Ask HN: How do I find legit, quality products on Amazon?
We've tried Fakespot and Review Meta: the former frequently detects an outsized proportion of fake reviews, while the latter will be in opposition (bias promoting affiliate link purchases?). It's getting discouraging when on a quest to buy light bulbs, every vendor is approaching a score of 60% review reliability.
Very often, the Amazon Top Pick has the worst reputation on review analysis sites.
Frequently, to short-circuit paralysis by analysis, we just buy the least worst item. Or a meaningless name brand at thrice the price (I'm looking at you, Philips) with equally dismal results. We're finding that garden variety consumer electronics are a landmine of knockoffs with poor quality and short lifespans. Just looking for a decent outdoor timer ended up an epic rabbit hole (and we're on a third try).
Is it really that bad? What has your experience looked like, and have you found tools to help? Thanks.
13 comments
[ 3.4 ms ] story [ 41.4 ms ] threadEdit: Wait, what? Light bulbs? Just go to home Depot or the grocery store and be done with it. Most other things can be bought this way. And it's same day having.
Usually can't find the price/spec/performance balance we want. Light bulbs was just an example -- we wanted BR30 lights (and lots of them) with 3000K color. Everything at HD/Lowes was either 2700K or 5000K. And 3x the per-bulb price. Same issue with just about everything home-electronic: we can't find the same thing locally and online has been gamed.
Plus with Covid-19, we're relying on delivery more than ever- we have a immune-compromised family member so try to take reasonable measures.
They don't build them like they used to? I want to say something about kids getting off my lawn right about now.
So, not that a handful of responses are much to go on yet, but as I write this, the sentiment is that avoiding Amazon is the solution, rather than navigating its murky waters. Food for thought. Thanks.
Another issue that adds to the confusion: a combined five star rating scale on a product that has 12 different variations is meaningless. They could treat them individually, but choose not to.
Your observation of the preponderance of unreliable reviews on Amazon matches what we see across the board. Unfortunately, ever since Amazon opened up to 3rd party sellers, the reviews have become a marketing tool by a lot of these sellers to move ahead of other products. These sellers use everything from pure fake reviews to gamed verified purchase reviews. This is major reason why so many reviews nowadays are unreliable, it is truly a wild west out there in the eCommerce world and fake reviews can mean $$$.
With that said, we just launched Fakespot Guardian as part of our new Chrome extension which solves the 3rd party seller problem by telling you if a seller is reliable or not. By knowing if seller and reviews are reliable, you will be able to purchase anything with confidence.
The constant problem was that competitors would automate clickbomb attacks -- fake traffic with click throughs that would ultimately get the site banned from ad networks (or severely devalue CPM rates) for fraudulent traffic. The irony was that we never used the same tactics ourselves, assuming that the risks outweighed the rewards. The malicious bot traffic ultimately spelled the end of the site.
I would imagine that an Amazon product/seller would suffer from high quantities of any fake reviews, whether positive or negative:
Too positive? Amazon or Fakespot & similar services penalize them.
Too negative? Consumers penalize them.
Seems like with a modest budget and a Fiverr-like service, smaller retailers could be harmed with relative ease.
Then, faced with these attacks, I'd imagine many companies with means might try countermeasures, triggering a sort of review arms race.
How do you separate the signal from the noise from deliberate fake reviews (of any kind) from third parties with malicious intent?
When I read them I am looking for consistency. If 4 people out of 20 complain it broke in 3 months, well there is my sign.
It is there you will also see that a lot people are dumb. My favorite was some advanced book on a tech topic. Title had 'Advanced' as the first word. Person who scored it one star - 'Not a good book for a beginner. Way too complex'. I wished you could down vote a score, or recommend it for review.
SO I do not just read the one stars, I often read the 2 stars. People posting a 2 star are not as emotional, and just the facts.
There are a couple dozen sites I trust across a number of categories of goods. I order from those, even if it means paying a bit of a premium.
Heck, maybe because it does. I’d rather pay $30 for a well made widget that’ll last a few years than $10 for a knock-off that’ll fail in a few days.