These days, I'm sure many of us are buying more stuff online than we typically do.
Although I'm a long time online shopper, there are still a lot of things I would usually try to get locally... nowadays? Not so much...
If you're like me — and trying to buy some product you don't normally shop for — you probably read lots of reviews before making a purchasing decision.
It can be a spiky business...
One of my fundamental procedures is to head to Amazon (not because I like Amazon, but because they do huge volume) and look at people's reviews of something I am considering.
Specifically, I want to read the negative reviews to see what tends to go wrong with whatever I'm about to invest in, so I can gauge for myself whether those are issues I'm willing to put up with.
Can we REALLY Trust Reviews?
You really have to take reviews with a grain of salt.
That is, I find myself needing to review the reviewers before I feel comfortable in trusting what I am looking at. That's particularly true of the 3-star and lower reviews.
Negative ratings are often skewed by people who have no idea what the actual purpose of leaving a product review is. Like this:
Prickly Pears
"UPS left box on my neighbor's porch and it got stolen!" as the text of a one-star review is actually completely useless and speaks more to a recipient's neighborhood than to the quality of the product.
Same holds true for the inevitable "Shipper damaged the box and it arrived broken!" one-star reviews. Come on! You're not reviewing the Postal Service, you're reviewing the product.
Then, of course, there's truly unhelpful reviews, like the one I just came across while checking out portable generators... and it inspired this post:
"It don't work rite like the description."
What the Eff does that even mean? Did you try to use a hedge trimmer to clip your toenails? Was the lawn mower powered by a team of hamsters rather than a motor? What???
Of course, one also has to be careful about the reviews to the plus side of the equation. Oftentimes, there are plenty of "shill reviews" to be found, particularly when it's a new product and not very many people have it in hand, yet.
Desert heart
What's the Lesson, Here?
My point in writing this wee treatise is to point out that we can't always base our buying decisions purely on the "number of start" attached to a particular item. We need to take the time to actually double check what people are saying.
Once the garbage has been discounted from your consideration, take time to actually read some reviews. I've found — on more than a few occasions — that some of the things people complain about aren't necessarily relevant to how I plan to use a product.
For example, complaints that "it corrodes when it gets wet" aren't relevant if your particular use case never involves going out in the rain, right?
This might all sound remarkably obvious to some people, but it's surprising (and alarming!) how many people are disappointed with purchases... and yet answer "no" when I asked them whether they actually read the reviews on the product!
Thanks for reading, and have fun during the coming shopping season!
How about YOU? Do you take the time to actually READ product reviews when shopping online? Or do you just go by the rating? Or are you not much of an online shopper? Comments, feedback and other interaction is invited and welcomed! Because — after all — SOCIAL content is about interacting, right? Leave a comment — share your experiences — be part of the conversation!
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Created at 20201125 12:51 PDT
0140/1367
I read reviews and think at least half of them are fake...
The ones written by retarded people are probably the real ones!
Hah! That cracked me up... yes, there are a lot of tards in the review listings, sometimes.
Yep ! I read reviews... a lot of them and I have noticed the same things.
More people who are unhappy seem to take the time to come complain about things than do people who are satisfied with their item. I also discount the bad reviews if they are not directly related to the actual product. Sometimes it seems like someone's review is for a different product than is shown. Not sure how that happens, but it does.
You do have to read between some of the lines for sure in order to try to discern which reviews are actually valid.
Because I am doing somewhat more online shopping than usual, I've just started to really notice how you have to be very careful with just going by "star ratings" without taking the time to look at where they came from.
You're right, people are often more into letting off steam over a product they *don't" like.