Is Amazon Too Late to the Fake Review Crack Down?
Articles about how to spot a fake travel review are a dime a dozen, but in this consumer-driven, instant-access economy, the onus simply can’t be on the buyer to detect fraudulent reviews. Without the bandwidth—or let’s face it, the desire—to do the legwork, consumers will gravitate toward sources that offer the most-trustworthy reviews.
Amazon knows this. Last Friday, the company took its second round of legal action this year against fraudulent reviewers in an effort to prevent degradation of its brand—and, clearly, to keep the consumers coming. This is certainly one way to do it, though notably reactive.
The other way, the proactive approach, ensures that only verified reviews—reviews where a purchase has been confirmed, or in the case of travel, where a stay at a hotel has been verified—are published. TrustYou’s Meta-Reviews, rely only on verified hotel reviews so that intermediaries and hotels that rely on our review summaries aren’t at risk of review credibility problems and, therefore, brand credibility issues.
Ninety-five percent of travelers report using reviews to make booking decisions. Reviews are intrinsic to the travel research and planning process now, and a travel brand will be tied not only to the reputation portrayed by the reviews but also to the veracity of the reviews themselves. Any inkling that something is amiss, whether it is the responsibility of the hotel or not, won’t be tolerated when travelers depend so greatly on reviews to be assured of their experience.
