Recently I found a section on ebay called "guides" and "reviews". I thought...ah, what a good idea! But then I started reading some of the reviews and guides that people have written and I started thinking...um, maybe some people do not know what a review or guide is for.

So, there's Ebay with a capital E (like buying and selling) and then there is 'ebay' (like groups, chat, answer center, town hall, match-ups, reviews etc etc)

So let's pretend that you are thinking of buying something...say you're in the market for a certain kind of DVD player, or digital camera, or vacuum cleaner or whatever...and you can't decide between a few kinds and you need some help. What can you do? Well you can check out the reviews that people have written about the product.

IN THEORY, people only write about the product itself...what they liked or disliked about the product, which would help you as a potential buyer, right? And if you got a new item and you liked it or disliked it and wanted to share your ideas about the product, you could go to ebay and write a review about it. Say it was good, it was bad, or whatever. Help other people make their decisions. Simple.

But then the confusion comes in...some people write 'reviews' that have nothing to do with the product...they write comments about how fast/slow shipping was or whether they liked the seller or not, or sometimes they write nonsensical comments that should never be published in the first place. "Reviews" like that give serious reviewers a bad name. Non-serious reviews make the whole concept of using this forum to find information, useless.

And confusion also comes in with the ranking system. IN THEORY, it's simple...if you read a review and it was helpful to you (if it answered your questions, told you pros and cons, helped you out, etc) then you vote "YES" (it was helpful). And if you think it was stupid (didn't tell you enough, or was poorly written or whatever) then you vote "NO" (it wasn't helpful). That is simple too, right?
So then ebay tallies up who is voted most helpful and their reviews go at the top of the list. Also, the more 'yes' votes a certain writer gets, the higher they move in the rankings as a good reviewer. (ex. "Top 100 reviewers")

Now things are a little bit different between review writers residing in the USA and in other countries (such as Canada, where I live). There are a TON more review writers in USA than in Canada and other countries and I think that is because every now and then, ebay gives incentives to American review writers (ex. for every review you write you get a chance to win a prize). So there are more people writing and competing to be the best. In Canada for instance, we get no prizes. So since thre is no real incentive for International review writers, there are fewer of us. The incentive for us to write reviews is just to help others. I know I spend a lot of time and thought when composing my reviews and guides, and that is because I want to be sure there is enough information there that will be able to help someone.

SO...I hope that clears things up for you, dear reader...basically reviews are there to help people, lousy/nonsense reviews should not be allowed to be published (but are, so you might have to weed through some bad ones to find a good one) and if you vote YES, that a review was helpful, then bit by bit, vote by vote, that writer moves up in the ranks. I hope that this has answered the question for you, "What is an Ebay Guide or Review?" If you did find this information to be of use, kindly let me know, by simply clicking "YES", it was helpful. Thank you, and have a pleasant day!

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