Dealers flooding review sites with fake user reviews

[yagoparamo]

Poster stated opinion based statement, I'm not contesting. I merely provided facts make your own conclusions

You must be from Spain too! Como esta?

 

[MayhemMarketing]

A racial slur coming from a Spaniard. I am not here to take your business boss no need to fret.

 

[ryan.leslie]

A racial slur coming from a Spaniard. I am not here to take your business boss no need to fret.

Whoa Mayhem, I'm sure this wasn't a racial slur, Yago was extending a long running joke around here about his command of the Spanglish language.

Can I offer some really friendly advice? I hope you'll take it as such. The best way to market here on DealerRefresh, and every other forum as far as I'm concerned, is NOT to market. Fill out your profile with your real name, put in a picture of yourself (shoot, wear a purple tie if you feel brave enough, this community loves that kind of self-deprecation ), engage the community with topics that you are well versed in, and above all else, resist the temptation to SELL your wares. If you are here investing your time in the community it is understood that you believe in your product, if dealers have questions about what you do, they'll ask you.

Try to help dealers above all else and you'll find this to be an awesome forum. If every post is a product pitch, not saying that is the case necessarily, then this forum can be merciless. There is a "low-jerk quotient" here, but the community works hard to enforce the rules so that it can be a place to truly Refresh your thoughts.

Hope this was an encouragement to you and anyone else reading to jump in and participate. Do so transparently and expect to learn more than you share.

Cheers!

 

[yagoparamo]

MH,

I don't know how in hell that would be construed as a racial slur... but if it did in whatever area of the world you may be in I do apologize for that.

 

[subi101]

I thought I was talking to numbers guys? More customers are not searching the BBB if they are it's based on cause and affect. There's the old marketing saying "Customers don't know what they want, that's why we have to tell them".

BBB is growing?

Google Daily Visitors; 92,799,000

yelp.com Daily Visitors 92,799,000

BBB Daily Visitors: 266,700

You are talking to numbers PEOPLE. People who understand that often times you have to read between the numbers and question everything about the numbers to fully understand them. I am not understanding the comparison of Google and Yelp in this particular matter. Google is first and foremost a search engine. So, any comparison is inflated because those numbers do not only represent review traffic. And Yelp got this lovely traffic bump from it's new boyfriend (Apple) that just recently broke up with Google.

Statistics aside, my initial (light-hearted) note was simply to point out that BBB is gaining traction. That is all. This is easily complimented by the growing numbers of people who are obsessed with reputation and research.

Also, I agree with Ryan. I would much rather have a light-hearted debate with a person I can relate to rather than an impersonal business name. I think you may have more people interact with you positively if you came out to play and continue to debate the topics and have a conversation. And no need to take things personally... we're all just here to chat a bit, poke some fun, and grow as Automotive people... aren't we?



Subi Ghosh
Director of Sales and E-Commerce
Joyce Koons Honda Buick GMC

 

[MayhemMarketing]

Subi,

I understand, didn't notice you were a lady and as a gentleman if there was any ill tone it was unintended, my apologies. For your question my point isn't to compare there popularity per say but to note that it isn't that the BBB isn't growing but consumers are more drawn to other sources of knowledge for mere accessibility (mobile phones) and communities. As a business there is very little you can do to directly impose an impression on the BBB or org. sites for that matter but if you have an opportunity to control your reputation on other various online sites why not take it?

You business should be weary of the online review sites;Yelp, Google, Yahoo listings, City Search, Merchant Circle, Insider Pages, Angie's list, and the BBB. But one must also be aware of consumer trends as what was a popular place of seeking reputable reviews may not be tomorrow. Just a short time ago having a My Space presence was important and now it has seemingly faded away..........,





Ryan,

I do appreciate the advice, you must be in marketing as well? I will consider it and apply it where I see fit. My intention for coming to the forums was to improve my over all knowledge of salesmanship and Dealer Refresh seemed like a good source. This for my own personal endeavors and have not pitched any direct/indirect services respectively so. However upon reading through I noted I could offer advice from my own expertise and have done just that in all of my postings thus far. And just like any other individual I value my time so when "Yago" scouted my postings and I took it as what seemingly felt like jabs, it was taken personally. But that is not matter, I understand it can be difficult to convey humor in text.


Yago;

I was under the impression you were pulling a "Fernando Alonso" * (Inside Spanish humor). I am glad to answer your valid questions in the other threads as soon as I get the chance. Your website seems of quality, I am sure you offer quality service just the same. I am in the most diversified and tolerant country in the world, USA. And yes it's Como Esta's?






parison of Google and Yelp in this particular matter. Google is first and foremost a search engine. So, any comparison is inflated because those numbers do not only represent review traffic. And Yelp got this lovely traffic bump from it's new boyfriend (Apple) that just recently broke up with Google.

Statistics aside, my initial (light-hearted) note was simply to point out that BBB is gaining traction. That is all. This is easily complimented by the growing numbers of people who are obsessed with reputation and research.

Also, I agree with Ryan. I would much rather have a light-hearted debate with a person I can relate to rather than an impersonal business name. I think you may have more people interact with you positively if you came out to play and continue to debate the topics and have a conversation. And no need to take things personally... we're all just here to chat a bit, poke some fun, and grow as Automotive people... aren't we?



Subi Ghosh
Director of Sales and E-Commerce
Joyce Koons Honda Buick GMC[/QUOTE]

 

[sunnyjay]

I don't know how places like this;
Buy Online Reviews
can get away with this. They specifically mention posting reviews on cars.com, dealerrater.com, and edmunds.com. They say they submit only your offline reviews but with out a system to verify if they are real. The company I work for his hurting and wants to stay ethical but it's very hard when the competition is playing dirty.

 

[Glenn Jimerson]

I don't know how places like this;
Buy Online Reviews
can get away with this. They specifically mention posting reviews on cars.com, dealerrater.com, and edmunds.com. They say they submit only your offline reviews but with out a system to verify if they are real. The company I work for his hurting and wants to stay ethical but it's very hard when the competition is playing dirty.

These companies are popping up all over the place. They often outsource this stuff to countries like the Philippines or India which makes sense when you read the weird syntax of the text. They aren't really too slick about posting either. I've seen blatant manipulation where a business won't have any reviews for months and then all of a sudden they get 10-20 in the span of 2 days.

The larger sites do have an incentive to develop an algorithm to detect stuff but that's low on the totem pole when it comes to priority.

For a serious shopper they'll see the fake reviews and go running the other way. What you can do is initiate a campaign where you train your employees to ask customers to leave a review on a specific site. Specificity is important otherwise the follow through drops off dramatically. Another is to place that call to action for leaving a review with a link in your email signature/email marketing. There are a lot of honest ways to do this. Avoid the dark side. Once your reviews are tainted there really is no fixing that stuff.

 

[sunnyjay]

Well i decided if my closest competitor was going to do it so would I. I got 30 reviews now all 4 - 5 stars and my phone is ringing off the hook again. I got passed it morally by having the ef7 guys post my actual customer reviews online and the simple fact I gotta keep the lights on. I regretted doing it at first as I thought I cross some sort imaginary line. . . I got over it on the way to the bank

 

[ryan.leslie]

Well i decided if my closest competitor was going to do it so would I. I got 30 reviews now all 4 - 5 stars and my phone is ringing off the hook again. I got passed it morally by having the ef7 guys post my actual customer reviews online and the simple fact I gotta keep the lights on. I regretted doing it at first as I thought I cross some sort imaginary line. . . I got over it on the way to the bank

I hope I'm wrong, and if so I will absolutely apologize, but... this sure looks fishy to me.

You say you're a dealer, but your profile says you're a consultant:


Your first post here in another thread mentioned the review posting company you hired:


And your next post just 4 minutes later in a similar thread provided a link to them:


...and now you're giving them a referral while you get over having fake reviews posted "on the way to the bank?" If you had 30 reviews posted in the last 72 hours on any site you may want to wait 30 days before you give a referral, those reviews won't likely be there still. Frequency is a dead giveaway of fraud.

I'm sorry if I'm offbase, but you don't have to go any further than the beginning of this thread to see evidence that some vendors don't respect this community and will try some crazy stuff to treat DealerRefresh like some kind of fertile hunting ground for new business. I guess it raises my guard a little when things look odd.

Do you mind telling us what dealership you work for, maybe the dealer you suspect of cheating? If you don't want to give that info publicly do you mind pm'ing me or a mod? You'll find that lots of people here disagree strongly with buying fake content and will absolutely try to help you find other ways to compete, but at least we'll know we aren't trying to convince someone that is pretending to be a dealer and selling fake content.

I think Uncle Joe calls it a shill...