What are product reviews?
Dear GreatCents,
I'm wanting to buy a new gaming system on Black Friday. However, I am not sure which is the best one to buy, what can I do?
Sincerely,
Pedro from Nebraska
Hey Pedro!
Okay so, product reviews are where a person or organization are able to share about their experiences with the quality of goods and services.
For example, I once purchased an app for my computer. After I had downloaded the program and started it up, it froze on me! I tried it several times and each time the program wouldn't work. I contacted their customer service and they explained that it was made for an older version of computer's system and I would just have to wait until they decided to update it. I couldn't get my money back and so I shared about my experience on a review. Reviews help us to help others, and learn from their experiences as well!
Product Reviews are everywhere! Anytime you shop online you will likely see review scores next to the item. These are calculated by finding the average rating of customers for those items. How do they get those ratings? They have customers share about their experience after they have received the item they have purchased.
Important to think about!
Commercials are trying to sell us things, as if buying them would make our lives a wonderland. We know at the end of the day, things are still just things and after a little while we will want something new or better. So when we do decide to purchase an item we want to do some research. What is something you would write a rating for? Something you really hated or loved or something you thought was okay? We tend to focus on the things that give us the strongest feelings, whether good or bad. Remember when reading people's reviews they might be a bit exaggerated. That is why it is important to check several different sources.
Where would I check?
Here is a quick list:
The site where I am shopping: Amazon, Ebay, etc.
YouTube- You can find videos where they walk through all the details.
Word of Mouth- I would talk to people that I know that have purchased the item or have experienced the service....
Hands on- If I can see the product for myself, I check it for quality.
When shopping in person or online, I tend to like to compare prices. If I am in a physical store, I will check if that item is online. If the item is online then I compare prices. Next, I will check the average rating. If it has thousand or more positive ratings, I can be pretty confident that it is a product that makes a lot of customers happy. If a large number of customers shared that they had a bad experience, I will want to be careful about buying that item. If the item is only available to me online, I might watch several YouTube reviews where I can see the product and it being used. I also, might add the product into my shopping cart for a few days (online) before I make the purchase. How do you and your family look at reviews?
Things to check out!
Here are some links to helpful lessons and articles that can teach you more about product reviews:
Learn about how the FTC is helping stop fake reviews
Check out this lesson about the Right to be Heard and the USDA
Thanks for writing!
Sincerely,
Blake from GreatCents
10/14/21