Reviews Not Influecing Buying?

[Vanuslux]

Too often I find reviews to be nearly useless - they often don't give me a table of contents, or tell me what's in a chapter (needs more than one sentence!) and don't tell me how big the chapters are.

I prefer the reviews I read to have that information, which is why I generally write a paragraph on each chapter and indicate the number of pages in my reviews. A review that doesn't give me a thorough idea of what is in the book does me very little good since tastes are pretty subjective.

 

[xazil]

While I do read online reviews when undecided about a product, quite often it is a thread on a place like here that sparks my interest in the first place and determines my leaning.

Including a while ago some game called "DnD 3rd Ed" on Eric Noah's boards.

 

[trancejeremy]

RPG.net added a hit counter to their reviews a couple months ago. The results were a lot less than I expected.

Generally speaking, most the reviews I've written have ranged from 900-2000 hits, most generally around 1500. (Actually, I wrote down how many reads my had the other day...):

As of Midnight, August 21st (the date the review was posted in in parentheses)

Into the Blue (June 9th) - 928
OGL Horror (June 11th) - 2106
HPL's Dreamlands (June 25h) - 1300
Legends of Excalibur (July 9th) - 1685
OGL Cybernet (July 19th)- 941
Dungeon Crawl Classics 7 - Smuggler's Cove (Aug 9th) - 1421
d20 Future (August 20th) - 886 (That was in 1 day, it's now up to about 2300)

They also have a top ten list. The top is Eberron, at 8500, then Lone Wolf at 3500, then a bunch at 2500 or so.

Now, even if 10% of the readers happen to buy the product in question (which is a very very generous guess, I would really guess the true figure is probably closer to .1% and even that is a wild, wild guess), that's not very much in most cases. At least from a larger companies' perspective.

OTOH, for really small companies, and PDF companies, they do help.

 

[Chaos Drake]

Yea, they definitely do influence my buying. Have picked up some stuff based on the reviews here. Think that they're easily forgotten about though.

 

[johnsemlak]

A bad review is more likely to make me not buy a product than a good review is to make me buy one

You said it. A bad review is like the kiss of death IMO.

Thing is, there are very few bad reviews posted. In the last month, 4 of 60 print products got lower than a '3', and 1 of 37 PDF products did the same.

 

[BryonD]

Thing is, there are very few bad reviews posted. In the last month, 4 of 60 print products got lower than a '3', and 1 of 37 PDF products did the same.

I agree completely. But that does not change the truth of the statement.
That a bad review has more influence is completely unrelated to how frequently those bad reviews actually occur.

 

[Clint]

I agree completely. But that does not change the truth of the statement.
That a bad review has more influence is completely unrelated to how frequently those bad reviews actually occur.

Writing an unfavorable review is much, much harder than writing a favorable one. Every praising point doesn't have to be explained, but every negative point has to be fully justified. Half of my collection is below average (little math joke there), but writing reviews for those books just isn't worth the time or stress.

I tried to write one negative review and I felt like a condescending jerk, even though I was just giving my honest assessment. I wonder if other most other reviewers feel that way and either skew their scores up to Average or just don't review products they don't like.

-Clint

 

[BryonD]

Writing an unfavorable review is much, much harder than writing a favorable one. Every praising point doesn't have to be explained, but every negative point has to be fully justified. Half of my collection is below average (little math joke there), but writing reviews for those books just isn't worth the time or stress.

I tried to write one negative review and I felt like a condescending jerk, even though I was just giving my honest assessment. I wonder if other most other reviewers feel that way and either skew their scores up to Average or just don't review products they don't like.

-Clint

I do not write reviews, so I can't speak from experience.
But your statements are very reasonable.

So again, I agree but my original statement remains true.
If anything, you have supported why those infrequent negative reviews are more influencial than the more common good reviews.

 

[CalicoDave]

As the price of RPG books continues to increase I consult reviews now more than ever. But, I don't really read reviews to see what that review author thought of the book, instead I use the reviews to try to get a fuller and more complete understanding of what I will be buying with my $35 or more.

A few years ago, when the average hardback was $20 or $25, that's almost an impulse purchase, but now that they are $35, $40 or even $50 I want to know what I'm getting before I plunk down my hard earned cash. So I consult as many reviews as possible to try to get an overall veiw of the product, and how useful I might find it.

Among others, reviews influenced me not to buy Conan, but did influence me to buy Book of the Righteous.

 

[diaglo]

Just don't spam me....

what about those of us willing to read your review. may we? please with sugar on top.