F&I and Showroom, October 2013

Industry Trends In a ranking of the most trusted review sites only one carspecifi c site broke the Top 10 By Brittany Marie Swanson I t should come as no surprise that online ratings sites are becoming an important part of the customer experience However not all customers are convinced that what they read on those sites is credible The 2013 Online Customer Review Study conducted by Maritz Research found that some sites are trusted more than others And based on the results customers value more established sites over smaller newer ones From April 3 to April 24 2013 Maritz surveyed 3404 people about the use of 13 dedicated customer review and ratings sites Analysts found that about a quarter of respondents felt that the integrity of review sites in general was questionable Of those 16 percent said reviews are overly negative and 9 percent said they are overly positive The remaining 75 percent thought the information presented on ratings sites is generally fair Many people we surveyed expressed concern over reviews on customer ratings sites being biased or even fake said David Ensing vice president of Voice of the Customer Integration for Maritz Research Many site visitors tend to believe that ratings sites select which reviews are posted that employees post fake positive reviews for the companies they work for and that raters only share their positive or negative experiences instead of sharing a balanced opinion Of the sites the study found to be most trustworthy Edmunds com was the only car centric site to make the Top 10 landing at the No 4 spot Yelp came in at No 5 while Dealer Rater clocked in at No 13 We were right near the top of the list with TripAdvisor Zagat and OpenTable Fifty four percent of 12 F I and Showroom October 2013 customers expressed a deep trust in our ratings and reviews said Seth Berkowitz Edmunds president and COO during a press conference on Oct 3 To get a sense of the scale TripAdvisor was at 59 percent and Zagat and OpenTable were at 56 percent so we were really all ranked quite closely with one another Respondents were asked to rate these high profi le sites using a fi ve point rating scale Percentages of respondents who said they trust most or all of the information posted on the sites ranged from 36 percent to 59 percent Many of those in the generally fair group reported that they still examine reviews on an individual basis to differentiate trustworthy ones from untrustworthy ones Respondents noted that they try to determine if a review is legitimate or if it is motivated by revenge as well as whether it is overly positive or unfair Respondents also said they read a range of reviews and do not take a business seriously if there are too few of them Another indication of skepticism according to the study is that most users of ratings sites 60 percent said they paid more attention to actual customer comments rather than to the numerical or star ratings reviewers provided Meanwhile 11 percent said they pay more attention to the numerical ratings and 29 percent said they pay equal attention to both Our research indicates that there may be a credibility crisis on the horizon for online review sites Maritzs Ensing said To address trust issues companies and ratings sites should consider more secure and credible ways to provide customers with reviews that have been verifi ed and arent skewed Credibility Crisis Of Those That Had Read Reviews on Sites the Percentage Who Trust Most or All of the Information as an Accurate Representation of Customers Experiences