Reviewers writing on message boards

[cleanteamofny]

From time to time we visit big box stores to by large ticketed items and some reviews are good as well as bad,
but there are times when some reviews are so good that I have to buy it too!
Now I've been looking at reviews at a different light and now I go by several stores and read the good and the bad reviews, then I make a decision if that item is worth buying!

Now I have a gripe and please do not hold it against me, but after posting on another website, I came to the conclusion that there is one or two people constantly knocks my reviews down as if my glass does not hold water and then I heard over the news that store clerks or MFG's management posting on message boards that my product is better than the yours and never post their machine in action on YouTube and always take you to a link to the MFG web page and never point out the flaws that may concern new buyers on the market. Are you getting where I'm coming from?

I'm for the consumer like OWS, if I post anything about my appliances, its to gain knowledge about the product and not to influence mine over yours, but to get you to compare and open your mind to what your needs are and does this unit it fit yours criteria.

OK, where am I'm going with this?
There was a news article on the radio that caught my attention earlier this week and after doing a little online research, it is so true!
Do you feel the same way of what was said in the link below?

http://consumerist.com/2011/12/growing-number-of-cyber-shills-invade-online-reviews.html

 

[rp2813]

I became suspicious a few years ago when doing research before purchasing a new vacuum cleaner for my mom.  It was so obvious from the relatively high number of effusive reviews on the Wind Tunnel that Hoover's marketing team had bombed the site.

 

Such "reviews" are easy to spot.  They tend to provide an unnecessarily detailed story up front that leads into the amazing performance of whatever product they're promoting.

 

 

 

[ptcruiser51]

Look for your neighborhood retailer

I daily have customers approach me specifically concerning vacuum cleaners. We have Hoover, LG, and Dyson on display. We have an inordinate amount of "returns" on these products at THD. When customers in earnest ask me what to purchase, I refer them to a "Vacuum Store" up the highway. I get a feinted "gasp": "You are recommending a COMPETITOR???" Well, yes, I am. I would rather you recall that "The man from THD 'helped me' "when you think of your purchase. And maybe you got the item that best suits you needs rather than what we have in stock.

 

[a440]

I feel the same way about "Kudzu" and "Angie's List".
Totally Bogus!

 

[arbilab]

Marketers have invaded "social media". Doing what marketers always do, lying.

YEARS ago I got a come-on from a 'career counseling' company with offices 'everywhere'. Skeptical, I googled their name + complaints. Guess what? They had already flooded the first 5 pages of google results with links back to corporate marketing by snidely placing the word 'complaints' on all their web pages in an innocuous context. And google doesn't discern context.

IOW, they knew they were douchebags and set out IN ADVANCE to keep me from knowing it. Well I could tell anyway, but not everyone is quite so able to correlate data (it was my last profession, for the computer industry, until they quit caring about quality).

It's marketing's job to get over on the uninformed. Thus it becomes our job to be informed. It's not an idle pursuit, but an earnest one.

 

[tomturbomatic]

I have found reviews for some products on Amazon to be helpful. Are those in this same category? Other products, I have Googled and all you find is page after page of reviews obviously written by the company. As one of our business researchers told us, Google is mainly an advertsing medium now. Their takeover of You Tube stinks.

 

[Jsneaker]

This is like Zagat

If you think that Zagat restaurant reviews are "straightforward", they are also quite biased. People do not realize that I believe one "PAYS"(in different ways) the Zagat's to come to review their restaurant, and they in turn NEVER give it fair or poor ratings!!!

 

[Jsneaker]

To Tom Turbo:

I agree with you about Google. They take-over everything and we have to deal with their constantly changing and highly confusing mods to sites like You Tube. For example, I detest their new format, so my channel is kept to the "old style". They think they are making things better when they are not. It's like all our goods are now mostly made overseas by cheap slave-like labor! We have very little choice anymore.