The False Affiliate Review: Alluring But Misleading

Plenty of hopeful work-from-homers trust the bogus reviews only to later feel ripped-off or hit by a scam.

False product reviews are articles, blogs, websites, forum posts, etc... which claim to examine a given service or product (say an ebook on using AdWords).

But instead of actually inspecting and examining the service or product and providing feedback, false reviews fall back on EXCLUSIVELY promoting the products rather than examining them.

After understanding the motives behind bogus reviews, spotting fake reviews is easier

Why would a person write a false review?

Now, there's absolutely nothing wrong with affiliate marketing, and I don't believe there's even anything wrong with an affiliate reviewing a product and making money from the review - provided he or she is actually reviewing the product.

Unfortunately, what happens too often is that affiliates will create review sites which rely on a few basic tactics. These may include:

Claiming that out of n number of products reviewed, product X was far superior. Or, I have used product X personally and highly recommend it.

The sad truth may be, however, that the affiliate never compared any products or may have never even used the product being promoted.

Be that as it may, the affiliate knows all to well that there is a high volume of consumers looking for reviews and insight into products, and that it is a market capable of being sold to.

Not wanting to miss out on his or her portion of the commission pie, the affiliate throws up a review for the product regardless of the absence of experience with the product in question.

(Un)Ethical?

Personally, I find the usage of fake reviews to be in poor taste and believe the ethicality of the false product review approach to be dubious at best.

The reasoning?

Consumers searching for reviews are essentially looking for real, user-reported experiences. False reviews step in assuming these roles, despite being devoid of those very experiences.

Whatever the ethical position of the tactic, it is important that consumers be aware of the fact that bogus reviews are easy to stumble upon.

Whether they are ethical or not may not be the most important question. Instead, as consumers, we should at least be capable of seeing false reviews for what they are – strictly promotions disguised as insight.

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