Reviews for sale ?

[Rya Nitely]

---

VonGklugelstein Alter wrote:

This whole situation is a fraud to trick people into purchasing an item.

---

And it does trick people...but at a cost.

At some point these merchants stop paying for reviews in order to maximise profit. Once they have accumulated a high enough number of 5 star reviews they stop paying. Now any new customer will be attracted by the numerous 5 star reviews, and when they purchase the item they will have high expectations - they will expect it to be dazzled and amazed like others were. These new customers are very likely to be disappointed - any fault in the item will be extremely annoying. The outcome - 5 star reviews quickly start turning into to 1 and 2 stars. I've had a close look at a particular merchant who paid for reviews and now I see this very trend. The payments have obviously stopped.

It's not worth it. I would prefer my customers to have a lower expectation and then be pleasantly surprised.

[VonGklugelstein Alter]

---

Rya Nitely wrote:

---

VonGklugelstein Alter wrote:

This whole situation is a fraud to trick people into purchasing an item.

---

And it does trick people...but at a cost.

At some point these merchants stop paying for reviews in order to maximise profit. Once they have accumulated a high enough number of 5 star reviews they stop paying. Now any new customer will be attracted by the numerous 

5 star reviews, and when they purchase the item 

they will have high expectations - 

they will expect it to be 

dazzled and amazed

 like others were. These new customers are very likely to be disappointed - any fault in the item will be extremely annoying. The outcome - 5 star reviews quickly start turning into to 1 and 2 stars. I've had a close look at a particular merchant who paid for reviews and now I see this very trend. The payments have obviously stopped.

It's not worth it. I would prefer my customers to have a lower expectation and then be pleasantly surprised.

---

lol.. this particular merchant magically has 1 or 2 star reviews disappear withing a few hours and adds 10 more reviews within minutes

 

[Spica Inventor]

"Here is the source of that policy:

Writing Reviews on the Marketplace

"Policies and guidelines"

 

Rules that are not enforced are nothing but phony P.R. Asking 'pretty please' in the guidelines is just a way for L.L. to cover their butts while all the time actually encouraging the behavior. ;-)

[Spica Inventor]

'The only way they can encourage inworld shopping is to block free members without an inworld store from offering items on the marketplace. Many of the big sellers on SLM are by people who do not have an inworld store!!!!  It used to be (During SLX days) that the big sellers were mostly by stores with a big inworld presence'.

 

Oh there's lots of ways to realistically and effectively encourage in world shopping more, but like you said, the merchants won't like any of those ways, and L.L. is affraid of losing a bunch of merchants from change outrage if even only temporarily. The best way imho would be for L.L. to take a much bigger cut in TMP sales above the 5% rate and at the same time reduce tier costs in world to make it revenue neutral for a while until more peeps start coming in to play the game now that they can much more likely afford to rent property and furnish their property (including merchants). TMP will always be the best place to find things quickly however and would complement the system well serving more as a place to search for things rather than purchasing things in many cases.

[Deja Letov]

---

VonGklugelstein Alter wrote:

I just saw that a merchant who is selling similar product as me has been getting like 20 reviews a day on a few items. After some research it turns out the merchant is paying for these reviews and therefore also paying people to buy their product in effect increasing the relevancy of their product.  

 

What is the story? Has The marketplace become this sleazy that anything goes?

---

Ya it has. The problem is LL has made the MP a complete joke when it comes to searching for anything. I think people who sell mainly on the MP may believe LL is pushing for more in world shopping and trying to kill the MP, where those of us who do business mainly world feel the exact opposite. Everything that happens to me and affects me negatively has felt like LL pushing people to use the MP more and more and do less in world shopping.  I think they do it by making it harder and harder for merchants to compete on the MP in a fair fashion. I'm sure it has something to do with their profits, since they take 5%, of course they would rather have MP sales and make money, since they make nothing on in world, assuming you have  MP store and in world store. But the relevance search is a total waste of time. It can be gamed with reviews, sales, views, and any other unknown ways to get a higher placement. to think they could have made the relevance search based on...you know...relevance...how rediculous would that have been?

[Medhue Simoni]

---

Rya Nitely wrote:

---

VonGklugelstein Alter wrote:

This whole situation is a fraud to trick people into purchasing an item.

---

And it does trick people...but at a cost.

At some point these merchants stop paying for reviews in order to maximise profit. Once they have accumulated a high enough number of 5 star reviews they stop paying. Now any new customer will be attracted by the numerous 

5 star reviews, and when they purchase the item 

they will have high expectations - 

they will expect it to be 

dazzled and amazed

 like others were. These new customers are very likely to be disappointed - any fault in the item will be extremely annoying. The outcome - 5 star reviews quickly start turning into to 1 and 2 stars. I've had a close look at a particular merchant who paid for reviews and now I see this very trend. The payments have obviously stopped.

It's not worth it. I would prefer my customers to have a lower expectation and then be pleasantly surprised.

---

Yeah, this is kind of what I have seen. Normally, people don't care enough to write a review. When the review convinces them to buy the item, and the item turns out to be crap, it is alot more likely the real customer will come back to review the item and give it a more meaningful review. On this current MP, it is quite a bit more effort to even figure out how to review an item, so I don't think the karmic influence is as strong. Over the years tho, I've seen many people go out of their way to correctly review an item. Of course, I've observed most of this on my own products. Quite a few times now, I've actually had, what seems like competitors writing a bad review, and some customer comes along and writes a beautiful review just because of the bad review. They usually reference the bad review, which is how I know. It makes me laugh every time I see this.

Again tho, this BS stuff goes on because LL has no idea how to make a review system that won't be gamed. The way you get around people trying to game the system is by making the process more work than it is worth. I don't mean make it hard to write or find the review section, which LL has done. The old rating and review system on Xstreet was perfect. I've pointed this out many times now, but I'll point it out again. When you have a system that is so dang easy to leave a rating or review, then MANY more reviews will be given. With the old system, I got dozens of ratings and a couple of reviews almost every single day. When I first started selling on Xstreet, I had many competitors buy things just to give me a 1 star. This totally pissed me off, cause other than a couple of 1 star rating, all the rest were 4 or 5 stars. Within a month or 2 tho, those 2 1 star reviews were massively drowned out by the 50 some 4 or 5 star ratings, as well as a bunch of awesome reviews. That competitor did not end up affecting the sales on those items at all.

Nowadays, with our current system, it's rare as hell to get any kind of review, and this makes it super easy for those that want to cheat the system. We can thank our fellow cry baby merchants for this current system, as they complained about the old system and LL was too ignorant to understand that a certain amount of people will always complain. The simple fact that LL doesn't seem to understand how bad this current system is, shows me even more that they have no clue what they are doing.

 To the point about LL not caring if people scam the system or not, they should care. Why do you think people leave? When you are constantly blowing real money on BS, eventually you realise that you just spent hundreds of real dollars and don't even have something decent to show for it. Would you stick around if you came to this realization? Then again, I really don't think most of the people that work for LL even know what a good product is. I just got 1 of LL's free gifts for premium members, and I'm sure I could find a freebie that has better coding. It's a vehicle and it can barely turn.

[Darrius Gothly]

I agree with you Medhue that the current Review system, with its nearly insurmountable difficulty in posting a review or rating, has completely destroyed any value a rating/review system should have. But I have to disagree that the "crybaby" Merchants are the cause.

When the new system was first envisioned, the dev team's goal was to improve it by making it simpler to police and by implementing methods to ease the policing. They even intended to have feedback created by "review hit parties" serving to impede themselves ... those posting lots of negative reviews simply to injure a competitor would find their ratings instead adding to the target's overall rating rather than subtracting from it.

But then came changes in the team, the original designers/developers moved on, their intentions were lost and the replacements had no clue what was intended or even how to make it happen. As a result they snipped here, whacked there .. and before long the entire system was rendered impotent. And there it stands.

Yes, the more vocal among us that wanted improvements or changes did inspire the initial design. But the goals were lost in a series of incompetent internal changes and an overall lack of desire to do anything worthwhile on the MP. Now that DD is here, all the promised improvements that were postponed because "we're focused only on DD" should start flowing off the drawing boards of the CTL Dev Team, but so far we've seen nothing of the sort. Instead they seem to have just stopped doing anything at all.

But then, sometime back I did mention that LL moving their focus to other products would negatively impact development of the SL Platform (and its attendant services). I just see this as more proof that my prediction is coming to pass.

[Madeliefste Oh]

We LL allows merchants to pay for reviews, the system should reveal what reviews are paid for and what reviews are spontaneous. They can add a field or radio button or something saying 'I was paid for this review' and ' I was not paid for this review', that the reviewer must check.

[Medhue Simoni]

Well, I really think that what you describe is the core problem with LL. We've basically had a constant turn over of LL employees, as well as management, since SL's beginning. The complexities of SL just don't allow for newbs to walk in and be able to even remotely understand the issues, or the problems. I would estimate that it would take any normal person years to have even a slight understanding of SL and it's issues. So, although I might seem harsh in my criticism of LL, I do have some sympathy for the Lindens.

What is frustrating, is seeing some areas that constantly get attention from specific Lindens and other areas like animation being ignored for over half a decade now. It's not like I haven't personally gone directly to Lindens that have been around for years, numerous times, only to be further ignored.

I also think that the size of the company becomes a big problem. When an issue is brought up, it gets passed along and passed along, eventually landing on a desk that can't do anything about it, or they don't see the importance. I've dealt with numerous other companies. When I see a major issue and send them some kind of correspondence, the issue is fixed immediately. Why? Cause I'm communicating with 1 of a small group that can easily and quickly determine how relevant the issue is, and actually do something about it. It's not 10 different people that the issue has to be passed to.

Even my recent encounter with Cloud Party, shows how a small group can be massively better than some large corporation with hundreds of employees. They are a small team of like less than 10 people. When I ran into many issues with animations in CP, the CEO commented directly to my forum post. He basically told me that they had no plans to alter the avatar skeleton and rigging. When others came out and had similar issues, CP immediately knew they had some serious issues that would affect their growth later and are now working on a whole new avatar. Now, I won't take any credit for their decision, cause my knowledge of their avatar was limited, and others pointed out more clearly what the issues were.

[VonGklugelstein Alter]

---

Madeliefste Oh wrote:

We LL allows merchants to pay for reviews, the system should reveal what reviews are paid for and what reviews are spontaneous. They can add a field or radio button or something saying 'I was paid for this review' and ' I was not paid for this review', that the reviewer must check.

---

And because everyone is so damn honest they would pick the " I was not paid" selection...

I am almost at the point where I am convinced that the reviews must go away completely. They can keep the comments but reviews must go. What they really need is a field in the listing that shows total number purchased. This is a more acurate indicator how a product performs, even if people game this.

If they want to keep this system as is, they should install a rating system for buyers. This way the douche that left a bunch of 1 star " Ok but not stunning"  reviews on my items can be "derated", since I cannot go find him and kick his ass.. once buyers collect enough bad ratings they should be IP and HW banned from making purchases on the MP. (SLX had some similar safety features that blocked alts from purchasing or reviewing)

 

Maybe I wil file a complaint with the FTC since the review process as it is set up violates the law.

 

 

 

[Deja Letov]

I was cruising around the marketplace and came across a system that appears to work like an advertising campaign that you pay for to let you list URLs of products you want reviews for along with how much you are willing to pay for those reviews. The system automatically pays people when they leave a review on those products you listed. personally, I think it's a lot of bull*** that they are so tight about category listings, keyword listings, false advertising, etc...when they clearly allow a system to be sold that is designed to game your results. makes no sense.

[Toysoldier Thor]

I have been watching this thread pop up on my android for the past few days and stayed quiet - thinking the topic will go to sleep soon (as it has many times in the past).  But it keeps going.

I am surprised how long its been talked about here - the reason is because this issue i nthe MP merchant community has come up as a sore spot OVER and OVER and OVER.

We all know that the MP listing reviews / votes are totally gamed by so many merchants.  Its sickening to see over all these years how they have been.  Merchants that pay for good reviews.  Merchants that use alts to create tons of 5 STARS.  Merchants and enemies of of other merchants that Grief competing listings....  We all know it exists.  LL knows it has existed since reviews were put in as a feature.

Example:  I watch as my oldest and by far most popular selling sculpty landscape pack that has made me $1000's of US income over the past 3 years since I released it still only has 29 5 STAR reviews.  the same pack that I get countless of compliments on over the years..... and I have only got 29 reviews.  I have seen this same listing even receive a burst of 3 1-STARS in the matter of a week which could only have been gamed by someone with a grudge.

And yet I see some competing merchants who have built up 100's of reviews for their product.  I dont game my reviews and if someone wants to come back and post a review vote - great.  But that has only happened naturally 29 times in 3 years.... yet other merchants can "naturally" and without gaming have customers post 100's of reviews?  Sorry - its gamed.

Yet, LL stands to its position and regardless of how many times Merchants have told them to REMOVE the review system that is clearly GAMED... they continue to allow SL MP Customers to be bamboozled and tricked into making buying decisions based on false / bought / gamed data.  LL has no care that customers are allowed to be tricked based on a gamed feature they support.

 

Every time this topic comes up - the answer is nearly uninimous that its unlikely to be fixed so REMOVE THE FEATURE!!  Only allow customers to post COMMENT REVIEWS and also allow Merchants the ability to Post rebuttal postings when a customer makes a review claim that is unfair.

 

But.... we all know that LL Commerce Team is not listening to us and will continue to NOT do anything about this sad situation.  So unethical merchants will continue to game.... customers will continue to be fooled.... honest merchants will continue to **bleep** and complain how its not fair that corrupt merchant are allowed to game... and LL will ignore us all.

 

Sooooo - when does this thread end until the next cycle?  

 

[VonGklugelstein Alter]

---

Toysoldier Thor wrote:

I have been watching this thread pop up on my android for the past few days and stayed quiet - thinking the topic will go to sleep soon (as it has many times in the past).  But it keeps going.

I am surprised how long its been talked about here - the reason is because this issue i nthe MP merchant community has come up as a sore spot OVER and OVER and OVER.

 

Sooooo - when does this thread end until the next cycle?  

 

---

 

That is because I never got going on it until now.. I am like the thing that does not go away until it gets what it wants..

 

Yes it is obvious which listings are full of bogus reviews if you are another merchant. To the untrained eye a product with many reviews must be great.. I have items that sold thousands of times and have no reviews or maybe 1. When some ding dong shows up on page 1 of a category with 43 reviews in about 3 days (not counting the 11 that were removed by LL for being made by direct alts) - other merchants will notice.

 

Long live this thread lol

 

 

 

 

 

[Deja Letov]

I totally agree, but I doubt the topic will ever go away because they will never fix it and LL will never correct it. It's funny, I just checked all my listings and with over 300 products listed I have a grand total of 18 reviews TOTAL for all products. AND for awhile there, I was even contacting everyone individually thanking them for their order and reminding them that if they felt so inclined they have an option to always review their order. I see what you mean though...18 reviews over 300 products and then you have some merchants who get TONS of reviews on a single product...total bull.

[Toysoldier Thor]

I did the same thing as you Deja way back in 2009 when I actully cared and was concerned that customers were making buying decisions based on the number and quality (i.e. # of stars) that my listings had vs others. 

For about a month I contacted customers after the sale and thanked them for their purchase and told them if they have any concerns / questions to contact me.  I then ended with a "If you have a moment and can take a few seconds to vote/review your purchase of my project, that would be appreciated".  That strategy netted almost NO new reviews. 

  Almost all customers "fire and forget".  They cannot be bothered going back into MP and taking a few seconds to provide a fair assessed review.  There are the rare few that will take the time "WITHOUT BEING BRIBED" to come back and review the product and their purchase.  But as you have already confirmed.... almost none do.

So.... as soon as I see ANY listing on MP with 100 or more (almost all 5 star) votes - there is only one conclusion.... the merchant GAMED THE LISTING.  In fact, for me... I would stay away from listings with this high a number of reviews as the likelihood of it being game is excellent and if a listing has to be gamed by a Merchant... it says a lot about the product he /she is selling.

Good products stand on their own.... bad products need this Customer Deception strategy to make sales.

 

[Czari Zenovka]

---

Deja Letov wrote:

I totally agree, but I doubt the topic will ever go away because they will never fix it and LL will never correct it. It's funny, I just checked all my listings and with over 300 products listed I have a grand total of 18 reviews TOTAL for all products. AND for awhile there, I was even contacting everyone individually thanking them for their order and reminding them that if they felt so inclined they have an option to always review their order. I see what you mean though...18 reviews over 300 products and then you have some merchants who get TONS of reviews on a single product...total bull.

---

Deja, when you speak of 18 reviews are you referring to the number of people who rated an item but didn't necessarily leave a comment, or are the 18 specifically comments left, not including ratings with no comments?

This got me interested and I was in the process of counting mine - then the MP went boom.  In the meantime decided to come back and clarify what you are counting so I can do an apples-apples comparison.

I did find something rather odd before the MP crashed - I have one product that has a 5-star rating (in that all 5 stars are blue) but says (0) reviews.  Okkkkkaaaayyy...how does that happen?

 

[Pamela Galli]

Czari the ratings given on Xstreet without a reveiw show up as 0 reviews.

[Czari Zenovka]

---

Pamela Galli wrote:

Czari the ratings given on Xstreet without a reveiw show up as 0 reviews.

---

If I'm understanding this correctly, you're referring to an item that was given a rating when the item was still on Xstreet but after the migration Xstreet reviews show up as 0 reviews?

Ok that looks exactly like what you just said....lol.  Need more caffeine apparently.

And thanks - I was scratching my head over that one.  A phantom review?  Gremlins in the system?

 

[Pamela Galli]

IOW a rating without a reveiw shows up as stars but as 0 reviews. :-)

[Suki Hirano]

Lol some merchants are bold enough to even put this in their item description:

"receive 50% refund if you provide a 5-star review!"

Yes it's perfectly within TOS. If RL business has no morals why should SL have any.

[Pamela Galli]

That is against TOS -- you can offer a reward for a review but not for only a good one.

[Deja Letov]

---

Czari Zenovka wrote:

---

Deja Letov wrote:

I totally agree, but I doubt the topic will ever go away because they will never fix it and LL will never correct it. It's funny, I just checked all my listings and with over 300 products listed I have a grand total of 18 reviews TOTAL for all products. AND for awhile there, I was even contacting everyone individually thanking them for their order and reminding them that if they felt so inclined they have an option to always review their order. I see what you mean though...18 reviews over 300 products and then you have some merchants who get TONS of reviews on a single product...total bull.

---

Deja, when you speak of 18 reviews are you referring to the number of people who rated an item but didn't necessarily leave a comment, or are the 18 specifically comments left, not including ratings with no comments?

This got me interested and I was in the process of counting mine - then the MP went boom.  In the meantime decided to come back and clarify what you are counting so I can do an apples-apples comparison.

I did find something rather odd before the MP crashed - I have one product that has a 5-star rating (in that all 5 stars are blue) but says (0) reviews.  Okkkkkaaaayyy...how does that happen?

 

---

I don't think I have any old ones with ratings and no comments. Everything has a star rating moment comment as far as I can see.

[Czari Zenovka]

---

Deja Letov wrote:

---

Czari Zenovka wrote:

---

Deja Letov wrote:

I totally agree, but I doubt the topic will ever go away because they will never fix it and LL will never correct it. It's funny, I just checked all my listings and with over 300 products listed I have a grand total of 18 reviews TOTAL for all products. AND for awhile there, I was even contacting everyone individually thanking them for their order and reminding them that if they felt so inclined they have an option to always review their order. I see what you mean though...18 reviews over 300 products and then you have some merchants who get TONS of reviews on a single product...total bull.

---

Deja, when you speak of 18 reviews are you referring to the number of people who rated an item but didn't necessarily leave a comment, or are the 18 specifically comments left, not including ratings with no comments?

This got me interested and I was in the process of counting mine - then the MP went boom.  In the meantime decided to come back and clarify what you are counting so I can do an apples-apples comparison.

I did find something rather odd before the MP crashed - I have one product that has a 5-star rating (in that all 5 stars are blue) but says (0) reviews.  Okkkkkaaaayyy...how does that happen?

 

---

I don't think I have any old ones with ratings and no comments. Everything has a star rating moment comment as far as I can see.

---

Thanks, Deja.  Reason I'm a bit confused (par for this thread apparently...lol) is that I have some products that have *ratings* only - meaning stars but no comments and others that have *ratings* and *reviews* - meaning one or more comments as well.  Must be from the SLX - MP migration to which Pamela referred. 

Will count actual reviews out of curiosity.

 

[Poenald Palen]

---

Betty Briand wrote:

I saw it being discussed here before.. think it was said that the whole thing is within tos.

I am not sure if the ratings are part of the best selling math thing, if they are, it should not be allowed

---

Yeah, I was asking about reviews once as well. I noticed that a few products had a solicitation notice and found out there is even a device for checking and then paying out...or maybe I figured there would be one made before long lol. Easy page parsing from a website and then send back confirmation to the owner or even automatically pay the clicker. Easy enough really, though managing it all with LSL's oddities might be a challange with a bit of customer service to do.

But, seems like you qustion the reviews though. I mean, if you want the cash back or bonus you really feel as if you should give a nice star level, and then voice concerns with the positive stuff emphasised. So, why would you give it less than 3 stars? I mean, you can still voice your concerns because many know that you can learn things about the product that are not mentioned and see the details in a review. So...yeah, it is sort of a odd system that helps you look like your product is popular maybe? But surely people know many merchants have freinds? But, the whole question si why would they bother? So, I have a tendency to sort of use them a bit but also wonder to much to just use one product or one page. It makes me search more to get a feel for what is offered. I like to window shop a bit, plus it is a fast, easy (er) way to figure out what is up with the market.

[Poenald Palen]

---

VonGklugelstein Alter wrote:

It is funny how good of an investigator you can become just by checking your own rankings periodically. You can see who is gaming the system but it does not matter because LL does not care because they make money on each sale regardless if it is fake or not.

I know the name of every texture seller who cheats the system but the only recourse I would have is to start gaming the system too which for now I do not have the time to do.

I love when reviewers say that the product they just bought is the best they have ever found and all other ones they tried are of bad quality.. and then find out the review was made on the "Born on date" of the purchaser.

Other tags are when they use quotes like 10/10 stars and about 10 different reviewers use the same 10/10 reference.

 

And yes.. I most likely outsell them by a lot and I do have some very good loyal customers who are the only reason why I haven't quit this mess yet. I am very tired of seeing these bottom feeders (and some Alts of big name merchants) trashing the economy with their tactics.

 

I predicted that the marketplace will destroy SL and so far I am on track with my predictions. Inworld stores and honest creators are dropping like flies while shady character (more shady than me) are starting to dominate the economy..

Trust is out the door with me ..  but I trust you ..lol

 

 

 

 

 

 

---

 

You see, this is the wierd thing. I didn't want to really make  a thread questioning reviews or talking about stuff like this...why? Because I figure people might think I was somehow trying to drum up people checking my products to either bash my products and say I am jelous (unlikely, but you never know who  you anger by simply asking a question in this world) OR would simply be intrigued at this and check all the marketplace and then copy the same tactic lol.

In fact, when I read your last line about trust it makes me think of how funny it is. For all I know, and we know, you are running and alt to see just how effective the pay or review system is! lol. Effectively, you then may build this alt up and continue to play innocent and even talk to your group about these terrible losers and even point a link to it...of course, the funny thing is that you then see how many customers you lose who may have not known of this other source of similar textures! Strangely, some may even laugh and figure you are the alt and then buy and end up IMing the other maker and start tracking YOU! Then, you are both tracking each other and trying to figure out each others motivations and triggers. One to make a sale, the other to find a odd merchant playing alt games to drum up business! In then end, in true spy vs spy fashion...something goes wrong and onen is hurt....maybe both....how, who knows. You end up logging into a trap or dating a alt of the person and they expose you both via some RL info with 2 alts dating or some oddity....still, no one cares to much but we here visiting the forums will will get the popcorn for the ensuingn arguments, outings and such. Then, a dog urinates on a dandelion and a bird distracts it and we are reminded....what was I doing again...wait, there is a dog peeing on my lawn...wait, why didn't I mow the lawn so there are no dandelions....they do look nice and I like to smell them though...wait, dogs pee on them......wait...am I still logged into SL forums? Ah, I have to go....I think something is burning....hhhhm......wait, don't I have to do something with a forum post or something.....*20 minutes later, 2 posts down and 1000 words wasted with a few more posts looking interesting* hey....wait, why didn't I mow the lawn.....I think I was trying to mow the lawn...right...uh...0_o hey...I know what, I wll finisha  few posts reading and then go and think about some stuff as I mow....oh, I don't have to mow the lawn.....it's to early....maybe I should go smell the dandelions though! Yeah! Great idea, that was what I was going to do...smell the roses so to speak..I mean, dandelions! /me walks off to enjoy the aroma..."ugh!! wha the hell"