AMAZON. The American giant is cleaning up by banning hundreds of Chinese brands suspected of rewarding Internet users for writing fake reviews extolling the merits of their products.
They are called Aukey, Mpow, RAVPower … They market electronic gadgets (chargers, headphones, baby monitors …). They are very popular with Amazon users. But they have just been dereferenced by the American group. Amazon indeed suspects these companies, until now partners of its marketplace, of not respecting the conditions of use of the site, in particular of defrauding by paying or by rewarding Internet users to write fake reviews and fake comments extolling the merits of their products but also, sometimes, denigrating those of their direct competitors. Amazon has long tolerated this type of practice, because the group wanted to promote the development of a community spirit and mutual aid on its platform, thus allowing its users to discover new products. However, in 2016, the rule changed, which nevertheless did not prevent fraudsters from continuing to have fun. Amazon gradually became aware of the extent of the problem and the cleaning up really began several months ago, especially after the discovery and disclosure ofMails exchanges between certain companies and Internet users aiming to manipulate the opinions published on the Amazon Marketplace. According to the Shenzhen Cross-Border E-Commerce Association, cited by Bloomberg, last August, more than 50,000 Chinese resellers were banned from Amazon, causing a shortfall of $ 15.4 billion. Today, 600 Chinese brands and 3,000 seller accounts have just been added to this blacklist, reports the South China Morning Post.
Customers encouraged to post positive reviews
In practice, the payment and reward promised to Internet users by fraudsters could take several forms, such as a gift certificate, an extended warranty, the possibility of exclusively testing new products, or even in cash to, for example, convince a disappointed consumer to delete a critical review posted online. In order not to attract (too much) attention, some companies even went so far as to “recruit” on Facebook by settling their small transactions via PayPal. Obviously, when you are about to buy a 5 star rated smartphone charger carried by the unanimous enthusiasm of nearly 10,000 satisfied buyers, the laws of probability being what they are, there is everything. even enough to ask a few questions. Even officially banned from the Amazon Marketplace, some of the companies targeted will however continue to sell their goods by using sub-brands or by positioning themselves advantageously on other platforms (such as AliExpress from Alibaba, Amazon’s Chinese competitor). Fortunately, while waiting for Amazon’s next cleanup, and to help you buy quality items, several sites (like Fakespot, Review Meta, The Review Index, AppBot, AMZ Trackers, Make My Jungle…) exist which allow consumers, but also sellers to flush out the false opinions that still sometimes pollute the marketplace of the e-commerce giant.