Success by Indirection
January 30th, 2006
Last century, when designers at Amazon.com decided to include negative reviews alongside positive ones on their product pages, you could almost hear the book publishers, music distributors, and device manufacturers whose products were being sold by the online store pound their collective fists on the table. How the heck does Amazon expect to sell more products if they allow people who may not even be actual, paying customers to publicly trash them?
At first blush the Amazon decision is counter-intuitive. It would seem that allowing anybody to say anything about an item would cause it to sell poorly because someone, somewhere, would write one rotten apple review of it and spoil the bunch.
That didn’t happen, though, and the decision Amazon made is very similar to decisions other successful online companies have made recently that are starting to bear fruit. These decisions all have one thing in common: the more tools you provide customers to help them solve their own problems, the more they use them, and the better your site does as a result. Even if you allow for things like negative opinions.
This was an indirect path to success for Amazon. Allowing both sides of the story takes a lot more work than telling only one side. This goes for all types of web sites: being honest is really hard work. If you write, you have to tell both sides of the story even if you lean heavily toward one of them. If you sell, you have to be realistic about what people are buying or they will never come back after they find out you’re lying.
In contrast, the direct path would be to try to control the message for each item being sold on Amazon. That means any potential customer only hears about how great the product is, even if it isn’t really so great. You can still find this type of bias in the publisher’s review that is included on most book pages.
Increasingly, however, people are turning to third parties such as other users to give them unbiased information. It is this indirect, long-term strategy that has paid off tremendously for Amazon. To this day they continue to allow people to write scathing reviews, knowing that as a whole they will be more valuable that way. After all, some items really are terrible, and you’re doing someone a favor if you tell them about it before they lay out their own money to find out.
Indirectness is an underlying secret of the success of the reviews at Amazon, and for all systems used for recommendations. Though they are difficult to create, they give users the tools with which to make better, more informed decisions. Knowing what not to do is nearly as valuable as knowing what to do.
January 31st, 2006 at 2:16 am
Great posting Joshua. I’m curious what you think of eBay’s recommendation system. When I’m the buyer, I feel like there is pressure to give the seller Positive Feedback (if I give them Negative Feedback, they will give me Negative Feedback).
January 31st, 2006 at 11:58 am
I think the eBay’s recommendation system is A++++++++!!!! Would do business with again!
Seriously, you bring up a great point, Dave. The system has both good and bad points. It’s highly valuable in terms of keeping people in line, but it does seem to work almost too reciprocally. Certainly the fact that people can see your rating is likely to make you play nicer, but you’re right about the possibility of retribution for negative feedback.
We haven’t tested eBay lately, but from my personal experience people treat their reviews more of a relationship than as an objective rating for each transaction. People give the rediculous feedback like I just did in order to obtain the same in return, not because their experience was the best thing ever.
In general, people tend to do business with folks they like, not necessarily those who provide the best service over time. Ebay seems to be successfully modeling that behavior.
January 31st, 2006 at 3:50 pm
Hi Joshua
I agree Amazon is doing a good job here. Nevertheless, what do you think to Apple’s implementation of customer reviews in their Apple Store?
From a business p-o-v this is a rather different issue as many of the products sold here are Apple’s own. I can get absolutely dreadful reviews of an Airport Express card or new Apple iPod earphones. Meanwhile, I notice that there are no reviews of their core products: iBooks, iMacs, Power Mac or iPods…
I presume Apple are harmed less if their accessories don’t sell due to adverse reviews - there’s always a substitute 3rd party product - but when your core business is selling a particular product and not selling a relationship or online experience (a la Amazon or eBay), the rules are different?
All the best
DJ
February 1st, 2006 at 6:31 am
Yes, Apple is doing things a little differently. Back when they released the reviews, it was quickly pointed out that they didn’t allow reviews of their own stuff. Their reasoning?
You can find the full story on News.com: Apple store takes reviews–but not of its own stuff
That particular messaging has since been removed from the site, but it certainly highlights the situation that Apple was in, and it would suggest that they felt the rules were indeed different.
Interestingly, neither Dell nor HP have any reviews. One interesting anecdote from testing is something I’ll call the “Amazon Effect”. When testing computer sites we’ve often had users demand to be able to go to Amazon before they go directly to the computer maker’s site, for the very reason described above: they want to get both sides of the story.
February 1st, 2006 at 7:32 am
The reason I commented: I work for a tour operator in the UK, and we’re having a similar dilemma.
We sell our own holidays and flights and believe in the power of customer reviews — but senior execs in the business are worried about managing negative feedback.
We have the “Amazon effect” for our business too: in the UK there are large community sites where users post reviews of their holiday experiences, and if necessary “dishing the dirt” about the flight, the service, the operator, the food, the cleanliness of their room, etc. Of course it is all unmoderated and unvalidated.
We know that people are likely to be searching for this kind of information anyway - but should we bring it onto our website for all to see, or leave it on other sites where we have no opportunity to manage it?
Cheers
DJ
February 1st, 2006 at 12:35 pm
Hi DJ,
Wow, that’s a great question, and one I’m sure a lot of folks are grappling with even as we speak. It’s even more interesting because I can’t find any examples of sites that allow reviews of their own products…if anybody out there knows of any please post it or send it along!
So we really don’t have much in the way of prior art. Apple, of course, doesn’t allow reviews of their own stuff, but does allow reviews of 3rd party products. Combine that with your observation that people use this information anyway (whether *you* provide it or not), and you’ve got a pretty compelling case that the reviews help users make better decisions.
To that end, our research has consistently shown that providing tools to help users make better decisions is a great way to make them happy and to keep coming back. But does that mean it’s a good idea to add reviews where they could trash you?
Let’s consider another medium: blogs. The Washington Post recently got caught up in a situation where they decided to take down blog comments. So it’s not all tea and roses.
However, when we were considering a blog here at UIE we had several talks about whether or not to include comments, given that comments gave anybody (specifically: trolls) a way to say just about anything. But, after looking really hard at how other blogs were faring, we realized that for the most part, most people on a site want to be there (that’s why they’re there). In other words, they’re already happy with what you’re offering. And if they’re not, the criticism they offer (sometimes negative) is tremendously valuable: we improve daily by paying a lot of attention to any and all feedback.
And time has played that out: we’re really happy with the success of the blog and we feel that we’ve opened ourselves up to more and better conversations with our customers. (just like the conversation we’re having here).
So, back to your problem. If reviews are really so helpful, and blogs comments can serve as a similar case, then it might be worth a shot.
Either way, we would love to hear about your results. Let us know how it goes!
February 1st, 2006 at 2:07 pm
To add to what Josh has said:
If you look closely at the reviews on Amazon, you may notice that there is rarely inappropriate language, off topic responses, or spams pointing you to pleasure-enhancing drugs.
Amazon is obviously moderating their reviews. They allow for civil discourse, but eliminate inappropriate responses.
Moderation could solve DJ’s problem. However, I think DJ would want to establish very clear moderation rules — what’s permissable (reasonab le complaints about service) and what’s not (angry, vicious attacks on your company).
If you have products or services that get criticism, getting that feedback will give you an opportunity to improve. It also gives you a way to talk about the improvements you’re making. “We hear you and we’ve responded with these changes.”
For those contributions that are moderated out, you can still have an offline discussion to try to calm them down and win them over.
All of this implies that your organization is commited to improving products and services. Not every organization has the where-with-all to make that happen.
February 1st, 2006 at 8:37 pm
Kudos for the thoughts, Joshua.
A year ago–inspired by an idea from Milton Glaser–I posted a few thoughts on ambiguity and misdirection in Web design, musing that perhaps it isnt’ enough to make everything easy to find. You might find it interesting: http://uxcentric.blogspot.com/2005/02/doing-leonardo.html.
Kathy Sierra added some interesting ideas: http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2005/03/can_you_have_to_1.html.
Regards,
Dave R.
February 14th, 2006 at 5:24 pm
I work for a university and am looking into using student-written blogs for recruiting on our website. These blogs would be unedited, so in our case, having a blog at all means taking a risk.
Both positive and negative comments in blogs should help prospective students make informed decisions about whether this is the right place for them, though. And in the end, that’s the goal.