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Acustomer review is anevaluation of a product or service made by someone who has purchased and used, or had experience with, a product or service. Customer reviews are a form ofcustomer feedback onelectronic commerce andonline shopping sites. There are also dedicatedreview sites, some of which use customer reviews as well as or instead of professional reviews. The reviews may themselves be graded for usefulness or accuracy by other users.
Before the arrival of the internet, customers could review products and services through customer comment boxes andcustomer service helplines. These methods still exist today although internet review sites are used more in recent years.
The reliability of customer reviews has been questioned.[1] Abuses akin toballot stuffing of favourable reviews by the seller (known as incentivized reviews), or negative reviews by competitors, need to be policed by the review host site. Indeed, gathering fake reviews has become big business.[2] In 2012, for example, fake book reviews have been revealed as significantly affecting ratings onAmazon.[3][4] In 2016 Amazon banned the practice of reviewing complimentary products, researchers have shown that the process still continued as of 2021, but without any disclosures.[5]
Since few sites restrict users to reviewing only items they have actually purchased, it is difficult to know if a customer is real, has actually used the product they are reviewing, and is giving honest, unbiased feedback about the product or services being reviewed. Tools likeFakespot andReviewMeta can help spot fake reviews on shopping sites like Amazon.[6] Unfortunately, the tools do not work on most other websites that show customer reviews.
Public calls have been growing stronger, demanding that review sites be held accountable for publishing fake reviews. Most recently (June 2021), theCompetition and Markets Authority (CMA) in the United Kingdom has launched an investigation into whether Amazon andGoogle are doing enough to prevent fake reviews from being published on their sites.[7] Both businesses claim to have sufficient resources and policies in place to prevent fake reviews from being published.[8] Legal steps could be taken against the giants if CMA determines those claims to be false. The problem has become so widespread that in 2023, the FTC announced plans to ban fake reviews and testimonials.[9]
Whether a customer receives an invitation or not, many businesses have expressed the wish that customers let the business know in the moment if some aspect of their interaction or product is unsatisfactory, so they can have the opportunity to fix it on the spot or provide compensation, rather than customers leaving unnecessarily disappointed and writing negative reviews.[10]
In 2010, British historianOrlando Figes posted reviews on Amazon praising his own work and criticizing that of his rivals.[11]
In August 2012,The New York Times revealed thatJohn Locke had paid an online service to write reviews of his books, in order to artificially boost sales.[12]
In 2022, researchers fromUCLA documented that millions of Amazon sellers purchase fake 5-star reviews through private Facebook groups.[13]
Humorous customer reviews are common on some major shopping sites, such as Amazon. These are oftenironically orsarcastically praising reviews of products deemedkitsch or mundane. Another example ismethylated spirits described in the style of awine review.[14] A product may become aninternet meme attracting large numbers of spoof reviews, which may boost its sales.[14][15] Famous examples includeTuscan Whole Milk and theThree Wolf Moon T-shirt.[15]
Examples of spoof reviews include:
British spoofers have targeted severalbuild to order novelty products made by Media Storehouse from two million licensedphoto library images, including acanvas print of minor celebrityPaul Ross, and ajigsaw puzzle of Nick Humby, a former finance director ofManchester United.[14]
I need this app for my refrigerator. [...] I put a red light in my fridge and went down for some string cheese at 3 a.m. and ended up with a hot dog because it looked the same in red light. Thanks a lot.