The under-rated power of online reviews

India's online market place is growing at a great pace. Everything from a shoe to a house - gets bought and sold online. Consumers jump from one marketplace to another depending upon the prices offered, the delivery time, the variety of options available and the reliability of the seller. When it comes to reliability and product quality, most of the customers fall back on the reviews posted by others who have bought the same product. Considering these, all the online retail biggies or the wannabe biggies - ought to pay a little more attention to collecting reviews from its customers. 

Around the world, there are dedicated review sites which provide reviews for everything - from consumer products to software to websites to businesses. And they pay their reviewers good money for doing so. India can boast of only a few review sites - mouthshut.com, tripadvisor.com, zomato.com. For reviews, most of the online shopping community depends upon feedback posted on Flipkart, Amazon, Snapdeal etc. by certified buyers.

Strangely, some of the biggies do not give an option to review. Ebay only allows buyers to rate the transaction and provide them feedback, while PayTm , allows only seller ratings. Even bigbasket has no place for product reviews. On the other hand, there is the cosmetics/personal care website purplle.com, which rewards users with loyalty points for giving reviews. 

I believe that not only e-commerce sites should encourage and actively seek customer feedback, but going forward, reward them for doing so with loyalty points. It does not have to be a big gesture or reward - just a simple acknowledgement for the customer who does take time out to review. It will also ensure that instead of only negative reviews (which people tend to be more eager to post), positive reviews will also be encouraged.