Reports suggest that Amazon is improving its reviews system. The upshot will be that newer, more useful reviews, will be considered as more powerful than old reviews, or those from buyers who haven’t actually bought the goods in question when products are rated on the site.
Amazon’s Julie Law said; “The system will learn what reviews are most helpful to customers…and it improves over time. It’s all meant to make customer reviews more useful.”
As the guys at CNET note, the changes in the first instance are unlikely to be noticeable but, presumably over time, we’ll be clearer about the impact of the new criteria. So, keep ’em peeled.
The new reviews changes are apparently already in action although we think just Stateside. It’s not clear when the changes will land in the UK. But, if you do notice changes, do give us a shout.
4 Responses
Shame eBay don’t differentiate between a product review and seller feedback like Amazon do. Shameful that if a buyer doesn’t like the ending in a book they can cause a negative affect on a business.
We manage our own brand and sell mainly on Amazons so this could be a major factor for us. Will be keeping a close eye on this…
as a side note, i REALLY like and find useful the “ask a buyer quesiton feature”, where you can ask people that ACTUALLY have bought the item a question perhaps that only an owner would know.
ive asked a couple in the recent weeks.
one on how the largest capacity SD card for a car stereo i was wanting to purchase, and another on the size of a microwave recently bought (after i couldnt find info anywhere), on both occasions i got meaningful answers within half a day.
very useful feature, and one that surely results in questions being converted to sales (as both mine did).