You may have come across these “review sites”, which are in fact just online stores who want to make a sale. Like the “How do you get rich” sites which have proliferated over the past two years, I find these to be deceptive. There is no reason to believe that all sites that offer reviews are deceptive (or any products that promise to show you how to profit from the Internet, although that’s an entirely different subject …),), but the fact that more of the negative ones are outnumbering the positive ones seems to indicate that this trend has been gaining momentum. Even the most popular ones can be a bit disappointing. You can get the best guide on https://blogs.ubc.ca/opinion/.
What’s a consumer supposed to do when faced with a problem? Internet allows you to be an informed customer, but the amount of bad information is overwhelming. You need some way of filtering it out. There are many millions of web sites, but I only found a handful (none) of them that met my criteria for trustworthiness. To be fair, some independent blogs come very close. Unluckily, blog review sites pay bloggers to provide positive reviews. They aren’t legally bound to let you know that the bloggers were paid.
Which review site do you consider trustworthy? These are the three things I look for in a review site that is trustworthy:
It is not true that all reviews are positive. Many are negative. You can be sure that these reviews were not written by writers who are paid. Consumer Reports does a great job of researching and will inform you about flaws. Consumer Reports presents two issues: First, it costs money (which I can understand because this is a very good service), and secondly, there is little opportunity for consumers to give their opinion.
The site’s nature is democratic. The site has a democratic nature. Why? We are all better off with more heads. It is through user feedback that the cream can rise. Amazon’s service is excellent in this way. They can respond, give ratings, or rate other people’s reviews. Amazon’s biggest problem is they sell all products that are reviewed. And I often wonder if some poor reviews don’t get removed. Amazon doesn’t have a single item that has been panned. Amazon has another problem: it’s a massive company that needs to be protected. There are high-paid executives on its board and the brand is worth billions. Google, Yahoo!, and all the other giants with good review sites for consumers have similar problems. As soon as big money comes into the picture, however, things become less democratic. Amazon’s democratic review system is one of the best out there.
The website isn’t “niche.” There is no way to miss this. Someone is probably trying to cheat the search engines. My opinion is that it jeopardizes the integrity and accuracy of each review. Although I understand that people make money by creating niche sites or selling their products online, those websites aren’t review sites. Then, you can start your own beekeeping site and tell readers all about it. Selling beekeeping items is a great idea! Do not disguise it as an unbiased place for reviews.