The Psychology Of Ratings And Reviews

Rozenblatt & Co. is the parent company of WiserOps, Inc.

Irreversibly damaging, unjustly punishing, easily abused and manipulated, the current rating and review system used by Yelp and other powerhouses online is archaic and should NOT be allowed to draw a picture of what someones experience might be when/if visiting an establishment or utilizing a service that is listed there.

Why is that you ask?

Well, let’s analyze the situation. When someone makes a purchase for something, a car, a hamburger, anything; they follow an ordering process. Then, most typically receive what it is they ordered/bought and move on without any intrinsic psychological motivation to do anything more regarding the earlier purchase.

Now, let’s look at what is most often happening to many restaurateurs or other business owners. If one thing or another goes wrong, there is often this intrinsic motivation from the customers end to “get back at you”. It’s such a clear example of vengefulness here that it’s ugly.

And, biggest problem is that it’s most usually someone venting over some nonsensical thing that does not pertain to the actual reason people go there.

I’ve read workflow-interrupting reviews, like once, about a busboy in a review that was supposed to be focused on the quality of food the establishment serves. People now see a certain star rating for said establishment, warding off review readers from a great place where the busboy might not have shaved one day - but they serve the best Filet Mignon.

Another time, I was discussing with a different restaurateur the problems with today’s mechanisms used to rate or review places and he shared a fantastic point which completely escaped me:

“There was once a time when you had to be someone in-order for your opinion to be taken seriously. But now the overwhelming majority who are the customers of any given place (relative to the owners or employees), are allowed to essentially paint our front window in whatever hue they so please.”

Sure, I hear you when you say “Yeahh!! FREDDOM Au SPeeCh ‘MerIca” and what-not, because i’ll never vote to trump the voice of anyone, but this system needs to be built correctly, so as not to allow for the continuing damages being incurred (in the billions) by various listed establishments which are affected (worldwide), their bottom lines are hurt because of the way this deceiving, often manipulated rating and review system represents them.

Fret not, it won’t be long until the old way of doing this put away like a child does an old toy.

All the input collected (and still being collected) from establishment owners is being cross analyzed VS consumer info collected from various e-commerce contributors about how best to allow for fair weight behind user reviews.

And so, it’s become clear the direction that it needs to go and genius minds are currently at work on it.

Please stay tuned and visit Critic.fm regularly to catch up on what we’re up to.

May perceptions & reviewer lessons be drawn with a fine feather, and cool be kept like New York’s weather in November, lest you lose your temper and cause irreversible damage forever.

~ Gil Rozenblatt, Managing Director @ Wiser Operations & Chief Critic @ Critic.fm