Review site

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A review site is a website on which reviews can be posted about people, businesses, products, or services. These sites may use Web 2.0 techniques to gather reviews from site users or may employ professional writers to author reviews on the topic of concern for the site.

Contents

Early examples of review sites included ConsumerDemocracy.com, Complaints.com, planetfeedback.com, [1] and Epinions.com. [2]

Business models

Review sites are generally supported by advertising. Some business review sites may also allow businesses to pay for enhanced listings, which do not affect the reviews and ratings. Product review sites may be supported by providing affiliate links to the websites that sell the reviewed items, which pay the site on a per-click or per-sale basis.

With the growing popularity of affiliate programs on the Internet, a new sort of review site has emerged: the affiliate product review site. This type of site is usually professionally designed and written to maximize conversions, and is used by e-commerce marketers. It is often based on a blog platform like WordPress or Squarespace, has a privacy and contact page to help with SEO, and has commenting and interactivity turned off. It will also have an e-mail gathering device in the form of an opt-in, or drop-down list to help the aspiring e-commerce business person build an e-mail list to market to.

Because of the specialized marketing thrust of this type of website, the reviews are not always seen to be objective by consumers. Because of this, the FTC has provided several guidelines requiring publishers to disclose when they benefit monetarily from the content in the form of advertising, affiliate marketing, etc. [3]

Impact

Studies by independent research groups like Forrester Research, comScore, The Kelsey Group, and the Word of Mouth Marketing Association show that rating and review sites influence consumer shopping behavior. [4] In an academic study published in 2008, empirical results demonstrated that the number of online user reviews is a good indicator of the intensity of underlying word-of-mouth effect and increase awareness. [5]

Anonymity

Originally, reviews were generally anonymous, and in many countries, review sites often have policies that preclude the release of any identifying information without a court order. According to Kurt Opsahl, a staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), anonymity of reviewers is important. [6]

Reviewers are always required to provide an email address and are often encouraged to use their real name. Yelp also requires a photo of the reviewer. [7]

Rating site

A rating site (commonly known as a rate-me site) is a website designed for users to vote, rate people, content, or other things. Rating sites can range from tangible to non-tangible attributes, but most commonly, rating sites are based around physical appearances such as body parts, voice, personality, etc. They may also be devoted to the subjects' occupational ability, for example teachers, professors, lawyers, doctors, etc. Rating sites can typically be on anything a user can think of. [8]

Features

Rating sites typically show a series of images (or other content) in random fashion, or chosen by computer algorithm, instead of allowing users to choose. Users are given a choice of rating or assessment, which is generally done quickly and without great deliberation. Users score items on a scale of 1 to 10, yes or no. Others, such as BabeVsBabe.com, ask users to choose between two pictures. Typically, the site gives instant feedback in terms of the item's running score, or the percentage of other users who agree with the assessment. Rating sites sometimes offer aggregate statistics or "best" and "worst" lists. Most allow users to submit their own image, sample, or other relevant content for others to rate. Some require the submission as a condition of membership.

Rating sites usually provide some features of social network services and online communities such as discussion forums messaging, and private messaging. Some function as a form of dating service, in that for a fee they allow users to contact other users. Many social networks and other sites include rating features. For example, MySpace and TradePics have optional "rank" features for users to be rated by other users.

Subject matter

One category of rating sites, such as Hot or Not or HotFlation, is devoted to rating contributors' physical attractiveness. Other looks-based rating sites include RateMyFace.com (an early site, launched in the Summer of 1999) and NameMyVote, which asks users to guess a person's political party based on their looks. Some sites are devoted to rating the appearance of pets (e.g. kittenwar.com, petsinclothes.com, and meormypet.com). Another class allows users to rate short video or music clips. One variant, a "Darwinian poetry" site, allows users to compare two samples of entirely computer-generated poetry using a Condorcet method. Successful poems "mate" to produce poems of ever-increasing appeal. Yet others are devoted to disliked men (DoucheBagAlert), bowel movements (ratemypoo.com), unsigned bands (RateBandsOnline.com), politics (RateMyTory.Com), nightclubs, business professionals, clothes, cars, and many other subjects.

When rating sites are dedicated to rating products (epinions.com), brands (brandmojo.org), services, or businesses rather than to rating people (i-rate.me), and are used for more serious or well thought-out ratings, they tend to be called review sites, although the distinction is not exact.

History

The popularity of rating people and their abilities on a scale, such as 1–10, traces back to at least the late 20th century, and the algorithms for aggregating quantitative rating scores far earlier than that. The 1979 film 10 is an example of this. The title derives from a rating system Dudley Moore uses to grade women based upon beauty, with a 10 being the epitome of attractiveness. The notion of a "perfect ten" came into common usage as a result of this film.[ citation needed ] In the film, Moore rates Bo Derek an "11".

In 1990, one of the first computer-based photographic attractiveness rating studies was conducted. During this year psychologists J. H. Langlois and L. A. Roggman examined whether facial attractiveness was linked to geometric averageness. To test their hypothesis, they selected photographs of 192 male and female Caucasian faces; each of which was computer scanned and digitized. They then made computer-processed composites of each image, as 2-, 4-, 8-, 16-, and 32-face composites. The individual and composite faces were then rated for attractiveness by 300 judges on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = very unattractive, 5 = very attractive). The 32-composite face was the most visually attractive of all the faces. [9] Subsequent studies were done on a 10-point scale.

In 1992, Perfect 10 magazine and video programming was launched by Xui, the original executive editor of Spin magazine, to feature only women who would rank 10 for attractiveness. Julie Kruis, a swimsuit model, was the original spokesmodel. In 1996, Rasen created the first "Perfect 10 Model Search" at the Pure Platinum club near Fort Lauderdale, Florida. His contests were broadcast on Network 1, a domestic C-band satellite channel. Other unrelated "Perfect 10" contests became popular throughout the 1990s.

The first ratings sites started in 1999, with RateMyFace.com (created by Michael Hussey) and TeacherRatings.com (created by John Swapceinski, re-launched with Hussey and further developed by Patrick Nagle as RateMyProfessors). The most popular of all time, Hot or Not, was launched in October 2000. Hot or Not generated many spin-offs and imitators. There are now hundreds of such sites, and even meta-sites that categorize them all. The rating site concept has also been expanded to include Twitter and Facebook accounts that provide ratings, such as the humorous Twitter account WeRateDogs.

Criticism

Most review sites make little or no attempt to restrict postings, or to verify the information in the reviews. Critics point out that positive reviews are sometimes written by the businesses or individuals being reviewed, while negative reviews may be written by competitors, disgruntled employees, or anyone with a grudge against the business being reviewed. Some merchants also offer incentives for customers to review their products favorably, which skews reviews in their favor. [10] So called reputation management firms may also submit false positive reviews on behalf of businesses. In 2011, RateMDs.com and Yelp detected dozens of positive reviews of doctors, submitted from the same IP addresses by a firm called Medical Justice. [11]

Furthermore, studies of research methodology have shown that in forums where people are able to post opinions publicly, group polarization often occurs, and the result is very positive comments, very negative comments, and little in between, meaning that those who would have been in the middle are either silent or pulled to one extreme or the other. [12]

Rating sites have a social feedback effect; some high school principals and administrators, for example, have begun to regularly monitor the status of their teaching staff via student controlled "rating sites". Some looks-based sites have come under criticism for promoting vanity and self-consciousness. Some claim they potentially expose users to sexual predators. Most rating sites suffer from similar self-selection bias since only highly motivated individuals devote their time to completing these rankings, and not a fair sampling of the population.

Response to criticism

Many operators of review sites acknowledge that reviews may not be objective, and that ratings may not be statistically valid.

In some cases, government authorities have taken legal actions against businesses that post false reviews. In 2009, the State of New York required Lifestyle Lift, a cosmetic surgery company, to pay $300,000 in fines. [13]

See also

Related Research Articles

Hot or Not is a rating site that allowed users to rate the attractiveness of photos submitted voluntarily by others. The site offered a matchmaking engine called 'Meet Me' and an extended profile feature called "Hotlists". The domain hotornot.com is currently owned by Hot Or Not Limited, and was previously owned by Avid Life Media. 'Hot or Not' was a significant influence on the people who went on to create the social media sites Facebook and YouTube.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Network effect</span> Increasing value with increasing participation

In economics, a network effect is the phenomenon by which the value or utility a user derives from a good or service depends on the number of users of compatible products. Network effects are typically positive feedback systems, resulting in users deriving more and more value from a product as more users join the same network. The adoption of a product by an additional user can be broken into two effects: an increase in the value to all other users and also the enhancement of other non-users' motivation for using the product.

An online community, also called an internet community or web community, is a community whose members interact with each other primarily via the Internet. Members of the community usually share common interests. For many, online communities may feel like home, consisting of a "family of invisible friends". Additionally, these "friends" can be connected through gaming communities and gaming companies. Those who wish to be a part of an online community usually have to become a member via a specific site and thereby gain access to specific content or links.

RateMyProfessors.com (RMP) is a review site founded in May 1999 by John Swapceinski, a software engineer from Menlo Park, California, which allows anyone to assign ratings to professors and campuses of American, Canadian, and United Kingdom institutions. The site was originally launched as TeacherRatings.com and converted to RateMyProfessors in 2001. RMP was acquired in 2005 by Patrick Nagle and William DeSantis. Nagle and DeSantis later resold RMP in 2007 to Viacom's MTVU, MTV's College channel. Viacom owned and operated RateMyProfessors.com for a decade. Cheddar announced its acquisition of RMP from Viacom in 2018. RMP is the largest online destination for professor ratings. The site includes 8,000+ schools, 1.7 million professors, and over 19 million ratings.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Testimonial</span> Statement extolling the virtue of a product or person

In promotion and advertising, a testimonial or show consists of a person's written or spoken statement extolling the virtue of a product. The term "testimonial" most commonly applies to the sales-pitches attributed to ordinary citizens, whereas the word "endorsement" usually applies to pitches by celebrities. Testimonials can be part of communal marketing.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Epinions</span> Defunct general consumer review website

Epinions.com was a general consumer review site established in 1999. Epinions was acquired in 2003 by DealTime, later Shopping.com, which was acquired by eBay in 2005. Epinions users could access paid product reviews; the company sold advertising on its site and shared the revenue with authors as an incentive for quality content. Competition from sites that crowdsourced reviews for free led to years of financial decline. On 25 March 2014, all community features, and features for submitting and editing reviews, were disabled. Subsequently, in May 2018, the site was fully closed down, and URLs in the epinions.com domain redirect to Shopping.com.

A review is an evaluation of a publication, product, service, or company or a critical take on current affairs in literature, politics or culture. In addition to a critical evaluation, the review's author may assign the work a rating to indicate its relative merit.

The Zagat Survey, commonly referred to as Zagat and established by Tim and Nina Zagat in 1979, is an organization which collects and correlates the ratings of restaurants by diners. For their first guide, covering New York City, the Zagats surveyed their friends. At its height around 2005, the Zagat Survey included 70 cities, with reviews based on the input of 250,000 individuals with the guides reporting on and rating restaurants, hotels, nightlife, shopping, zoos, museums, music, movies, theaters, golf courses, and airlines. The guides are sold in book form, and were formerly only available as a paid subscription on the Zagat website.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yelp</span> Directory service and online review forum

Yelp Inc. is an American company that develops the Yelp.com website and the Yelp mobile app, which publishes crowd-sourced reviews about businesses. It also operates Yelp Guest Manager, a table reservation service. It is headquartered in San Francisco, California.

A rating scale is a set of categories designed to obtain information about a quantitative or a qualitative attribute. In the social sciences, particularly psychology, common examples are the Likert response scale and 0-10 rating scales, where a person selects the number that reflecting the perceived quality of a product.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">RateItAll</span>

RateItAll is a consumer-review website that also incorporates social networking. Consumers review diverse products and services, share information, and get paid modestly for their reviews. Its reviews include a five-star ranking system for those items being rated. It is one of the largest consumer-review internet based services, offering free access to over 8 million reviews posted on its website to date.

In physical attractiveness studies, averageness describes the physical beauty that results from averaging the facial features of people of the same gender and approximately the same age. The majority of averageness studies have focused on photographic overlay studies of human faces, in which images are morphed together. The term "average" is used strictly to denote the technical definition of the mathematical mean. An averaged face is not unremarkable, but is, in fact, quite good looking. Nor is it typical in the sense of common or frequently occurring in the population, though it appears familiar, and is typical in the sense that it is a good example of a face that is representative of the category of faces.

ResellerRatings is an online ratings site where consumers submit ratings and reviews of online retailers, and online retailers participate to respond to reviewers and to gather reviews from their customers post-purchase. As of July 11, 2017, the site had over 6.2 million user-submitted reviews for 202,000 stores.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Content marketing</span> Form of marketing focused on creating content for a targeted audience online

Content marketing is a form of marketing focused on creating, publishing, and distributing content for a targeted audience online. It is often used by businesses in order to achieve the following goals: attract attention and generate leads, expand their customer base, generate or increase online sales, increase brand awareness or credibility, and engage an online community of users. Content marketing attracts new customers by creating and sharing valuable free content as well as by helping companies create sustainable brand loyalty, providing valuable information to consumers, and creating a willingness to purchase products from the company in the future.

A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews and ratings of products and services. This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users can view the reviews, selling information to third parties about consumer tendencies, and creating databases for companies to learn about their actual and potential customers. The system enables users to easily compare many different reviews of the same work. Many of these systems calculate an approximate average assessment, usually based on assigning a numeric value to each review related to its degree of positive rating of the work.

Marketing buzz or simply buzz—a term used in viral marketing—is the interaction of consumers and users with a product or service which amplifies or alters the original marketing message. This emotion, energy, excitement, or anticipation about a product or service can be positive or negative. Buzz can be generated by intentional marketing activities by the brand owner or it can be the result of an independent event that enters public awareness through social or traditional media such as newspapers. Marketing buzz originally referred to oral communication but in the age of Web 2.0, social media such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube are now the dominant communication channels for marketing buzz.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Social media marketing</span> Promotion of products or services on social media

Social media marketing is the use of social media platforms and websites to promote a product or service. Although the terms e-marketing and digital marketing are still dominant in academia, social media marketing is becoming more popular for both practitioners and researchers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Franklin Report</span>

The Franklin Report is an independently published guidebook that primarily rates home maintenance and renovation providers such as interior decorators, architects, and contractors. According to the New York Times, it is the first publication to review and rate Interior Designers and Decorators Founded by CEO Elizabeth Franklin in 1999 to review companies in the New York City area, it now covers also Los Angeles, Chicago, Connecticut/Westchester, and the Palm Beach to Miami area in Florida. Initially sold in book form, The Franklin Report is now predominantly an online presence with a user review-based rating system. Town & Country magazine named it "the design version of the foodie bible Zagat.".

The reputation marketing field has evolved from the marriage of the fields reputation management and brand marketing, and involves a brand's reputation being vetted online in real-time by consumers leaving online reviews and citing experiences on social networking sites. With the popularity of social media in the new millennium reputation, vetting has turned from word-of-mouth to the digital platform, forcing businesses to take active measures to stay competitive and profitable.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">User review</span> Consumer appraisal posted online

A user review is a review conducted by any person who has access to the internet and publishes their experience to a review site or social media platform following product testing or the evaluation of a service. User reviews are commonly provided by consumers who volunteer to write the review, rather than professionals who are paid to evaluate the product or service. User reviews might be compared to professional nonprofit reviews from a consumer organization, or to promotional reviews from an advertiser or company marketing a product. Growth of social media platforms has enabled the facilitation of interaction between consumers after a review has been placed on online communities such as blogs, internet forums or other popular platforms.

References

  1. ↑ Viehland, Dennis W. (2000). "Critical Success Factors for Developing an e-Business Strategy". Research Letters in the Information and Mathematical Sciences (1): 1–7. hdl:10179/4385.
  2. ↑ Bronson, Po (11 July 1999). "Instant Company". The New York Times Magazine. Retrieved 4 November 2020.
  3. ↑ "The FTC's Endorsement Guides: What People Are Asking". Federal Trade Commission. 2017-09-07. Retrieved 2022-06-30.
  4. ↑ ""Online Consumer-Generated Reviews Have Significant Impact on Offline Purchase Behavior," November 29, 2007". Comscore.com. 2007-11-29. Retrieved 2011-02-25.
  5. ↑ ""Do Online Reviews Really Matter? An Empirical Investigation" May 13, 2008" (PDF). Elsevier B.V. 2008-05-13. Retrieved 2012-08-15.
  6. ↑ "Sacha Pfeiffer, "Ratings sites flourish behind a veil of anonymity," Boston Globe, September 20, 2006". Boston.com. 2006-09-20. Retrieved 2011-02-25.
  7. ↑ "How online customer reviews work". www.business.qld.gov.au. 21 June 2012. Retrieved 4 November 2020.
  8. ↑ Pfeiffer, Sacha. (September 20, 2006). "Rating Sites Flourish Behind a veil of Anonymity". The Boston Globe.
  9. ↑ Langlois, J. H. & Roggman, L. A. (1990). "Attractive faces are only average". Psychological Science, 1, 115–121.
  10. ↑ He, Sherry; Hollenbeck, Brett; Proserpio, Davide (2021-12-10). "The Market for Fake Reviews". Rochester, NY. SSRN   3664992.{{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  11. ↑ ""Medical Justice caught impersonating happy patients on Yelp, RateMDs," May 27, 2011". Ars Technica. 2011-05-27. Retrieved 2011-05-27.
  12. ↑ ""Polarization: Planned and Spontaneous," December 3, 2005". Uchicagolaw.typepad.com. 2005-12-03. Retrieved 2011-02-25.
  13. ↑ ""Company Settles Case of Reviews It Faked," July 14, 2009". The New York Times. 2009-07-14. Retrieved 2009-07-14.
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