Fake Reviews
Friends have been notifying me of changes in the Amazon review policy. “Are they trying to eliminate indies?” a worried friend asked me.
Before I go into details, let me first explain the problem from Amazon’s point of view. As the Economist points out in a recent article, fake reviews are a big problem for websites that claim to be an impartial resource.
Image: frostmediasolutions.com
“I will post an awesome review on your amazon product,” bess98 declared on Fiverr. On October 16th Amazon charged that bess98 and more than 1,000 others were illegally hawking customer reviews. The case comes just six months after Amazon sued the operator of four sites peddling similar stuff, including the subtly named buyamazonreviews.com.
Amazon is hardly alone in this. Other websites have fought fakes with lawsuits, carefully honed algorithms and even sting operations—Yelp has undercover staff answering ads from firms seeking glowing write-ups.
That is because such practices are particularly troubling to firms. “If consumers can’t rely on the content,” says Vince Sollitto of Yelp, “then the service is of no value.”
“While small in number,” Amazon contends in its new suit, “these reviews can significantly undermine the trust that consumers and the vast majority of sellers and manufacturers place in Amazon.”
Image: techwyse.com
Yet, despite the lawsuits, the problem persists.
So websites have tried to fight fakes. Algorithms comb reviews for suspicious wording. Expedia allows hotel recommendations only by those who have paid for a room there. Amazon tags a review as “verified” if the writer has indeed bought the product. Presumably such reviews are more reliable, though bess98 is one of many who claim to be able to game Amazon’s system.
The Problem
As a recent Seattle Times post points out, Amazon’s biggest challenge is figuring out the best way to discover violations of its reviews guidelines. It’s hardly a trivial task: the company is estimated to list about 365 million items at the time.
That’s far too many for humans to police, particularly for a company that prefers to automate as many business processes as possible. So Amazon has largely relied on algorithms to catch the worst offenders of its guidelines.
Image: supplementcritique.com
To do so, the company is constantly tweaking its software, creating new rules. Goodreads claims that it has gotten its hands on the latest ones. Before we go into that, though, let’s be clear about one thing: Amazon doesn’t reveal the exact process it has for vetting reviews. Its review moderator is quoted as saying:
“Due to the proprietary nature of our business, we do not provide detailed information on how we determine that accounts are related.”
Instead, they directed the Goodreads blogger to the company’s Review Guidelines.
Here’s, then, the official line:
We are unable to accept the following feedback:
Promotional Reviews – In order to preserve the integrity of Customer Reviews, we do not permit artists, authors, developers, manufacturers, publishers, sellers or vendors to write Customer Reviews for their own products or services, to post negative reviews on competing products or services, or to vote on the helpfulness of reviews. For the same reason, family members or close friends of the person, group, or company selling on Amazon may not write Customer Reviews for those particular items.
Paid Reviews – We do not permit reviews or votes on the helpfulness of reviews that are posted in exchange for compensation of any kind, including payment (whether in the form of money or gift certificates), bonus content, entry to a contest or sweepstakes, discounts on future purchases, extra product, or other gifts.
The sole exception to this rule is when a free or discounted copy of a physical product is provided to a customer up front. In this case, if you offer a free or discounted product in exchange for a review, you must clearly state that you welcome both positive and negative feedback. If you receive a free or discounted product in exchange for your review, you must clearly and conspicuously disclose that fact.
Goodreads’ Take
Still, Goodreads claims to have the guidelines for what Amazon is looking for when a book review is posted. Specifically, they claim that Amazon will reject the following kinds of reviews:
1) A review by a book blogger whose blog is part of a paid blog tour, even if the book blogger is not paid. Often only the organizer of the tour gets paid, but the blog review is considered a “paid review,” so it can’t be posted on Amazon.
2) A review written in exchange for a gift card. Even if that card is only in the amount of the price of the book. A reviewer could possibly use the card for purchasing something else.
3) A review written in exchange for another review. Review trading is 100% forbidden.
4) A review written in expectation of a free book. A review copy must be given before the review is written or the book will be seen as payment for the review.
5) A review by a person you “know” online. Amazon can detect if someone leaving a review is following you on Twitter or befriended you on Facebook. Amazon’s expectation is that a fan will leave a biased review, so it wants only impartial people writing them.
It is the last one that has my friends up in arms. They point out that only traditional publishers have the means to reach people who don’t know the author. Indies must instead rely on organic growth, which means fans, social media followers and word-of-mouth advertising. So, what’s going on?
Has Amazon Gone Crazy?
Image: Dilbert
Before I give you my take, let’s first examine the facts, as I understand them:
- Amazon has created the Indie book market with the creation of Kindle. It is their leverage against the Big Five – not to mention a profitable one. As such, it is not in their interest to destroy something it has fought to build.
- Amazon does have a problem with fake reviews.
- Goodreads makes a claim to have gotten its hands on the new rules, but this is unverified. Amazon’s own rules contradict their claim. It looks to me that Goodreads only offers an educated guess at what the rules might be.
All this leads me to believe that there’s no reason to reach for the pitchforks and torches just yet. It sounds more like Amazon wants some leeway in deciding which reviews to reject/delete, and is purposefully vague in its phrasing, to avoid creating loopholes.
I am not naive. I don’t think that Amazon is a friend of Indies. I do believe, however, that, as shown by successive Author Earning Reports, Indie works are a highly profitable segment of Amazon’s bookstore, and a company would have to be crazy to risk losing this.
My own experience suggests that Amazon is not crazy: over 80% of my reviews are for books whose authors I have met online and/or follow on social media. Less that 10% of these have ever been rejected/deleted, and these were for the authors that are, indeed, closest to me.
I’d be interested to hear your experience with this.
Oh, and if you haven’t done so already, be sure to check my post, How to Score Great Amazon Reviews: Resources and More for safe ways to get reviews.
Gisela’s Take
Gisela Hausmann specializes in handbooks for Indie authors. Her NAKED TRUTHS About Getting Book Reviews Kindle Edition has been called a “must-read” by 8 Amazon Hall-of-Fame reviewers. Here’s what she has to say on the matter:
“Since paid reviews are no longer an option, all kinds of online venues have popped up where authors introduce their books with the purpose of getting reviews. They are trying to fill “the void.”
Some of them go about it in a good way, many others – not so much.
Regardless, each time, an “Amazon author” reviews another “Amazon author’s” book, both authors feed data into Amazon’s algorithm.
The basic gist of it is:
• First level: Amazon author reviews book (which is not nothing special, lots of authors read nonfiction to learn, and they read fiction to see what the competition does, for entertainment, or to learn from other authors, etc…)
• A more defined definition is: self-published author reviews books from other self-published author.
• An even more defined definition is: self-published author xyz’s book was reviewed 5 times in 10 days from 5 other self-published authors but nobody, who is not an author, AND, author xyz also reviewed the books from 2 of these 5 self-published authors. And, to make matters “worse,” all of them gave 5 star reviews only.
Now, keep in mind that Amazon churns the data from hundreds of thousands of authors and you can guess how that algorithm is able to identify patterns, and also why Amazon employees learn how to fine tune that algorithm based on the data they see.
So, what can authors do?
- Read and review other books published by big publishers.
- Do, what I suggested in my book: Contact Amazon top reviewers (they know how to get reviews right) and find readers/reviewers elsewhere. There are meet-up groups, book signings, get on local TV, or get your book featured in a print publication.
- Do a Goodreads give-away. I have described one way how to get a good turnout at a Goodreads giveaway in of my other books. Once a reader has reviewed your book on Goodreads you can contact him/her and ask the reviewer to copy and paste that review to Amazon’s site.
- Also, do twitter promotions, get your book reviewed by a book blogger, who can reach readers you don’t know – in other words, do what you can to reach people you are not connected with.
- At your Amazon author page post pictures of book signings, you being on local TV, and screen prints of publications where your work has been featured. This helps Amazon to see WHY your work is getting reviewed. The more often your work is featured anywhere, the more people will read and review it. Things have to make sense.
Amazon’s algorithm reads the data it receives. Thus, self-published authors need to avoid getting ONLY reviews from other self-published authors.
Additionally, as an Amazon Top Reviewer, I want to stress: Please approach reviewers and book bloggers in the proper way. More than 70% of the review requests I receive are no good, less than 10% are great requests. Here are some tips:
• Write about your book and don’t just paste a link there. No top reviewer will research your book. Just recently, another top reviewer wrote in a review of one of my books, ” I probably get a dozen or so poorly written inquiries every day. If I don’t learn by the end of paragraph one what it is that the emailer wants me to review, I trash the email…”
• Avoid writing a me-mail with an abundance of I-my-me words. Your request is about your book and not about you.
• Don’t tell the reviewer that you would be honored and similar exclamations. Flattery does not lead to success.”
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Goodreads SHOULD know since they’re owned by Amazon.
My understanding is that they’re run as two completely separate entities. For now, anyway.
Great info and advice Nick! Thanks. ?
Glad you found it useful, Ali 🙂
Nicolas, thanks for the update. Though, I must say I’m not too happy with the last requirement. I say leave well enough alone, because sometime tweaking things can make more troubles.
A wise woman indeed…
I’m sick of Amazon’s craziness. I concur with their views on paid reviews, but the oxymoron is that they thrive on having our Indie books on their site and we as Indies have to self promote and make connections with readers, and that leads to invalid reviews because we’ve done our work to promote and obtain followers, only to have them not to be allowed to review. There’s no end to this madness.
Lol – I hear your frustration, but in Amazon’s defense, they are trying to run a decent shop, while a number of unscrupulous people are trying any kind of get-rich-quick schemes 🙂
It’s truly a double-edged sword. 🙂
Rejecting “A review by a person you “know” online” does seem really harsh and crazy! But I had no clue that fake reviews were such a big thing! Does having a lot of reviews help sell books that much? Speaking of which, I need to go give some real reviews for your books! Sorry I haven’t done them yet, I’m excessively lazy!!
Lol – that’s all right, as I don’t know where you live. Or I would have already sent in the flying monkeys…
Aw I love flying monkeys! Here let me just type in my address…
But… but… you’re supposed to be scared of them! What kind of a monster are you??!
Dear Nicholas,
This is a great blog, which points at many of the issues indie authors face. As an Amazon top reviewer and author of a highly acclaimed book about how to get book reviews I feel I should address the review issue once more.
Since paid reviews are no longer an option, all kinds of online venues have popped up where authors introduce their books with the purpose of getting reviews. They are trying to fill “the void.”
Some of them go about it in a good way, many others – not so much.
Regardless, each time, an “Amazon author” reviews another “Amazon author’s” book, both authors feed data into Amazon’s algorithm.
I am not a programmer but my sister is. The basic gist of it is
• First level: Amazon author reviews book (which is not nothing special, lots of authors read nonfiction to learn, and they read fiction to see what the competition does, for entertainment, or to learn from other authors, etc…)
• A more defined definition is: self-published author reviews books from other self-published author.
• An even more defined definition is: self-published author xyz’s book was reviewed 5 times in 10 days from 5 other self-published authors but nobody, who is not an author, AND, author xyz also reviewed the books from 2 of these 5 self-published authors. And, to make matters “worse” all of them gave 5 star reviews only.
Now, keep in mind that Amazon churns the data from hundreds of thousands of authors and you can guess how that algorithm is able to identify patterns, and also why Amazon employees learn how to fine tune that algorithm based on the data they see.
So, what can authors do?
1) Read and review other books published by big publishers.
2) Do, what I suggested in my book: Contact Amazon top reviewers (they know how to get reviews right) and find readers/reviewers elsewhere. There are meet-up groups, book signings, get on local TV, or get your book featured in a print publication
3) Do a Goodreads give-away. I have described one way how to get a good turnout at a Goodreads giveaway in of my other books. Once a reader has reviewed your book on Goodreads you can contact him/her and ask the reviewer to copy and paste that review to Amazon’s site.
4) Also, do twitter promotions, get your book reviewed by a book blogger, who can reach readers you don’t know – in other words, do what you can to reach people you are not connected with.
Amazon’s algorithm reads the data it receives. Thus, self-published authors need to avoid getting ONLY reviews from other self-published authors.
Additionally, as an Amazon Top Reviewer, I want to stress: Please approach reviewers and book bloggers in the proper way. More than 70% of the review requests I receive are no good, less than 10% are great requests. Here are some clues:
• Write about your book and don’t just paste a link there. No top reviewer will research your book. Just recently, another top reviewer wrote in a review of one of my books, ” I probably get a dozen or so poorly written inquiries every day. If I don’t learn by the end of paragraph one what it is that the emailer wants me to review, I trash the email…”
• Avoid writing a me-mail, which is defined by an abundance of I-my-me words. Your request is supposed to be about your book and not about you.
• Don’t tell the reviewer that you would be honored and similar exclamations. Flattery does not lead to success.
Oops, just saw that I forgot another way to help the with the Amazon-algorithm issue: At your Amazon author page post pictures of book signings, you being on local TV, and screen prints of publications where your work has been featured. This helps Amazon to see WHY your work is getting reviewed. The more often your work is featured anywhere, the more people will read and review it. Things have to make sense.
Merry Christmas to all!
This is such a great comment, that I’ll add it to the post. Thank you! 🙂
I’ve sometimes duplicated a review on amazon.co.uk on amazon.com, having purchased the book from the uk site. Does that mean that the .com review isn’t valid, as I haven’t bought the book from there? It just seems silly that once someone posts a review on amazon, that it’s not carried across all of their sites as it’s the same company.
I do the same, actually. Although, if you go to .co.uk, you’ll see they list the .com reviews under the .co.uk ones.
Yes, but only one will say it’s by a verified purchaser . The other will say it’s by a customer. I guess they’re willing to publish it in both places, as long as they think it’s a genuine review.
If Amazon’s ever-evolving system brooms some legit reviews, that’s better than letting non-legit ones through. I’d rather have ten regarded as having been vetted for integrity than have fifty regarded as suspect. Amazon’s conundrum, though, would be that lowering the probability of a review being allowed to show would discourage people from bothering to write and post them. (I don’t dash off a few lines, but rather put time and effort into writing a thoughtful review both helpful to potential buyers and as feedback to the author.) As an author, I want people to assume integrity in reviews about my books, but as a reader I don’t want my reviews killed because I follow the author. Heck, odds are that’s how I learned about the book. I like requiring that the book be acquired from Amazon to review it there, or that its origin be disclosed, especially if won during a promotion. If posting reviews for people followed on social media and/or belonging to same organizations such as RRBC becomes a problem, we might need to start creating separate identities pseudonymously with Amazon accounts of their own, and buy products through there so we don’t show up in social media. One of the comments above suggests Amazon doesn’t really have access to social media links, but the ways they can are numerous. For example, large portions of Twitter users allow access to their accounts through third-party services such as unfollowspy, crowdfire, roundtree, and others. All Amazon needs to do is cut a private deal with those sites and mine data. Read your fine print; social media access from third-parties to actual sites such as Instagram don’t guarantee that the data can’t be mined. Google is the biggest data-miner in the world, and they have algorithms that can match activity and user searches to other data and sell it as a service. Let’s assume Amazon has and will develop better ways to find connections, and behave accordingly. Just because Amazon chooses to set a threshold for when it intervenes does not mean it’s not aware of more than we think.
I agree. I just trust Amazon to use its powers in a way that won’t threaten its bottom line 🙂
Reposted the blog link on a Facebook group page I belong to about coloring books. This came up and some artists are new to this Amazon experience so thought they would find this useful. 🙂
Thank you so much for that 🙂
Excellent post, Nicholas. I am flabbergasted that Amazon would eliminate reviews from people you have met through social media. It seems contradictory to the idea of getting your book out there on social media. So I hope it’s not true. I’ve tried to avoid even the impression of conflict of interest by buying each book I review. I figure the authors can use the income and then that aspect of influence is moot.
You’re a star 🙂
I totally get the desire to eliminate “fake” reviews, and with 365 million items, it clearly can’t be done by humans.
One thing Amazon could do to curb the problem is to offer a solution! Duh. Give us something we CAN do instead of slapping us with what we can’t. If they create a vehicle for books to get reviews, the problem is significantly diminished. Something like:
When an author publishes a book, he/she can indicate that up to 50 copies can go into a review pool. Readers can browse the review pool and download a free book with a commitment to write a review within 30 days. Readers might be limited to one book a month or they may have to sign up with Amazon or something. It would be easy to create controls to limit abuse. Once the 50 downloads are done, that avenue is closed for that book. Easy peasy. 😀
That’s certainly one way to go. Another, even simpler one, might be to flag “suspect” reviews and let readers decide if they’re genuine or not.
That would be super easy. So many potential solutions…Amazon is so good at thinking outside the box, they should be able to find a solution here. 🙂
Great article, Nicholas. One thing that I find a bit baffling is that since Amazon owns Goodreads, it seems that they would have the same review policy. But maybe it’s not that unusual. Amazon owns Audible, too, and on Audible you have to obtain the book through them (whether purchased or gifted to you) in order to leave a review.
True. They are separate companies, and Goodreads seems to be left to its own devices 🙂
I agree with what you say in the final paragraph. I think all my reviews are by people I’ve met online or through the Language Creation Society, which I also follow online. I’ve never had a review rejected that I know of. And I have never given away a book in exchange for a review. I’ve given away books through Facebook events, but most of those have been with Smashwords coupons. I only say to those who win copies that I hope you’ll review it after you read it. And I’ve never had a review rejected because the book wasn’t purchased through Amazon. So I don’t know what I’ve done right, but I don’t seem to have gotten in any trouble.
Honesty *is* the best policy 🙂
Very helpful blog today and great comments. My big concern is when authors continue to do these review swaps. I get requests like that frequently on Goodreads and always decline, telling them that Amazon and Goodreads ban review swaps. Most don’t believe me since Goodreads has groups on their site “Swap Reviews” and “The Book Review Exchange,” which encourage review swapping. And yet Goodreads claim to forbid book review exchanges as policy. I find that there are a lot of amateur authors out there who don’t understand this is a profession and ethical standards are necessary for all if we are to maintain respect.
That’s an excellent point. Thanks 🙂
Thanks, Nicholas. I’ve seen a different interpretation of the “Validated purchase” aspect, though. I have read many places the following:
The reviewer doesn’t have to have purchased the book being reviewed; the reviewer just has to have bought something on Amazon, anything, anytime, and therefore, have an Amazon customer account that includes one purchase.
Proof (maybe):I almost never buy books, especially fiction (sorry; low-income and no space for books). I use(d) the public library for ALL my fiction reading, and, therefore, reviews, up until my sister gave me her used Kindle. Now, I sometimes have downloaded a free copy of an ebook and read and review those ebooks. Therefore, I show almost no book or ebook purchases on AZ or elsewhere for most books, yet I don’t think AZ has removed any of my reviews.
Finally, many of your readers and you, I believe, belong to “review swap” organizations. Do you do the swapping? I do not know. But, if you even belong to those groups, your reviews may be suspect and your reviews may be taken down (and probably should be, if they are of other members’ books).
Two years ago, when I first became an indie author, I used to belong to a few of those groups. I left all of them before doing any review swapping and I refused to participate, long before all this blew up. Glad of that.
My worry is that people who have been on my online video talk show, *CHANGES* conversations between authors, and others whom I “know” online through social media, ARE many of the authors whose books I read and review. I still provide honest reviews (as you well know), but what do AZ’s “algorithms” assume about my “relationships” to these reviewers and my/our reviews?
I have no idea.
I sincerely hope AZ doesn’t go crazy and remove all reviews if the author is on a friends or followers list anywhere. That would totally ruin most of our books’ review lists.
Best to you, Happy Holidays and happy new fatherhood, Nicholas!
Sally
P.S. Seeking guests for *CHANGES* for Jan 27 and beyond! Visit and follow directions on: https://sallyember.com/changes-videocasts-by-sally-ember-ed-d/
AND welcoming reviewers for any and all three of “The Spanners Series” sci-fi/romance/ utopian ebooks/books, any time, whoever you are! I provide free ebooks to reviewers. i welcome honest reviews! sallyember AT yahoo DOT com
Thanks, Sally 🙂
My sentiments exactly.
Thanks 🙂
It’s getting to be a bit of a Gordian knot, but by and large I think the principle you talk about is probably the right way to go, provided you’re giving balanced, honest reviews. Most indie authors these days HAVE to network, which means they’re reviewers as well as writers – both activities benefit most when you behave impeccably, which in book review terms means it’s bona fide and giving a true opinion that represents your feelings about the reading experience. Presumably this is why Amazon’s fairly careful over the keyword aspect to identifying the patterns for fakes. I haven’t had any problems myself (so far) despite belonging to a writers and readers community – but then I hope my reviews are fair and unbiased and always verified purchases…
I agree. As a rule, honesty *is* the best policy 🙂
For one thing, Amazon is making its own publishing company with various subsidiaries. That makes me wonder if the indie authors are seen more as a means to an end because they’re now gathering their own authors. Total conspiracy theory on that one though.
My biggest concern with all of this is that it’s aimed solely at the fake 5-Star review, which I do agree is a problem. Yet it’s always seemed easy to report a 5-Star and get it taken down when compared to a fake 1-Star. The praising one you simple call the reviewer a friend or specific words become program triggers. Many of those reviews are similar because there’s an attempt to avoid spoilers. The fake 1-Star can just spout nonsense and it’s harder to prove that they’re fake. I think because there’s no organization behind it like the ones that are asking for money. Still, I hate to see policies that only focus on half of the problem.
Honestly, I think the use of algorithms is both smart and stupid. Makes sense that Amazon is doing this because of the amount of reviews flowing into the site. But a program won’t know if it’s looking at a legitimate fake or a real person who just happened to write the ‘wrong’ words. Plenty of readers will go to an author’s page in an attempt to make contact, so what happens to those that are successful and manage to pull of a long dialogue? They’ll inevitable say something along the lines of friendship or make it seem, to a program, that they ‘know’ the author. I guess I just want a human element to be within the system to make sure those getting deleted are really fake and not simply hapless.
It would make more sense to add the human element on the side of the reader. I.e., flag “suspect” reviews in some way, and let the reader decide whether it’s genuine or not.
True. Although how do you determine if something is ‘suspect’? Most people will see that marking and jump to the conclusion that it must be true. Don’t think there’s any true way to win this one.
I guess not. Still, removing the review altogether feels more drastic than my suggestion (in fact, Chris McMullen’s)! 🙂
I agree. That also makes people think twice about posting reviews in general. If it’s only going to be deleted then readers might not even bother. I’ve seen a lot of people voice that opinion.
I have quite an extensive experience with online reviews, as I am an Amazon Vine Voice, after being invited onto this programme by achieving positive feedback for my reviews from customers. This involves being sent a choice of free goods to review; anything from books, to lawn mowers, or pet food. They do not ask for a ‘good’ review, only an honest one.
These reviews are marked to the effect that I am reviewing an item I received free of charge, so that potential buyers are aware of that fact. If the item is something I have actually purchased, then it is shown as a ‘verified’ purchase. When it comes to reviewing books, or Kindle books from people I might ‘know’, I always purchase them. This not only gives a review the ‘verified’ status, it also helps the author with sales figures, and some financial reward. And at Kindle prices, it doesn’t cost much, let’s face it.
I have never had a problem reviewing work from people who follow me on Twitter, or those who I follow there. I cannot see why companies like Amazon could not add this ‘received item free’ notation to books received as free copies, to make the whole process more transparent to the potential buyer.
But when a company this big controls such a lion’s share of the retail market, they can more or less do what they want, I suppose.
Best wishes, Pete.
Pete, how does one get invited in this program? Does a reviewer have to reach a certain Positive Feedback number? For example, I have 234 Helpful Votes (I review only books, though). After reaching a certain number, will I also get invited? Just curious. I’m not sure I want to be sent a free lawn mower 🙂
You get to choose from a ‘targeted’ list MM, not just sent stuff randomly. I have been lucky to get all sorts of things, most of them very useful, or actually wanted.
I have reviewed close to 1000 products, over half of which were DVD films, over a period of some years. I received a 73% positive feedback (almost 700 votes) rating based on these, so was contacted by Amazon and offered the chance to be included. This membership can also be revoked, if my percentage drops, or if they simply choose to remove me. My ‘ranking’ fluctuates as the percentage dips or rises.
There is also a well-known tactic going on, where others deliberately leave unhelpful votes, to increase their own standing. Human nature is a wonderful thing…
Hope that helps. Best wishes, Pete.
Really? That’s disgusting.. But then human nature can be that, too. Thanks for the info!
You’re a prince among men, Pete.
As for Vine, it is specifically excluded in Amazon’s policy. Since they know you’re part of the program, you don’t need to add any disclaimer.
I am not sure that I qualify for such praise, Nicholas, but will accept it gracefully. I hope that all three of you have a wonderful Christmas.
Best wishes from Norfolk, Pete.
You too, Pete. Although the official “Merry Christmas” post will be posted on the 25th, along with a small surprise – a Christmas quiz 🙂
Me too!
Does Goodreads have the same review policy as Amazon? I’ve written several reviews on Goodreads of authors I follow on WordPress and Twitter.
Thanks for the helpful information, Nicholas!
A pleasure! Good to see you here 🙂
No, Goodreads seems to be much more relaxed about it. On the other hand, it doesn’t sell books, so…
It’s the “friend” policy that gets me too. When I love a book it’s only natural to become curious about its author and look them up online to keep up with their new releases. For instance, I’m a Karin Slaughter fan, so I friended her on FB. I don’t “know” her. We’re not “friends.” But in Amazon’s eyes we are. Ridiculous! That’s why it’s important to disconnect your Goodreads (because Amazon owns Goodreads) from your Facebook so Amazon can’t accuse you of being “friends” with the author. I just got a review the other day that started out “When I first met Sue.” and I cringed. First off, I’ve never “met” this person. Secondly, I think I’ve had one quick exchange with him on FB. One! But I’m guessing Amazon will probably remove this review because of the first line, even though he goes onto to say “so many writers tote their books that I had my doubts.” Which, if a human read the review, would realize that we’re not actually friends, nor have we “met.”
Actually, I don’t think that Amazon will remove it. Most of the people who have reviewed Runaway Smile have done so after reading it on my blog, and state so clearly. No reviews have been removed yet.
I don’t write many reviews but when I do they are always for books I’ve loved, but I do try to make them informative. They are also for books I’ve bought from Amazon [and I’ve been buying books for almost as long as they’ve been in existence]. So, I haven’t had a review rejected, or at least not that I’m aware of. A better review system however, benefits all of us. Let’s just hope Amazon gets it right in the end.
Indeed. A great way would be for Amazon to flag suspect reviews as “probably by a friend” or something, and leave it at that.
Yes, that would work far better than just pulling the review.
So long as the official rules remain unchanged, I don’t think we have to really worry. Books that I read as ARCs and enjoy immensely I usually purchase to give the Verified Purchase tag to my review and not have to mention “free copy in exchange of an honest review”, but I can’t do that with all the ARCs I get, so if I mean to post a review of an ARC I read on the book’s launch day, even if I don’t write “free copy…” doesn’t it show that I got it from the author? That’s what remains to be seen. How Amazon will treat first-day reviews that have no “free book for exchange” tag. We’ll see.
I think that Amazon would have to be stupid to not flag first-day reviews from people who skip the “free copy” disclaimer 🙂
I’ve never had a review deleted. (knock on wood) I’m not really sure why, but after reading this, here may be some reasons why: I have a separate Amazon account that I write all my reviews from. I write reviews on lots of products from that account, not just on books, and not just indie author books. In fact, I’ve never written a review from my author account. I used to have my twitter linked to my author account, but when reviews started getting deleted, I unlinked it from Amazon. As a double precaution, I try to make communication with my author friends in a private message (although, not always). I also have a separate twitter account where I talk to people more often.
I do tweet – “get a free book in exchange for a review”, and that’s where I get some of my reviews. A lot of those people write reviews for big publisher reviews. I also, as I’m sure most of you do, encourage people at the end of my book to write reviews. I’ve received a couple of reviews from readers this way, and they have product reviews for all kinds of stuff, not just books.
I don’t have a ton of reviews though, and have considered using Netgally. I do know that Amazon itself uses Netgally, as I’ve seen some Netgally reviews on Amazon Imprints. I’m specifically thinking of Susan Ee, who was published through Amazon and on the day her books were released, she had Netgally reviews. (I was insanely jealous that they got to read her book early and mad at myself for not thinking about looking her up on there.) I thought you had to pay for that though? (Although I haven’t looked into it recently.)
Just realized I put this at the wrong spot, sorry. Meant to post it at the bottom. 😛
Lol – no worries :Dd
That’s a great tip, Fleur. Thanks for sharing! I’m not sure how Netgalley works, but I’ll share if I find out (or if you do 😉 )
Merry Christmas!
This came up in my facebook feed. I thought it was interesting.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1584291371854759/permalink/1682880521995843/
Since it’s a closed group, you may not be able to read it, so basically it says that some people used Netgalley and received a bunch of 1 star reviews. Reviewers on Netgalley are encouraged to leave a review everything they receive, so even if it’s not really their thing, they leave 1 star reviews. However, some people filter through the reviewers’ requests (or use a company) and that seems to help. A lot of people say it’s not worth the money spent. So… I think it was good for a while, it must be one of those things that changes over time. I find this industry changes very quickly, what worked last year, probably won’t work this year.
That’s very interesting! Thanks 🙂
I know authors on Twitter and WordPress and Goodreads; we’ve all left reviews for each other, all have been accepted except one. Having said that I’m going to go back and double check because you never know what these monkeys at Amazon are up to.
Lol – I think they’re just trying to run their business 🙂
I see no way that Amazon could tell who I am connected with on FB and Twitter. These things could only be accessed if Amazon had a secret understanding with FB and Twitter and I hardly think this is the case. Actually, I know for a fact Amazon is not a Facebook business partner because their helpdesk told me so while discussing an irrelevant issue with me. So rest easy, folks! Most of my reviews are also by people I connect regularly with on Facebook, since either before or after they posted the review. I haven’t had my reviews deleted and haven’t lost any either. Last, I think it’s best not to add a disclaimer when you’re reviewing after receiving a copy from the author. Saying it’s a free copy in exchange for a review only attracts attention it, whereas if you say nothing they can give you the benefit of the doubt – people do pick up second hand paperbacks or borrow them from friends, for example.
Effrosyni
I agree with the first part of the comment. As for the second one – not to add the disclaimer – it’s up to the reader, although I have to point out that not mentioning it is against Amazon’s rules.
I didn’t know that it’s against the rules, Nicholas. I’ll have to research this, thank you… but I still wonder how they will catch the reviewer who hasn’t mentioned it 🙂
Lol – they know when you’re sleeping, they know when you’re awake… Oh wait, that’s Santa…
Very informative article, Nicholas. Thank you for sharing this.
A pleasure! I hope you find it helpful 🙂