Fake Amazon Reviews at Work and why YouTube Reviews make more sense

If you are reading reviews on Amazon and you see certain combinations of words, it usually means the review you are reading is probably fake. Amazon is especially guilty of this. Over 90% of the reviews you see on Amazon are fake. Some products that might be the only reviews even shown. Just 100% fake reviews, with not a single genuine one.

It is a problem that is plaguing the advertising world, as well as shopping/commerce. You can see them on Google, Yelp and other websites too... But Amazon is the biggest culprit.

And for my purposes I am going to use fake book reviews as an example.

If someone writes:

"Wow. I honestly couldn't put this book down!"

That means they didn't actually read the book and don't know what to write.

"This guy is a really good storyteller."

Notice how it doesn't tell you anything about the book? It is just short and completely bogus.

"I just ended up wanting to read more."

or

"Wow. This book should be made into a movie!"

Again. Nothing about the plot or the characters. The person writing doesn't know what to write because they didn't actually read the book.

So what should a real book review look like?

"I really liked the characters and the plot. I didn't care so much for the one character, Mordechai, he was a real jerk, but I suppose he is meant to be. I am not sure if I will buy the next book in the series. I really don't like it when books end on cliffhangers, but I did really enjoy the book so maybe I will after all. Four stars out of five!"

Yep. Notice the difference?

The reader actually complains about the book, even though they still liked it. That is when you know the review is definitely genuine. They also didn't give it a perfect 5 star rating. If it was a 5 star rating and they had no complaints, the chances are much higher that the book review is fake.

"This book caught me off guard at first because the main character is Muslim, but after the fight scene in chapter two it really picked up the pace and I enjoyed myself. I did think that some of the characters were overly complicated, and wishy-washy, but they also have their good points. Kudos to the author for making a superhero book that feels realistic, but without making the superhero rich like Batman. If you like movies like Unbreakable or Red Dawn then you will probably enjoy this book."

Pop culture references, hmm? Complaints about the character being wishy-washy and too complicated, but also praising the book for its realism. That is a good way to spot a real book review. (The book in question is "The Girl in the Red Hoodie" by Charles Moffat.)

Speaking of Charles Moffat, you should check out his YouTube channel where he posts fantasy book reviews.

Which brings us to the next topic...

Why YouTube Reviews Make More Sense

Amazon, Yelp and Google reviews are very often fake. We get that. Capitalism is so rife with fake reviews these days that for every real review there are 9 fake ones. This is because the people selling their products NEED reviews in order to get sales. Even if they're fake, a fake review is better than no reviews when your goal is to make money.

But on YouTube it is a lot harder to fake a product review or a book review.

In the example of books you actually need to READ the book in order to do it. You can't just say:

"Hello! It's Bob here and I want to talk today about Stephen King's book "The Shining". I, uh... Uh, um... I didn't actually read it so I just watched the movie version instead."

Yeah...

That isn't going to work. Trying to make a fake book review for something you didn't actually read will be pretty obvious within the first minute of making the video and trying to talk about it.

Physically reading the book is important, and video reviews like those you find on YouTube means they cannot be faked. At least not easily. There is a huge measure of authenticity when you watch a video review where the author starts talking about the character, the plot, and while there is the chance for spoilers, they can't really fake it in the normal sense.

Someone would have to go through a lot of effort to fake a book review for something they didn't actually read. Possibly by watching the movie version. But since many books don't have a movie version I suppose someone could also read a synopsis of a book (sometimes available via Wikipedia) and then fake it using that so they at least know something about the characters and the plot.

Plus at the very least the person needs to BUY the physical book so they can show it to the audience. I suppose they could read an ebook version, but when you're making a video you want something physical like the actual book that you can show in your hands.

In Charles Moffat's case he will also often compare different books to one another, so you're not just looking at one book, but also getting an idea of other books which are similar to it. Like in the video below in which he compares the Witcher series by Sapkowski to similar books by Charles Saunders and others.

The point I am trying to get at is that maybe this is what Google, Amazon and Yelp should be doing... Video reviews!

If everyone doing a product review or a book review had to post a video of themselves with the actual product then it would be far more useful to people looking to buy said product or book.

It would be way more honest and Amazon would finally shed their reputation for having so many fake reviews. Video is the perfect way to fix this problem.

And notice also, for privacy reasons, that Charles Moffat doesn't actually show his face in the above videos. Just his hands/arms and the books he is talking about. So if you do it right there is no privacy issues to worry about if people don't want to show their face when making a review.