Wow I did not know about this. I guess there really is no absolute way you can be sure. I think companies probably also struggle with keeping comments legitimate as well and I don't think they can really do much past the additional security measure of having the verified purchases label since there's not much they can do if someone wishes to purchase and leave a review even if it's under false pretenses, and even if they did it would be a difficult task to sift through which ones are legit and which ones aren't.
There is no way to be sure, unfortunately. The same is true for legitimate reviews. I have purchased products before, and there were all positive reviews, and then after I have received the product and identified issues with the product, I have gone back, read the reviews, and seen that the reviews are much more reflective of the experience with the product that I received. I don't know how companies will keep reviews honest in the future.
There is one way to identify such reviews. If something doesn't work and a bunch of people give the product a bad review in say October. And then suddenly, you find a number of positive 5 star reviews in Oct and Nov, you can be sure that there is something fishy. I have found this kind of a pattern to be very common. But, again, maybe the people giving bad reviews were the fakers. You can only find out if you buy the product. Of course, if there are 5000 positive reviews and 20 bad reviews, you know that the product is good. No one has the kind of money to spend on 5000 fake positive verified reviews. You'd need 5000 real addresses and people to pull that off.
Yeah, dates are always very revealing. It is like when you find yourself on a fake facebook page, and the person behind it has created a whole bunch of other fake profiles for the first fake one to interact with? If they are all updated on the same day or within the same time frame, it is a sure tell.
I always read reviews before I purchase something on Amazon, especially if it's something that has a lot of functions that may not work well or break easily. I also post a lot of reviews for products I buy, because I find reviews so useful. I've been noticing a lot of reviews with disclaimers that the product was received for free in exchange for a review - and a lot of the time all of those reviews are 5-star reviews. Since noticing this trend, I definitely started being more vigilant about reading reviews instead of just relying on a high rating. It's actually less likely that I will buy a product if I see a lot of positive reviews for it with that disclaimer. There's really no way to know if they are legitimate or not. Of course, the best way to deal with it is just to buy items with free returns and try it out for yourself.
I will read reviews in any event, because if ever I am spending money, then I sure ash hell am going to read the reviews. But I pay extra special attention to the reviews when I am considering purchasing electrical items, or items that are priced very highly. Usually, it is not because I am afraid of wasting money, but simply because I want the best shopping experience possible and do not want to be inconvenienced.
When I feel a review is too generic and lacks personality, I could highly suspect Its legitimacy. Like those overly emotional reviews stuffed with keywords and clickbaity outrageous claims "It changed my life", "Solved all my problems", "In my life I have been so happy". Luckily, there are lots of niche blogs that review a lot of products, you can compare a review's claims with another review written by a trustworthy blogger. Also, personally I found that better and naturally written reviews are generally legit. People that write fake reviews are mostly untalented in this regard.
We would search for online reviews before purchasing a product. We don't focus on one website alone. We search for the same product in other shopping websites, YouTube videos, blogs and forums like this one. We want to see honest reviews on the pros and cons on using that particular product from consumers who already used them.
