Reviews!

Sell On Amazon
1

We all know how notoriously difficult it is to gain reviews. We launched a new product recently, which prompted our main competitor to follow suit and compete with it with their new product, undercutting us on price (which is all fair in love and war but we dont want a race to the bottom price war).

Still all that said, what I dont get is how they have managed to gain 12 reviews within about 6 weeks from launch (we’ve managed to get one across four new products in that time). I know it’s a numbers game, the more you sell, the higher the percentage of review-leaving buyers, but even still 12 in such a short space of time seems weird. They’re all verified, and they’re not vine, so what’s their secret??

By the way our top selling product, if amazon’s ‘sold in last month’ stat are to be beleived, is selling double their product with 12 reviews yet only 1 or 2 no reviews left. Maybe we’re just not pleasing the customers enough! Seller feedback says different though. Mystery.

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2

They have either paid a “reviews company” for the reviews or asked their friends to order some and leave glowing reviews. It’s easy if you want to flex the rules.

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3

I knew about review companies (are they legit in amazon’s eyes? or just asian based fake reviewers?? (other ne’er-do-well continents are available)) . Blimey, I’d never risk (my account) doing that. Is that known and widespread then?

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4

Personally, I would never use these shady people but one thing for sure is that every single new product launch from mainly Chinese sellers will have fake reviews to give it a kick start.

But use your friends, why not? Just be smart about it. Not too many and not everyone living near you.

Obviously, you will reimburse your friends and if your friends are nice, they might even give your items back to you for reselling.

Consider Vine also but it is very expensive indeed. I am running an item that a brand asked me to produce for them and I shared the material costs for a 30-item Vine review. They insisted that the £140 fee was all that had to be paid to Amazon (they paid it) and ignored me when I told them that they also have to pay commission and FBA costs of around £650. I didn’t argue with them!

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5

I just thought that was inherently risky asking friends and family. Yes vine seems way to pricey and from what I’ve read you risk a vine reviewer who’s had a bad day

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I wouldn’t recommend using family to place orders. Friends yes.

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Especially if they share the same name! :wink:

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I exactly know how you feel. I have been doing private label for more than 10 years now. However, there has recently been an epidemic of Chinese sellers (aggressive replicators who will copy your products and do anything to sabotage you), who are clearly getting desperate.

In the past, I managed to launch a product and then sell it as my holy grail for many years undetected and make a lot of money.

Now, every time I launch a well-researched new product (I design it from scratch and there are no similar products / not a generic product), within less than 3 months, swarms of just launched Chinese sellers start popping up with their exactly replicated listings, with the only exception being a brand name consisting a random mixture of letters, all with walls of 5 star reviews, photos of celebrities in their reviewer profile, names such as “Maggy Patrick”. Of course, my listings start getting bombarded with negative reviews, they run aggressive PPC and subject me to black hat attacks.

This used to be rare, now it is happening to everyone.

Please don’t try to equal them. These “replicators”, as I call them are buying their reviews. Their listings will always pop up with 5 star reviews left within days of launch. And yes, you can expect black hat tactics to damage the standing of your own listing, so they can outsell you.

My advice is that you never launch a product without having a carefully planned strategy how to fight this abuse. You need to have an Amazon Brand Registry for the brand. And not just for the brand, trademark the name of the pattern / design or the accessories and then use it in the product’s title or description. Once they replicate your product, you can be guaranteed they will unknowingly copy the name of the trademarked term used in your description.

Use Amazon Vine to get reviews. Then, use trademark reports / legal action to get rid of infringing listings that copy your products and purchase fake reviews.

Trust me, I know how badly it feels when they have walls of 5 star reviews within a week, when you had to wait for yours and they are not all 5 stars.

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9

Thanks Kika. totally appreciate that must be so painful. It isn’t however exactly the case here as this is a competitor I’ve known about for a while, uk based like me and created the product in question to compete with me once I released mine. Not saying what you say wont happen, good forewarning. I am brand regsitered and copyrighted ready for that. So I guess they’re just paying or getting friends to review, as they cant be natural buyer reviews that quickly.

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Is the product an exact copy of your product? Or just similar type of item?

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Just similar, different design. dont have a problem with the product itself, just the reviews seem fishy

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