The situation with Amazon reviews has become unbelievable. I recently purchased a $20 item with around 30,000 reviews, overwhelmingly positive. $20 was a reasonable market price for this item from any retailer.
There was a card inside the box from the seller saying they’d send me a $15 gift card for posting a 5-star review and then forwarding them proof I had posted it to some gmail account. I followed the instructions, and like clockwork got $15 back on Amazon.
When reviews become so critical to item visibility it should be no surprise that they are gamed, but it’s still a shame that it’s come to this.
A highly rated pizza chain in my city (4.8 stars out of 6000+ reviews) is giving out free desserts if you rate them 5 stars. I've called them out on it years ago, but it seems that they are still doing it today: https://goo.gl/maps/1L8zdhWgwDK8b8Cy6.
Shake shack does this too. They opened one up nearby and simply changed the location of a well performing store across the country to where the new store was so they could open with thousands of positive reviews.
Same case in India as well. Here sellers bribe money to consumers, asking to write a five-star review. I have had sellers call me multiple times to leave a review. If you mention in the reviews that seller is harassing you for fake reviews and other reviews might be paid, then your review gets taken down.
It’s probably best to ignore reviews and just shop based on critical reviews or recommendations from friends. And even then it is better to purchase directly from manufacturers rather than risk getting counterfeits. I’m not sure what value middlemen like Amazon add other than fast delivery, which most people can live without.
Three star reviews are all you should read these days. It’s typically unbiased / unemotional and objective. 1 and 5 star reviews don’t tend to be reliable.
There’s nothing critical about them anymore. They’re all affiliate marketing sites. Have you noticed there are no bad products anymore? Their only goal is to convince you to buy something. There’s no expertise.
There was a great sky talk at Defcon this week about groups that literally have catalogues of stuff people choose from, order, then get PayPal refund for the 5 star reviews (multiple merchant sites not just Amazon). Some of it is pretty expensive stuff (3D printers, batteries and more). I don’t have an answer for a fix but I definitely just ignore reviews now.
There was a card inside the box from the seller saying they’d send me a $15 gift card for posting a 5-star review and then forwarding them proof I had posted it to some gmail account. I followed the instructions, and like clockwork got $15 back on Amazon.
When reviews become so critical to item visibility it should be no surprise that they are gamed, but it’s still a shame that it’s come to this.