Paying for reviews on Amazon

[LettersFromTatyana]

The New York Times had an article about paying for book reviews on Amazon:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/26/b...nd-for-online-raves.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&hp

I'm not really shocked (well, I had no idea paying for reviews was so expensive, or that reviewers made so much!). However, while I knew this was going on, the real kicker (for me at least) can be found on the third and fourth pages, where we learn that John Locke, the first man to sell one million e-books through Amazon (not the philosopher JL!), paid for reviews. I mean, if he did it, what does that say about everyone else?


So now I have to ask:

Has anyone here paid for reviews, or seriously considered it? Do you know anyone who has?

Why did you/they ultimately decide to do this, and did it really help you/them sell more books? Do you/they feel guilty about it at all, or is it considered normal now?

How much do you trust the reviews on Amazon, or base your purchases off of them?

 

[Verdad]

Reader reviews are just one of the things I consider and probably the least important one. I do give them some weight if I’m undecided and if they strike me as honest.

Internet and caveat emptor are practically synonyms anyhow, so I’m not too outraged about this particular illustration of that. Still disappointing it seems to work, though.

 

[soflabbwlvr]

This goes hand in hand with another article I read a few weeks ago, that described authors exchanging favorable reviews with one another. If I can find the link, I'll post it. Taken together, the two phenomena pretty much debunk the idea of basing a purchase on reviews.

 

[lovecraft68]

I have not paid for reviews however, I have swapped them.

I am good friends with a couple of other authors here and we have exchanged reviews.

In our defense we have read each others books and stories here and I don't feel I have lied about anything I have written.

Thing is, that if authors think comments are rare here, try getting a review on amazon.

One of the authors I did a review for has a book that has sold 5000 copies in the year it's been out. It only has 8 reviews and one is mine and one is another friend.

Even 50 Shades, which has several thousand reviews, that number is based on literally millions of sales.

Reviews drive amazon sales and with them being so hard to come by many people have someone review their book for them. Not to this degree of course (and I would not be surprised if some of the glowing initial Shades reviews are less than legit) but its part of the game.

There is an article I read somewhere about selling e-books that even encourages people to do this, Not pay for, but get some friends to review your work.

Like anything else some people are stupid about it, things like "Can't wait for more from this amazingly talented author" and you can tell its bogus.

the standard practice is to ask someone to just make a quick point or two about the work, something you won't see in the limited preview people get.

To me this is no different than when I had the comic shop and at trade shows told people why they should subscribe at my store rather than the guy down the road.

When you're selling your services, be it books, software, house cleaning etc... you're selling yourself.

Won't you take every edge you can get?

But having said that, I think actually buying them from someone "legit" goes a step further. That's a far cry from an unknown lit author boosting another unknown lit authors story.

 

[emap]

So stupid and moronic pop in my head but I'm cranky today.

Still there is one thing that popped up and said what the hell. namely the talk about how reviews are taking away advertising and word of mouth. I'm left a little dumbfounded there, all the places I go online to look at things finding a review is tantamount to a needle in a haystack.

Except when it comes to Amazon oddly enough. Books in general as well, I actually buy at Literary Guild and they have reviews rather quickly. The first review is a person saying what the book is about. Which is great because there they have the book and the author and that covers it without reviews. Amazon though they get a section to sell the book and the read some of the book options.

Which well brings me to a question. What happened to using everything available to sell the book and the reviews are only bonus to that end?

Some of the authors I look at on Amazon do this, they give a concise account of what the book is about. Which is great, reading the book is only going to alert you to what voice the author used and if it sounds good anyway you don't really need that unless you are a stickler for it.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Uh, what about the testimonials the publisher solicits for the book jacket?

No one advertises his goldmine until the Academy Awards nominations come out. People advertise shit that aint selling. The more ads I see, the less I'm impressed.

As for Amazon Reviews, I only read the bad ones; if theyre coherent and detailed I pass the book by.

 

[lovecraft68]

Another reason many people look for someone to throw a review to them is trolling.

You think its bad here? Try selling a book when amazon has the asshole policy of not needing to buy the book to review it.

People don't even have to spend the money to just click review and blast away. Sometimes they base it on the preview other times they are just being assholes.

People one starring a 4000k story that sells for .99 like they expected War and Peace.

I got a 2 star review on mine and the reviewer said right in the review it was based only on the preview.

I clicked "see my other reviews" and sure enough Mr. Troll has reviewed 2 dozen books and everything is a 1 or 2.

I was fortunate in the sense they called out the sex scene as being hot, so they threw me a bone, but point is Amazon is showing no concern for the authors with this policy so why shouldn't we find ways to counteract that.

Knock on my book in that review is my characters are arrogant. They are, in the beginning, but that changes as the book moves along. You have to go past the preview to see it.

So I had someone simply say, that the characters start out obnoxious, but by the end you feel for them.

I have also bought a copy of every book I have reviewed. Except Shades. My wife bought that and I blasted it based on flipping through her copy before she gave it away.

 

[manyeyedhydra]

It doesn't surprise me. I don't think it's restricted to self-published authors either. The first 3 or 4 reviews of a lot of commercially published books look suspiciously like they were planted there by the publisher's marketing department. Then add in a few more that were clearly put there by friends of the writer.

I don't think most real readers are that bothered about leaving reviews. I've had two on amazon from around 600 sales over a couple of years.

I usually ignore all the 5-star reviews if I'm browsing to buy.

 

[lovecraft68]

I pay no attention to reviews, I go by cover and then description Sounds good I'll ask the wife to buy it, as I don;t have a kindle. I have a kindle for pc app, but for whatever reason, it keeps corrupting and I lose the book in it.

I have a book that's at its 4th straight month of 175 or so sales. It doesn't have one review.

Kindle ranking seems to help, that and the more people who buy the book the more "people who bought this also bought..." pages it shows up on.

 

[PennLady]

I've never paid for a review and have to say the idea never occurred to me. I've posted a few reviews on Amazon but not many. My problem is that even for people I "know," sometimes I don't feel i can give their stuff a good review, so I just don't say anything.

 

[sun_sea_sky]

I don't really believe reviews in most cases. Just as an example in the local newspaper there will be a favourable review of a local restaurant, and then an ad for the same restaurant on the adjacent page. You can't tell me that they didn't bargain with the place that if they advertise, they will get a good review.

As for online reviews, it isn't that hard to make a dozen bogus accounts and post good reviews of your own work, or trolling reviews of your competition.

Possibly more useful is simply to search the Internet, looking for ad-hoc reviews in forums and things like that.

Like anything else some people are stupid about it, things like "Can't wait for more from this amazingly talented author" and you can tell its bogus.

Yeah, it would be more believable to say "not quite up to his usual standard."

 

[emap]

I don't really believe reviews in most cases. Just as an example in the local newspaper there will be a favourable review of a local restaurant, and then an ad for the same restaurant on the adjacent page. You can't tell me that they didn't bargain with the place that if they advertise, they will get a good review.

As for online reviews, it isn't that hard to make a dozen bogus accounts and post good reviews of your own work, or trolling reviews of your competition.

Possibly more useful is simply to search the Internet, looking for ad-hoc reviews in forums and things like that.



Yeah, it would be more believable to say "not quite up to his usual standard."

Honestly I'm more inclined to believe restaurant reviews in the paper. The writer of the reviews is paid by the paper and the manager of the reporters doesn't touch sales or advertising. Besides most of the papers revenue comes from the buying public who buy the paper. Magazines work the same way, most of their revenue comes from the people who get the paper or magazine. Granted those reviewers are known to get bought but actually not that often. Usually fired after it's found out and reporters being reporters would report on it.

Course the reviews on movies you don't want to listen to until it comes out and the general public can see it. The ones done before it's released you can tell are simply the guy saying it's an awesome movie, probably for money.

The funny part, movies have been doing this for decades and everyone knows, and yet suddenly books are shown to do the same thing and people are surprised.

Yes I know I didn't mention that before, I didn't think about it. Took Sun there talking about other reviews to spark the thought.

 

[sun_sea_sky]

Besides most of the papers revenue comes from the buying public who buy the paper. Magazines work the same way, most of their revenue comes from the people who get the paper or magazine.

It no doubt varies a bit. The "local" newspaper we get weekly is free, so no revenue comes from subscribers. It is all funded by ads. The bulk are real-estate ads, for which you don't really have "reviews", followed by ads for local restaurants, businesses etc.

A quick Google shows that there used to be an 80/20 rule for newspapers, where 80% of their revenue comes from advertising and 20% from circulation. So I wouldn't say "most" revenue comes from the readers. This is apparently declining (from 80% to maybe 55%) but you can see that the "client" of the newspaper is really the advertisers, not the readers.

The same goes for commercial TV. You, the viewer, aren't the client. The advertisers are, which is why viewers are treated with such contempt (eg. programs running late, shown out of order, cancelled, interrupted by ads, etc.).

Your role, as a viewer, is advertiser-fodder.

 

[RodenAddison]

. . . As for Amazon Reviews, I only read the bad ones; . . .

James. At first, I hated your guts. Now, I find you oddly amusing and entertaining. I'm not trying to make fun. I appreciate your cutting whit. Okay, sometimes it's a little dull, but we all have our off days. Even ogres.

Just wanted to ask. Is amazon where you get all your material.

 

[emap]

Oh hey now, you are slightly wrong on the TV part. People don't pay for the channels, well some channels you do. Usually those channels are even more driven to do things that will make people sit up and go oh damn I have to watch that.

HBO has True Blood, I don't remember if they still do it but Real Sex. They show the movies that regular cable doesn't have yet and I like this part, don't have commercials. Instead of commercials they have backing companies and feature their products. Like True Blood everybody gets a Bud I think it was.

See what you are missing, is the advertisers are the big revenue for the TV channels. They don't get them unless there are viewers. So they all try and come up with shows and movies that make people go I want to watch that and they all live or die on the Nielson rating. Good shows are canceled because they don't do well enough on those ratings.

I'm hoping they get a better look at who actually views a show or movie because the Nielson ratings are not really that great of a system. It's one of those boxes represents something like 100000 houses. I enjoyed Prime Suspect, but it's canceled. Look at Futurama, it was canceled but enough regular people said hey I watched that so they brought it back. Prime example of it not working. There's one of those every few years really.

Which has nothing to do with the actual thread so sorry for the hijack we now return you to your regular scheduled whatever this was.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

James. At first, I hated your guts. Now, I find you oddly amusing and entertaining. I'm not trying to make fun. I appreciate your cutting whit. Okay, sometimes it's a little dull, but we all have our off days. Even ogres.

Just wanted to ask. Is amazon where you get all your material.

I write my own material. I usta sell it to newspapers where it was used in the puzzle section.

People hate me for all kinds of reasons, I'm used to it.

 

[sun_sea_sky]

The New York Times had an article about paying for book reviews on Amazon ... I had no idea paying for reviews was so expensive

Paying for friendship. Isn't that prostitution? And yes, it can be expensive.

 

[damppanties]

Paying for friendship.

That's what therapy is.

 

[desertslave]

This is the 2nd time today (and it's 9:30 a.m) that I've discovered that I'm naive about something! (And at my age, that's a double surprise. LOL)

I don't post written reviews on Amazon often (because I'm lazy), but I star almost everything I've purchased/read, and I generally make use of others' reviews if I need to make a decision on a particular book. I guess I'll be making more critical assessments from now on.

I just wrote a review for technical hobby book. It makes me kind of sad that it might be suspect. Hrm.

 

[Recidiva]

I've listened to...if I remember correctly, a New York Times audio digest article on this.

It's against Amazon's policies to allow paid reviews. If I recall correctly, they discovered that one of the vendors of a Kindle accessory was offering paid positive reviews, and I think they wiped out the entire review history for the product, I'm not sure if they suspended future reviews or sales.

If Amazon has credible evidence that paid reviews are being offered, they'll take action of some sort.

 

[lovecraft68]

I had a review pulled from a book I put out early this year.

I don't blame them for being suspicious about it, it was ridiculously gushing.

I have no idea who it was and still wonder if it was some one I knew trying to "help" me or just someone who just really liked it.

It was like one of those "you're the bestest writer ever!" comments we get on lit sometimes.