The other day I was surfing WeddingWire and I came across something that made me worry a bit -- a negative review for a vendor we booked. Granted, this is one negative review among the dozens of glowing ones, but it still took me by surprise, and suddenly I was questioning whether we'd made a mistake.
Earlier today another negative vendor review caused me to bite my lower lip and worry. I signed into Etsy to check in on my invitations (they're supposed to ship tomorrow, according to the timeline we agreed on -- wish me luck!!) and saw another buyer recently left my seller negative feedback due to non-delivery of an item. That makes two non-delivery complaints in the past month. Yikes. I really don't want to be #3.
All of which got me wondering -- why are negative reviews so much more influential on my psyche than positive ones? The customer isn't always right, after all, and no one review can tell the whole story about a vendor or about a particular transaction. Plus, sites like WeddingWire have no way of verifying that the reviews come from people who actually used the company, and I've heard there are some unscrupulous folks who will post fake bad reviews to beat down their competition. (This is obviously not the case with Etsy feedback, where a reviewer can't post anything unless he or she bought something.)
So why is it that user "RosieluvsJake" complaining that a vendor screwed up her order can make me start wondering whether we've made a huge mistake, automatically becoming more important than the 7 positive reviews posted earlier?
What about you guys? Do bad reviews make you nervous? Or do you ignore anonymous commenters on the Internet because you can't know if they're legit?
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
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2 comments:
They do make me nervous... if they are recent. I would contact the seller to double-check that everything is okay and on schedule. I'm going through a non-communication phase from the person making our invites, so I know how you feel!
Ugh, non-communication is THE WORST -- so stressful. I'm on pins and needles today waiting to see if our invites are actually shipped. Econo Boy encouraged me to at least give the stationer a chance to do it right (i.e. ship them by the end of the day and send me the tracking number) before I contact her again, but my inner control freak is begging to be let off the leash and just send one little reminder today ...
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