Customer review

A customer review is a review of a product or service made by a customer who has purchased the product or service. Customer reviews are a form of customer feedback on electronic commerce and online shopping sites. There are also dedicated review sites, some of which use customer reviews as well as or instead of professional reviews. The reviews may themselves be graded for usefulness or accuracy by other users.

The reliability of customer reviews has been questioned. Abuses akin to ballot stuffing of favourable reviews by the seller, or negative reviews by competitors, need to be policed by the review host site. Since few sites restrict users to reviewing only items purchased from that site, it is difficult to prove a customer has actually used the product they are reviewing.

Before the advent of the internet, methods by which customers could review products and services included customer comment boxes and customer service helplines. These methods are still in existence today although internet review sites have grown significantly in recent years.

One of the first review sites was Epinions, established in 1999.

Major dedicated review sites include:

Sites which incorporate significant review functions include:

Germany

The UK

The US

The Netherlands

Humorous customer reviews are common on some major shopping sites, such as Amazon. These are often ironically or sarcastically laudatory reviews of products deemed kitsch or mundane. Another example is methylated spirits described in the style of a wine review. A product may become an internet meme attracting large numbers of spoof reviews, which may boost its sales. Famous examples include Tuscan Whole Milk and the Three Wolf Moon T-shirt.

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Wikipedia