Tech Reviewer: Do Bad Reviews Kill Companies?

[nerdemoji]

Prominent tech reviewer Marques Brownlee just posted this video:

Summary (if you didn't watch):
Rhetorically asks if bad reviews kill companies.
or do bad products kill companies
YouTuber brings up the two most notable personal examples the Fisker car and a recent Humane Pin (or something like that).
Both products were described by the Youtuber as very bad, and having multiple oversights
Reviews must be defined as independent and honest, otherwise they are useless (For example, a "solicited review" would not even count, as it is not independent)
Youtuber recalls a time when a phone review (Razer phone) had fixes as a result of the review (vibration motor got fixed)
Reviews are for consumers and ultimately help them make decisions on whether a product is good before they purchase it
The Youtuber's review of the Fisker car was promptly followed by their bankruptcy
Was their downfall a result of the review. Well you need to "zoom out"
He wasn't the only reviewer, and there was consensus that the product was bad
also, the Humane Pin was bad, and failed on many promises
The reviewer doesn't and shouldn't feel obligate to sugarcoat the shortcomings, especially of a $700 product with a subscription

TL;DR
In conclusion, it is the responsibility of the company to make a good product that will in turn be reviewed favorably. A real review is a reflection of the product, bad or good.

 

[sam_adams]

YouTuber brings up the two most notable personal examples the Fisker car

He needs to check his sources. Fisker didn't go out of business because of bad reviews [1,2].

 

[ta240]

It is a tough area. Which comes first the bad review or the company suffering? It can happen either way. Is the product truly bad or are its faults just being over highlighted?

How many people have thought their audio product was good and were happy with it until they saw the review of it here?

In a world where you get more clicks the more edgy the review is; there is an actual financial incentive to exaggerate in reviews. Reviews that say "It is pretty good, a lot like the other choices that are out there" won't get many clicks and thus not much money. Reviews that either say "It is so terrible" or "It blew my mind" will be more popular. Thus hit pieces or gushing love letters are the norm. And the followers of the influencer/infomercial host like to jump on either. Buying loads of the Vista Spark amp (remember those) or dumping on a different manufacture.

I think we are past the time where youtube opinion reviews would influence a manufacture to update their product. Product lives are short and people's attention spans are shorter. Reviews were once information that people used when looking at an item to see if the things mentioned would bother them. Now they generally use that information to move on. With the way social media works, people feel a connection to the reviewer; it isn't just someone writing about a product, it is their friend telling them to avoid that product.

I've never heard of the guy in this video but his thumbnail looks very Andrew Robinsonish. Maybe he is more Erin(ish) and level headed, I'm not interested enough to click.

 

[Chrispy]

He needs to check his sources. Fisker didn't go out of business because of bad reviews [1,2].

I thought it was too many car fires....

 

[sam_adams]

I thought it was too many car fires....

Too much salt . . .

 

[Ron Texas]

The wrong response to a bad review can kill a company. We are watching this drama play out here on ASR over a review of a Tekton loudspeaker.

 

[Chrispy]

Too bad it doesn't work for crap outfits like GR.

 

[amirm]

I've never heard of the guy in this video but his thumbnail looks very Andrew Robinsonish.

He is much better than Andrew. He strikes me as smart and very tuned to usability issues.

 

[Chrispy]

He is much better than Andrew. He strikes me as smart and very tuned to usability issues.

While I find most of Marques' reviews to be too specific to his own interests, he is fairly comprehensive in his reviews. Practical not so much.

 

[JSmith]

If one makes well performing products for their price range, they don't get a "bad" review.


JSmith

 

[amirm]

Youtuber recalls a time when a phone review (Razer phone) had fixes as a result of the review (vibration motor got fixed)

As most of you know, we have had this influence over many companies.

US Federal Trade Commission says this well: https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidan...review-fairness-act-what-businesses-need-know

"Contracts that prohibit honest reviews, or threaten legal action over them, harm people who rely on reviews when making their purchase decisions. But another group is also harmed when others try to squelch honest negative reviews: businesses that work hard to earn positive reviews."

For every company "working hard" to produce a lousy product, there is another that is working hard to build a great product. Without negative reviews, the latter's work would not be differentiated.

 

[Ninjastar]

He needs to check his sources. Fisker didn't go out of business because of bad reviews [1,2].

The reviewer featured here was credited as the person who tanked their stock price.

This happened immediately following his review (he has almost 19 million subscribers) where he called the Fisker Ocean the worst car he had ever reviewed:

Fisker Scrambling After Popular YouTuber Called The Ocean The 'Worst Car I've Ever Reviewed'

Things have not been going well for Fisker. The owners that have managed to finally get their hands on an Ocean have been dealing with several issues, some that are potentially dangerous. One YouTube reviewer with an incredible 18.5 million followers highlighted these problems in a video that...

autos.yahoo.com

Fisker's stock has tanked ~50% since Brownlee's video went live. More people subscribe to Brownlee's YouTube channel than to the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and USA Today combined.

There are some similarities here with what happened between ASR and Erin with Tekton Design. Brownlee could not get Fisker to lend him a car for review so he found someone that owned one to do an "unsolicited review". Fisker apparently tried to stop Brownlee from releasing his review until they were able to do a software update to address his complaints. He declined to halt the release of the video.

 

[kemmler3D]

Brownlee is one of the good ones, I used to covet a review by him, but it was hard to get on the channel for smaller brands.

Anyway, I think bad products kill companies, but a dishonest bad review could kill them also... which is why there are legal remedies for companies that are falsely maligned in reviews. So bad reviews aren't a problem, if anything there aren't enough of them.

In basic economic models of markets, a perfectly efficient market relies on several preconditions, one of which is that all consumers have "perfect information". In other words, everyone knows everything about everything they buy and can make the optimal choice according to their preferences.

So bad reviews are required for the economy to function properly.

 

[dshreter]

Reality is somewhere in between. Bad companies kill themselves, but fair reviews can also play a a role in killing decent products.

Reviews with high exposure have the ability to shape perceptions much like marketing, and influence what people think is important about a product. Reviews can emphasize good or bad experiences with features or attributes that might not really matter yet it still translates to a reputation.

 

[nerdemoji]

The reviewer featured here was credited as the person who tanked their stock price.

This happened immediately following his review (he has almost 19 million subscribers) where he called the Fisker Ocean the worst car he had ever reviewed:

Fisker Scrambling After Popular YouTuber Called The Ocean The 'Worst Car I've Ever Reviewed'

Things have not been going well for Fisker. The owners that have managed to finally get their hands on an Ocean have been dealing with several issues, some that are potentially dangerous. One YouTube reviewer with an incredible 18.5 million followers highlighted these problems in a video that...

autos.yahoo.com

There are some similarities here with what happened between ASR and Erin with Tekton Design. Brownlee could not get Fisker to lend him a car for review so he found someone that owned one to do an "unsolicited review". Fisker apparently tried to stop Brownlee from releasing his review until they were able to do a software update to address his complaints. He declined to halt the release of the video.

that is just an opinion. we can only speculate how much his particular review had on the downfall of the company, as other reviews and other troubles pre-existed his review. I am fairly certain that they would have went out of business regardless of the review, but it might have sped things up for them. ultimately the product is what tanked the price, not the review that reflected it

 

[jayapple]

Good products also need publicity, bad products also need to be known.Some Internet celebrities, with many fans, they can indeed form an influence and destroy the company.
But the premise must be a fair and objective test, if it is malicious defamation, it will indeed have a great impact on the company.

Anyone has the right to defend his reputation, but the premise is that you have a good reputation, otherwise you have nothing to defend.

After the release of any product, there will be marketing expenses, here is to give some reviewers who accept bribes, there are objective and fair reviewers, refusing to accept bribes.Release objective test results, if the results are poor, the manufacturer's product is eliminated is also the objective law of capitalism.

Even if there is no reviewer, consumers will also publish a negative review of the product on the Internet, which will naturally affect other consumers.

 

[gwing]

Just a thought - but what might be much more effective than a 'legal fighting fund' for reviewers as we have been discussing recently might be simple cohesion from the reviewer community. If other reviewers, particularly those like Margues with a huge platform, took an interest and also gave their publicity when bullying attempts happen then this in itself would likely stop the bad practice dead in its tracks (aside from the minority of real idiots who engage in frivolous lawsuits when they have nothing to gain and lots to lose , have just lost their common sense and don't really care/consider the consequences).

 

[MaxwellsEq]

It's the response to a bad review that can cause a problem. I specialized in technical resilience and disaster recovery. There are many examples where something went wrong, the company immediately accepted it, did frequent and honest comms and introduced a fix. These companies survive and in fact thrive, because people feel confident that any issues will be resolved.

There are companies that remain silent, or deny the problem, or lawyer up. These fail.

To survive though, you need depth and budget. If you have neither, no matter how well you handle it, you'll be in trouble. Keeping a "war chest" is essential.

 

[sam_adams]

The reviewer featured here was credited as the person who tanked their stock price.

Not the original company, but the company purchased by a Chinese group after the original went TU and ceased production. The original Fisker designs were deeply flawed themselves, but were not the root cause of the company's failure. Cars are harder to build than speakers, for too many reasons to mention, and a small volume builder faces risks as a startup many orders of magnitude greater than a larger, well established company. The history of Tucker always comes to mind.

 

[TonyJZX]

tesla is a great example of this

at one point tesla's market cap was many multiples more than every other car company... combined

and we know tesla have vast resources but how come they produce such a flawed product and attract some controversial reviews and yet... they still exist???

there's going to be 'cult of personality' companies where they can survive despite the bad press

i think a good example would be the big three german car companies... BMW Mercedes Audi/VW/Porsche

given the various controversies they've had, how come they still sell?

it comes to a point where some companies are immune to a lot of poor reviews?

the companies mentioned here like Fisker were always teetering on the edge and have not gotten the 'mass zeitgeist' of the public imagination

if you want to case a wider net, how about companies like Rivian and Lucid Air?