New Article: Why Blog Reviews Can Bite You In The Butt

[thejenn]

Authored by: Jennifer Laycock

Full Text: http://www.searchengineguide.com/laycock/009111.html

A Snippet:

The blog world isn't fair. While bloggers have a wonderful way of ferreting out the truth when someone's being less than honest, they also have a way of occasionally placing blame where blame doesn't belong. Case in point? This week's fuss over Microsoft and Edelman, their public relations firm.

[vangogh]

Interesting Jenn. I hadn't seen this story until now.

I would imagine some of the backlash against Microsoft here is due to the way they've done business over the years. Right or wrong there are a lot of Microsoft haters who are only too happy to pounce on anything even slightly anit-Microsoft.

In this case it doesn't sound to me like they did anything wrong at all, though from what I understand many reviewers aren't allowed to keep the items they review. I'm not a product reviewer so maybe I'm wrong in this. It's just been my perception. I would think not being given the product outright would lead to a more honest review and this was my understanding of why reviewed products are often returned.

For the blogger the clear lesson is that honesty is important. I think we've always wanted it, but the web makes sure you're going to be found out quicker. It's easy to think sitting at home in front of a laptop that you're blog is in its own isolated world, but it's hardly the case.

Microsoft should realize though that at this point they need to go a little above and beyond. Maybe it's not fair, but in truth they created their poor reputation with many die to their own practices over the years.

Did they do anything wrong in this case? It sounds more like an honest mistake, but it is Microsoft and given their past many are going to be predisposed to not trusting them and giving them the benefit of the doubt.

[St0n3y]

I don't see how sending someone a product in exchange for a review necessarily means they are trying to buy a positive review. Free or not, if you don't like it you don't like it. Period. End of story. If I get a bad chair for free I won't write nice things about it. It'll get a bad review (if I did such things) and I'd toss it in the garbage.

[vangogh]

I can see where if you get to keep the product it might be seen as a bribe of sorts.

"If you review my new operating system I'll give you a free computer"

I think there would be some who might think they need to give a positive review in order to accept the gift and lets face it if someone hands you a lot of money aren't you going to naturally be more likely to say pleasant things about them.

I agree it shouldn't matter and most people would still review the product honestly, but the gift can bias the message some and even more bias people's perceptions of the message.

I don't think Microsoft had the wrong intentions here at all, but given their track record the're going to be judged a little more harshly by many.

[thejenn]

Yep, I honestly think this was a case where Microsoft got slammed for no reason. Granted, it would have been smart to require full disclosure and some will say it would have been even smarter to have required them to send the product back.

When I worked for About.com, they had a policy that any review product that you received that was valued over X dollars (can't remember what it was, I wanna say $40) had to be returned after you finished reviewing it. I think that's generally a good policy.

On the other hand, I've also now got experience with this from reviewing products at The Lactivist blog. I had a pretty large company send me a breast pump in December. It retails for about $150 and they can't really resell them. I offered to send it back but they said not to worry about it. So, I will be giving it to a friend that just had a baby. It won't impact my review at all that they let me keep it, but I also disclose in every review whether I bought a product or whether I received it for free.

I think ultimately it's the type of thing that sort of self regulates. Those that give glowing reviews to bad products simply because they got something for free are not going to attract and retain the types of audiences that make reviews valuable. People are smarter than that. Sure, I could write glowing reviews for every product I receive, but wouldn't my readers start to get a little suspicious if I loved EVERYTHING? Especially if they end up buying it themselves and hate it?

Therefore, as a blogger, it's not in my best interest to be dishonest in my reviews. Now I know that not every blogger is going to view things from the same long-term perspective...but I have to think those types are the exception rather than the rule...

[vangogh]

I agree with you Jenn on the self regulating nature of the reviews. You could only get away with giving a very positive review of a bad product a couple of times before you'd lose your audience.

The latest issue of PC World has a short article called 'This Blog For Hire' on the latest pay per review business model. They quote Michael Arrington of TechCrunch as likening the PayPerPost site as something akin to the payola scandals back in the 50's. The criticism is mostly over the non disclosure of being paid for the review.

Whether or not you get to keep a product shouldn't affect the review and I think most reviewers will be more interested in being honest so they keep their audience, but it's easy to see how a review could be influenced by the direct reward of keeping the product.

[St0n3y]

The more I think about this the more I believe the MS really screwed up. The review was not for the laptop, it was for the operating system. A laptop is a very nice gift for a review of a piece of software. They could have simply send an disc to install it (but who would?). Disclosure was certainly essential. I think it would have been completely cook for MS to send a laptop if the product they were reviewing is the laptop, because like I said, If they didn't like it then the 'gift' would have have been meaningless.

[vangogh]

I hadn't thought about it that way. I still think Microsoft had good intentions here, but given how people view them they need to take extra precaution against these kind of things happening.

That might not be fair, but they created this situation for themselves with how they've operated over the years.

[thejenn]

Yes, but who in the right mind is going to install a beta copy of a new MS operating system on their everyday computer? I sure as heck wouldn't.

Thus, the laptop was essential to being able to do the review...now they could have required the return of the laptop or full disclosure or whatever, but I think the laptop was essential...

[St0n3y]

Yeah, the laptop WAS essential for the review. MS really should have thought about that. I agree the uproar was likely unfair... but it was of their making.