Just in time for Halloween, Amazon drops the ax on incentive reviews. Amazon has cracked down on fraudulent, fake, and unethical reviews on their product listings this year. But now…they just said off with their heads! For a while, reviewers were allowed to receive free or discounted products in exchange for reviews as long as they disclosed that info. Not anymore.
Amazon Reviews Policy Change
Now the only reviews allowed are ones bought by the customer. No freebies. No discounts. Must be a verified purchase. If anyone violates the rules, Amazon could go as far as to bring on a law suit and at the least ban the profile. The only review program supported at this point will be Amazon’s Vine Reviews, which is invite only.
Further, this has been just a matter of time before this policy would happen. Basically the few bad apples spoil the batch. There are plenty of honest reviewers with integrity, but because of dishonest companies and reviewers, policies like this happen. In the grand scheme of things, understandably Amazon needs to look after the customer. Customers need to be able to reply on legit reviews and not be led astray.
Unfortunately, reviewers like myself reap the consequences of other’s lack of integrity. It’s been goal and value to always give full, honest opinions about products. That’s the way it will always be. I dread leading someone in a wrong direction no matter what the subject is.
Sadly, there have been a number of occasions Amazon sellers ask me to be post only 5 star reviews, not disclose the product was given for review, etc. It literally disgusts me.
Good news is reviews should clean up a bit over on Amazon.com. It’s really needed and surly the unethical reviews have been nothing but a thorn in the side to Amazon. I’ll continue to accept offers from Amazon sellers and place tech related products on Bane-Tech.com and non-tech related products over at ReviewerLife.com.
Are you happy about the policy? As a customer? As a reviewer?
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Source | Amazon
