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There will always be a desire to pay for reviews, since 70%-80% of shoppers check reviews before buying[0][1] (and growing[2]). Amazon could help fix this prob

There will always be a desire to pay for reviews, since 70%-80% of shoppers check reviews before buying[0][1] (and growing[2]). Amazon could help fix this problem by creating "sponsored" reviews. This way a company can pay for reviews in a non-scummy way, a reviewer (and Amazon) gets paid, and a customer can tell whether the review was paid for or not. Or just pass laws to regulate reviews. 0. http://www.peopleclaim.com/blog/index.php/the-review-of-ratings/ http://www.peopleclaim.com/blog/index.php/the-review-of-rati... 1. https://www.chainstoreage.com/news/study-81-research-online-making-big-purchases/ https://www.chainstoreage.com/news/study-81-research-online-... 2. https://deloitte.wsj.com/cmo/2016/11/01/media-device-habits-of-the-modern-consumer/ https://deloitte.wsj.com/cmo/2016/11/01/media-device-habits-...

treebeard901 8y ago
> and a customer can tell whether the review was paid for or not. Isn't this what the companies are paying for?
- jameslk 8y ago
  Given the opportunity to pay for sponsored reviews or risk getting perma banned from Amazon, I'm guessing a lot of companies would choose the former. Regardless, it's not an idea I have seen tested yet anywhere, so it's hard to know.
cmplxconjugate 8y ago
The fundamental problem though is that companies want to discretely inject these overly positive reviews. If users can identify these “paid-for” reviews, they will most likely treat them with distrust. I really can’t see a way around this.
Nasrudith 8y ago
I doubt that sponsored reviews would solve it - if they wanted to be shady they would astroturf it anyway. Marketing departments with multimillion dollar budgets still engage in that. As for regulating reviews what could possibly work for that? Real ID would be unduly oppressive in chilling effects in addition to opening up barratry and harassment of reviewers. Even if fake reviews fall under false advertising laws good luck enforcing it.
- mc32 8y ago
  What about independent reviewers like consumer reports, or similarly disinterested party?
chaostheory 8y ago
Amazon has done this for years now. It's call Amazon Vine. Select Amazon customers with high review ratings are given free* products for which they have to give unbiased reviews. It's both sponsored by Amazon as well as various manufacturers. https://www.amazon.com/gp/vine/help https://www.amazon.com/gp/vine/help It has mixed results. Amazon is upfront about Vine reviewers getting free product and resulting reviews have a Vine tag on top. Customers tend to not like Vine reviews vs verified purchase reviews. While there are negative Vine reviews, most are positive. It may be due to a psychological quid pro quo, since you tend to get more products from the same manufacturer if you offer positive reviews vs negative ones. It's just really hard to be unbiased when you keep getting "free" stuff from one of your favorite companies. *It's taxable according to Amazon's cost in most cases so you get to figure out Amazon's margins for a lot of products. If it's manufacturer sponsored, then the item isn't taxable as income. Food and similar products are also not considered taxable.
- dkonofalski 8y ago
  Why would companies know who's getting their products to review and why would reviewers know which products they're getting? I feel like an easy fix for this is to have the company send the product to Amazon first and then have Amazon handle the distribution to reviewers. There's no "quid pro quo" if there's no incentive to review a product favorably. That's why Consumer Reports was so successful in the past. Their reviews were completely unbiased because the draw was in people paying to get thorough, objective reviews of products. Now that revenue comes from ads and manufacturers all over the internet, it's hard to find reviews that aren't paid ads.
  - ghaff 8y ago
    While product-for-reviews have a certain conflict of interest, I know quite a few people (including myself) who write reviews of both products we receive for free and products we pay for who give honest opinions. If I agree to let you send me a product, I'll write a review but you won't like my review if I don't like your product.
    - 8y ago
benatkin 8y ago
I don't just check the average rating and number of ratings. I also check the quality of reviews. If an unscrupulous company wanted to increase the chances of me buying from them, they might try buying bad fake reviews for their competitors.
- trukterious 8y ago
  Yes. A review that explains why the product is good is harder to fake. Plus the reader may be able to verify independently whether the explanation itself is good. In which case the source no longer signifies.
  - benatkin 8y ago
    Yes. I find that the positive reviews are often more useful than the negative reviews. If a positive review is five star but still mentions some negative things, it feels authentic and I can go off of that. This is how I deal with the problem where people won't give anyone less than five stars because they don't want to hurt their livelihoods.
markdown 8y ago
> Or just pass laws to regulate reviews Australia just today fined a company for manipulating TripAdvisor reviews: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17649912 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17649912
not_a_terrorist 8y ago
> Or just pass laws to regulate reviews. Let me guess: you vote democrat, don't you?

treebeard901 8y ago

> and a customer can tell whether the review was paid for or not. Isn't this what the companies are paying for?

jameslk 8y ago
Given the opportunity to pay for sponsored reviews or risk getting perma banned from Amazon, I'm guessing a lot of companies would choose the former. Regardless, it's not an idea I have seen tested yet anywhere, so it's hard to know.

cmplxconjugate 8y ago

The fundamental problem though is that companies want to discretely inject these overly positive reviews. If users can identify these “paid-for” reviews, they will most likely treat them with distrust. I really can’t see a way around this.

Nasrudith 8y ago

I doubt that sponsored reviews would solve it - if they wanted to be shady they would astroturf it anyway. Marketing departments with multimillion dollar budgets still engage in that. As for regulating reviews what could possibly work for that? Real ID would be unduly oppressive in chilling effects in addition to opening up barratry and harassment of reviewers. Even if fake reviews fall under false advertising laws good luck enforcing it.

mc32 8y ago
What about independent reviewers like consumer reports, or similarly disinterested party?

chaostheory 8y ago

Amazon has done this for years now. It's call Amazon Vine. Select Amazon customers with high review ratings are given free* products for which they have to give unbiased reviews. It's both sponsored by Amazon as well as various manufacturers. https://www.amazon.com/gp/vine/help https://www.amazon.com/gp/vine/help It has mixed results. Amazon is upfront about Vine reviewers getting free product and resulting reviews have a Vine tag on top. Customers tend to not like Vine reviews vs verified purchase reviews. While there are negative Vine reviews, most are positive. It may be due to a psychological quid pro quo, since you tend to get more products from the same manufacturer if you offer positive reviews vs negative ones. It's just really hard to be unbiased when you keep getting "free" stuff from one of your favorite companies. *It's taxable according to Amazon's cost in most cases so you get to figure out Amazon's margins for a lot of products. If it's manufacturer sponsored, then the item isn't taxable as income. Food and similar products are also not considered taxable.

dkonofalski 8y ago
Why would companies know who's getting their products to review and why would reviewers know which products they're getting? I feel like an easy fix for this is to have the company send the product to Amazon first and then have Amazon handle the distribution to reviewers. There's no "quid pro quo" if there's no incentive to review a product favorably. That's why Consumer Reports was so successful in the past. Their reviews were completely unbiased because the draw was in people paying to get thorough, objective reviews of products. Now that revenue comes from ads and manufacturers all over the internet, it's hard to find reviews that aren't paid ads.
- ghaff 8y ago
  While product-for-reviews have a certain conflict of interest, I know quite a few people (including myself) who write reviews of both products we receive for free and products we pay for who give honest opinions. If I agree to let you send me a product, I'll write a review but you won't like my review if I don't like your product.
  - 8y ago

benatkin 8y ago

I don't just check the average rating and number of ratings. I also check the quality of reviews. If an unscrupulous company wanted to increase the chances of me buying from them, they might try buying bad fake reviews for their competitors.

trukterious 8y ago
Yes. A review that explains why the product is good is harder to fake. Plus the reader may be able to verify independently whether the explanation itself is good. In which case the source no longer signifies.
- benatkin 8y ago
  Yes. I find that the positive reviews are often more useful than the negative reviews. If a positive review is five star but still mentions some negative things, it feels authentic and I can go off of that. This is how I deal with the problem where people won't give anyone less than five stars because they don't want to hurt their livelihoods.

markdown 8y ago

> Or just pass laws to regulate reviews Australia just today fined a company for manipulating TripAdvisor reviews: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17649912 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17649912

not_a_terrorist 8y ago

> Or just pass laws to regulate reviews. Let me guess: you vote democrat, don't you?