> This is clearly total and utter crap, as anybody who has spent any time on Amazon knows.
"Today's Deals" is absolutely infested with brand new products with tons of suspicious reviews, and has been for the last year. Even just checking the date from the first to the last review (e.g. one week) reveals problems for a product with 100+ reviews.
> I don't see any easy answers to Amazon's problems.
There's no "easy" answers, but user reputation is a good start. Right now every review is worth the same as every other review, but looking at the data available we can rate reviews:
- Did the verified buyer actually receive the item before review?
- Is the reviewer's account brand new?
- What does account activity look like outside of reviewing (e.g. Do they browse products? Shop? Check order history? How many non-buy/non-review interactions do we have for every review posted?)
- How did they get back to the product to review it (e.g. direct link? third party site? order history?)
- Did they use a coupon for a discount on the product? Is that coupon posted on Amazon? What % was the coupon? If it is 90% are they even a verified buyer?
- Was the shipment tracked? If not how do we know they even received anything?
I've heard of folks gaming at least some of these points by offering refunds (through a different channel, e.g. paypal) to buyers to leave a positive review. I don't know if it's true, but it definitely seems plausible and an easy way to buy reviews from 'legit' buyers.
Amazon could counter this by offering a big bounty on turning in sellers that do this, and/or financially penalizing them (the sellers) if sufficient evidence is produced.
"Today's Deals" is absolutely infested with brand new products with tons of suspicious reviews, and has been for the last year. Even just checking the date from the first to the last review (e.g. one week) reveals problems for a product with 100+ reviews.
> I don't see any easy answers to Amazon's problems.
There's no "easy" answers, but user reputation is a good start. Right now every review is worth the same as every other review, but looking at the data available we can rate reviews:
- Did the verified buyer actually receive the item before review?
- Is the reviewer's account brand new?
- What does account activity look like outside of reviewing (e.g. Do they browse products? Shop? Check order history? How many non-buy/non-review interactions do we have for every review posted?)
- How did they get back to the product to review it (e.g. direct link? third party site? order history?)
- Did they use a coupon for a discount on the product? Is that coupon posted on Amazon? What % was the coupon? If it is 90% are they even a verified buyer?
- Was the shipment tracked? If not how do we know they even received anything?