reviews” online? While I don’t have any concrete numbers to share with you (mostly because it’s impossible to tell for certain which reviews are fake) I can tell you that many times it is obvious which reviews should be taken with a grain of salt. As you’ve probably noticed most regular folks aren’t good actors so it follows that there aren’t many good fiction writers out there either. Fake 5-star reviews are the easiest to spot because they’re often so over the top they are just unbelievable. Fake negative reviews often lack details about what the reviewer dislikes and often fail to include a single positive statement (even the toughest critics always find at least one good to say).

Fake online reviews can be a problem on some websites but as a webmaster and a user you can trust in the wisdom of the crowd to minimize the effects of the fakes. Next week I’ll talk about some specific things you can do to resolve online reviewer disputes - good info for webmasters and reviewees alike!

SportsOneSource posted an article last week about how online reviews are helping to drive sales at REI. From the article:

Customers of Recreational Equipment Inc. who submit online reviews of gear they’ve bought at the retail co-op purchase at a 26% higher rate than non-review readers, according to the vendor who helped implement the online feature.

Now this is a little confusing since it sounds like the study compares purchase rates of folks who submit online reviews with folks who don’t read online reviews. There’s certainly a difference between submitting and reading reviews but based on the article title I’m going to assume they are actually comparing purchase rates of review submitters to non-review submitters.

Now, the finding is that review submitters are more likely to purchase than non-review submitters, but I’d argue that folks who purchase recreational equipment probably have experience with said gear and are interested in sharing their thoughts. Not only that but those who purchase ALOT of recreational gear are probably ENTHUSIASTS who enjoy discussing the merits of various products. If I own three sleeping bags I know enough to write a helpful, meaningful review, and I’m more likely to share my thoughts.

So does submitting a review make me more likely to purchase or does purchasing make me more likely to submit a review? I’m pretty sure it’s the latter but then again that probably won’t help me sell online review software

Update: I reread the article and had another thought. Maybe the finding is that folks who 1. bought an item in store and 2. later went online to post a review were 3. 26% more likely to make a purchase online than someone who didn’t read the online reviews. Again, still comparing apples to oranges (submitting to reading) but it seems like the argument is that by going online to submit a review 1 out of 4 folks are hanging around to make a purchase. Then again, it’s tough to make an online purchase if you don’t visit the website in the first place. Or maybe people went online to say how much their purchase sucked and then proceeded to purchase a competing product, later returning the first purchase in store

Online reviews have the power to shape consumer spending and that has some folks worried, particularly those who sell sub-par products or work in stodgy, old-line industries. But rock bands? Most of these guys are embracing the internet and using the power of reviews and word of mouth marketing to their advantage.

But not Metallica. After alienating much of their fan base by suing fans suspected of trading illegal copies of songs through Napster and other file sharing services, the band is now demanding that bloggers remove early reviews of the band’s forthcoming album. And this comes after the band invited said bloggers to hear demos of some of the early songs!

Yes, online reviews have shifted some of the power from producers to consumers and added a layer of transparency to every market imaginable from knitting supplies to rock music. Most teenagers don’t go out and buy an album after hearing the first single on the radio - they head to Amazon first to see what the reviews say about the rest of the songs. Metallica should know by now that they can’t control what people are saying about their music - they should just concentrate on making the best album possible.

Besides, rock and roll has always been about giving the finger to the critics - not whining when they don’t say what you want.

The idea of paying someone to write a review certainly isn’t new: newspapers and magazines have employed food critics for decades while magazines like Consumer Reports employ dozens of professional reviews who test hundreds of products and services each year. But what about the online space: Does the pay-to-review model have a place online?

Most online reviewers are not paid for their work; it is passion (good or bad) for a product that drives most users to share their two cents. Many bloggers choose to use their blogs as a platform for sharing their opinions on products or services and may indirectly receive payment via advertisements on their site, though rarely are they paid directly for their reviews. Some companies have attempted to pay bloggers to say nice things about them online, though once the word gets out  it can become a PR nightmare.

And then there are sites like EchoTV that pay reviewers to post video reviews on virtually any household product you can think of: bicycle pumps, cleaning products, etc. Reviewers are paid for the initial submission PLUS they get a cut every time the video is played. The thing is, before I even knew reviewers were being paid, I felt like most of the videos I watched on EchoTV weren’t genuine, as if the people were just going through the motions. It turns out their motivation to review wasn’t that they had feelings about the product either way - they just wanted the cash. I can just imagine one of these reviewers looking around her living room for things to review - TV, couch, books, lamp, etc. - anything for a shot at earning some money. Because of this the video reviews seem to fall flat.

Aside from being paid to provide reviews, some bloggers and online reviewers may receive complimentary product samples from manufacturers. I’ve been sent a number of bicycle-related products to review on my own blog and each time I write a review I feel a bias to say mostly positive things about the product, even if it’s just so-so. Some companies send “loaner” items for review which actually makes me more comfortable since I know I won’t be influenced by the manufacturer’s supposed generosity.

In the end it’s important to find the best way to motivate your reviewers and to consider how different arrangements may influence the outcome of the review. For bloggers and online reviewers it’s a good idea to give full disclosure about compensation when possible to build trust and to keep your readers coming back for more honest reviews. Stay tuned for some of our tips for motivating your reviewers without resorting to pay-offs.

I came across an interesting site the other day called ExpoTV that offers video reviews of all kinds of products from makeup to snow tires and beyond. It’s certainly an innovative concept but for me there are some major hurdles a review site like this will face.

First, the reviews are only useful if you trust the reviewer and perhaps this is one reason ExpoTV decided to use this model - you get to actually see and hear the person reviewing the product. In many cases, though, the reviewer can be distracting to the review. I was searching for a mountain bike pump review and came across a woman reviewing a floor pump. Now, keep in mind that I’m a mountain biker - I stay in shape and I like to ride fast and get dirt in my face. The woman reviewing the pump was middle aged, overweight, and had a thick southern accent which, when taken together, completely invalidated everything she was saying to me. Of course, had I been reading a review from the same woman writing as ’southernlady123′ (fictional screen name) things could have been different because I would have assumed she was a mountain biker just like me. ExpoTV pays video submitters for their reviews so the site seems to attract folks who review just about everything in their home, whether they are knowledgeable or not. ‘Pay-for-reviews’ is another topic entirely, I’ll write more about this later.

Video reviews also need to be aggregated and coded to be useful. For example, if I see there are 138 reviews of a digital camera on Amazon.com I can trust that the 3.5 star rating is a pretty good average, and I can then compare that rating to other cameras in my price range. With a video, it’s one perspective on a single product. Perhaps if the video reviews were scored (positive, negative, neutral) and THOSE scores were then aggregated, a site like ExpoTV could start to be helpful. As it is now the videos themselves are rated which doesn’t say alot - does it mean the product is good or that the reviewer did a good job? As a consumer I just want to know if the product is recommended…

Over the past few years there has been much buzz about blogs and how they’re revolutionizing the way we find and share information and news online. I can’t count how many times I’ve heard about the ‘blogosphere’ from television news coverage of the current presidential primaries - apparently it must be very important. I certainly read (and write!) blogs myself but do average Americans really care? Are they looking for interesting blogs to read about their favorite subjects?

A quick search of the Google Traffic Estimator seems to say no, at least compared to other keyword queries. Searches for blog-related web sites seems to be on par with searches for forums (you know, message boards) and forums have been around since the early days of the internet - heck, I even used to lurk on a few back in the days of the Prodigy dial-up service. But how does the popularity of searches for blogs and forums compare to searches for reviews?

It turns out the search volume for review related web sites and information is roughly 3 times the volume of searches for blogs or forums. So why aren’t we hearing about the online “review space” on the nightly news? Review aggregation is, after all, a service that would not exist without the internet and something that has the power to bring transparency and change to all sorts of industries. We also know more and more folks are turning to the Internet to read reviews before making purchase decisions.

In fact part of the reason review sites aren’t as common is that blogs and forums are much easier to create and configure since their software is readily available. Review App was created to make building and deploying consumer review websites as easy as launching a blog (and back in 2006 there were 50 million of them!) or managing an online forum. People are looking for reviews online - let Review App help you supply them!

Sports One Source posted a good article about the importance of consumer reviews in the ski and snowboard industry. The article is available via subscription only but here are some highlights:

(T)he majority of snow sports participants (86.4%) said that they take the time to read online product reviews that other consumers have written before purchasing new products … More than 88% of panel members said they seek out and read these reviews before purchasing expensive snow sports equipment and apparel.

Wow, 88% seek out product reviews before making a purchasing decision! While those interested in high end snow gear are generally younger and more comfortable seeking information and advice online than average, this certainly signals an important trend.

Almost 7 out of 10 consumers have decided not to purchase a product because of a review another consumer has written. On the other hand, the impact of a bad review only goes so far, 61.6% have purchased a product even after it received bad consumer reviews.

Retailers are concerned that bad reviews can tank sales - and this seems to reinforce that concern. Since retailers are often unwilling to give consumers the ability to post potentially negative product reviews it is important for review sites to remain independent in an effort to provide the best information to consumers.

Consumer review web sites provide tremendous transparency to markets for goods and services that simply could not have existed before the Internet. Today, anyone can create a consumer review web site using Review App - what will your Review App be about?