# Amazon removing ARC reviews?



## Curious Author (Feb 10, 2012)

Content removed due to TOS Change of 2018. I do not agree to the terms.


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## TromboneAl (Mar 20, 2015)

>your Amazon account matches elements of other Amazon accounts reviewing the same product.
That sure is a hard sentence to understand. I don't know if that's corporate speak or just dumb.

I'll be interested in the latest info on this since I plan to send out about 200 ARCs to my newsletter subscribers.

>for naught.
It's worse than that. The warning about a shutdown and an explicit refusal to listen to reason ("we may not reply to further emails about this issue") is scary.


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## MClayton (Nov 10, 2010)

This exact same thing happened to a friend of mine who sent out close to 100 ARCs. They initially removed most of the reviews, but subsequently reinstated about half of them. Some speculation was that since it's the same group of people who have reviewed her previous books, it looks like review manipulation - but that's just speculation. No one really knows.


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## dianapersaud (Sep 26, 2013)

BVLawson said:


> An author started a thread in a Facebook group saying that she sent out *ARCs to her launch team who posted their reviews on Amazon *-* only to have several removed*. When the author contacted Amazon, they said, "We are unable to post your customer review to the Amazon website *because our data shows that your Amazon account matches elements of other Amazon accounts reviewing the same product.*"
> 
> Two days later, she received a warning she'd manipulated reviews and that her account could be shutdown. When contacted again, Amazon's reply was "Thank you for taking the time to contact us in response to the policy warning. Our investigations have shown that your account is related to the accounts of customers who have reviewed your book." They then told her again that any further violation will result in her account being shutdown and that "We cannot share any further information about this warning and we may not reply to further emails about this issue."
> 
> ...


According to what you posted, they didn't remove ALL ARC reviews, so they aren't targeting ARCs. From what you posted, the corporate speak suggests the reviewers must share the same info-like IP address or maybe the author has them in her (shipping) address book so they are related.

Without any specific information, we can only guess. But as long as they aren't terminating all ARCs for Indies, then there's no need to panic.


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## Mxz (Jan 17, 2015)

I wouldn't be surprised if they started doing this to most authors.  They're always trying to find ways to make it harder for us as far as reviews but don't even care when trolls 1 and 2 star books for no reason or launch attacks against authors.


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## Guest (May 13, 2017)

Could you post the ARC reviews on your web site (and/or Facebook page) and link from your Amazon page and book?


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## SCapsuto (Dec 11, 2015)

dianapersaud said:


> According to what you posted, they didn't remove ALL ARC reviews, so they aren't targeting ARCs.


One of the things Amazon reportedly has done in the past is assume that anyone you're connected with on social media is biased and potentially a friend or relative of yours... which is ridiculous, since readers who like your books are apt to follow you online.

Maybe these deletions are a variation on that.


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## mdrake (Jul 14, 2016)

dianapersaud said:


> According to what you posted, they didn't remove ALL ARC reviews, so they aren't targeting ARCs. From what you posted, the corporate speak suggests the reviewers must share the same info-like IP address or maybe the author has them in her (shipping) address book so they are related.
> 
> Without any specific information, we can only guess. But as long as they aren't terminating all ARCs for Indies, then there's no need to panic.


My thinking would be along these lines. It sounds like from the email that she's gotten "too close" to those reviewers.

Have they reviewed all her other books? Has she reviewed theirs? (Are any fellow authors?) Has she sent any of these reviewers anything physical via Amazon in the past that might indicate a "close" friendship? Is she friends with them on Facebook or GoodReads? Are they local to her and might share some of the same IPs, like perhaps some of them frequent the same coffee shop or go to the same university even if they only casually know each other?

Wasn't there a thread last year about how having your fans as friends on GoodReads was getting reviews flagged?


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## mdrake (Jul 14, 2016)

SCapsuto said:


> One of the things Amazon reportedly has done in the past is assume that anyone you're connected with on social media is biased and potentially a friend or relative of yours... which is ridiculous, since readers who like your books are apt to follow you online.
> 
> Maybe these deletions are a variation on that.


No, I think (IIRC) that it was having your fans as friends. So having a GoodReads Author page with followers is fine, but having those followers as friends was bad. Same for Facebook: if they follow your author page, that's fine. If they are your actual FRIEND on your personal page, that's bad. That was the speculation, I think.


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## dianapersaud (Sep 26, 2013)

LilyBLily said:


> It looks as if Amazon has removed all reviews by people who did a prior ARC review of one of my books. So, having an "ARC review team" will no longer work. We'll have to find new ARC readers for each new book.
> 
> This really sucks, and it's totally against the traditional publishing standard of repeatedly sending out ARCs to the very same people/organizations most likely to review your books.
> 
> ...


Did they remove just your ARC team reviews or did they remove ALL reviews by those ARC team members (meaning everything they have ever reviewed)?


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## Dpock (Oct 31, 2016)

LilyBLily said:


> This really sucks, and it's totally against the *traditional publishing standard* of repeatedly sending out ARCs to the very same people/organizations most likely to review your books.


My understanding is Amazon is attempting to _revert_ to the traditional publishing standard. Advance Review Copies used to go only to professional journalists, esteemed critics, and professionals in the book's subject area.


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## Allyson J. (Nov 26, 2014)

Dpock said:


> My understanding is Amazon is attempting to _revert_ to the traditional publishing standard. Advance Review Copies used to go only to professional journalists, esteemed critics, and professionals in the book's subject area.


Some of my readers can't leave reviews anymore, even though they paid for copies. They aren't ARC team members, they are fans.


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## SA_Soule (Sep 8, 2011)

Wow! This sucks! I send out ARCs to about a 100 reviewers/bloggers after each new release. I hope you get this resolved.  

Suggestion...can the reviewers post the review under a different account? (I have about 3 different Amazon accounts.)


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## Dpock (Oct 31, 2016)

LilyBLily said:


> As for reverting to trad publishing standards, since trad publishing reviewers will not touch indie books, where does that leave us? I don't see the point of squeezing us to death; we generate a ton of revenue for Amazon.


I doubt it will affect revenue or indies particularly, but should increase the quality of reviews overall. Traditionally, ARC reviewers wrote reviews _for publications_. They never left reviews in customer reviews (have you ever seen Michiko Kakutani from the NYTs Book Review in a customer review section?).

A lot of people here have dropped ARC teams, citing they made no difference in sales.


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## Laran Mithras (Nov 22, 2016)

LilyBLily said:


> As for reverting to trad publishing standards, since trad publishing reviewers will not touch indie books, where does that leave us? I don't see the point of squeezing us to death; we generate a ton of revenue for Amazon.


While I don't use ARCs (hate them, personally) I agree that Zon's hand in this matter seems a bit unfair. Are we not their bread and butter?

Indie's are 44% of the ebook market share - outclassing all others by 20 and more points. However, Gross Sales $-wise, trad-pubs take it 42 to 25 (2016).

Hmm, if I were Amazon, I'd be looking at Gross Sales $s, too. Sucks to be an indie when Zon wants to throw their weight around.


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## jaehaerys (Feb 18, 2016)

Indies are a blip on Amazon's radar, so they definitely throw their weight around as they like. In this case I kind of like the idea of getting rid of ARCs in favor of organic reviews.


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## Laran Mithras (Nov 22, 2016)

dn8791 said:


> In this case I kind of like the idea of getting rid of ARCs in favor of organic reviews.


  The courage that took to say here...


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## Dolphin (Aug 22, 2013)

Dpock said:


> I doubt it will affect revenue or indies particularly, but should increase the quality of reviews overall.


That's the nub of it, I think. Repeat after me: _*Amazon only cares about customers*_. This is meant to improve reviews for their benefit, and anybody else whose interests get caught up is acceptable collateral damage.

Besides, we've been complaining to them about unfair reviews since at least the John Locke fiasco half a decade ago. Now they're trying to fix it. I'm receptive to that, even if the initial efforts seem draconian.

I'm even sympathetic if one of their explicit goals is to eliminate the ARC teams that indies have been working so hard to cultivate. Yes, they've been helpful to many an indy career. Yes, I know you're not explicitly pressuring them to provide a positive review. But don't they, usually? Despite the rule that you can't _require_ a review in exchange for an ARC, don't you cut them from your list if they never leave a review? Does the customer benefit when every new release gets reviewed by a stable of 100 diehard fans--the kind of people you know will read your book and review it within days? Is the primary purpose of your ARCs to benefit the customer? Or is it for the benefit of the author, and a natural outgrowth of exogenous factors like BookBub's review requirements?

I mean suppose we're talking here about repeat reviewers who're typically positive and have some other kind of connection to the author (could be a Facebook fan, Facebook friend, Twitter follower, nearby address or IP--anything a weak AI might find and interpret as a link). Tell me how you can identify which among those reviewers has received some kind of inducement. Tell me how you know which ones are biased out of loyalty to the author, absent any _quid pro quo_. Tell me which ones are sockpuppets created by the author or a contractor. Tell me how to engineer an algorithmic method to sort all that wheat from the chaff so that only the objective, unbiased reviews remain.

Amazon has every reason to ask those questions and grasp at solutions. Sure, they don't want to do anything to spite us, but neither are they in the business of rewarding us for anti-competitive business practices that don't benefit their customers. If the best solution they can arrive at is to eliminate anything that gives even the _appearance_ of impropriety, then so be it. They'd be well within their rights. We may even come to appreciate it, in time. New authors who lack their own ARC teams would benefit immediately and never feel the loss of a tactic they never employed.

I've got two main thoughts about how to react.

First, do away with the "street team" ARC approach. This would save some time and effort, which could be used elsewhere, and you may still be able to finagle early reviews through other approaches. Maybe it means buying more AMS ads early in your release cycle--all part of Amazon's evil plan, to be sure. The successful writers will find ways to flourish in the new world order. 'Twas ever thus.

Second, if we think this is tied to Facebook, why not do away with Facebook? Do you need it? If you could have your ARC team or Facebook, which would you choose? How else could you use the time that you're currently spending on Facebook?

What's niggling at me is this notion that your account could be shut down for review manipulation if anybody connected to you reviews your books (or simply reviews more than one book!). The communiques from Amazon in this thread haven't clearly been specific to ARCs. I'm inclined to read that as some kind of miscommunication (what are the odds, right?). If that were the policy, what choice would you have _besides_ withdrawing from social media? Gets even hairier if it extends past Facebook.

I'll be interested in seeing how it all plays out.


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## Laran Mithras (Nov 22, 2016)

Dolphin said:


> First, *do away with the "street team" ARC approach.* This would save some time and effort, which could be used elsewhere, and you may still be able to finagle early reviews through other approaches. Maybe it means buying more AMS ads early in your release cycle--all part of Amazon's evil plan, to be sure. The successful writers will find ways to flourish in the new world order. 'Twas ever thus.


Wow, another courageous poster on kboards.

Honestly, I figured there was no point in posting my exact same sentiments here.


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## Dolphin (Aug 22, 2013)

Laran Mithras said:


> Wow, another courageous poster on kboards.
> 
> Honestly, I figured there was no point in posting my exact same sentiments here.


I don't even think they're ineffective, necessarily--I'll let people with numbers and case studies speak to that. More than anything, I think we tend to do a bad job of assessing opportunity costs. ARC teams could profitable and still be a waste of your time.


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## NoLongerPosting (Apr 5, 2014)

Removed due to site owner's change to TOS.


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## Laran Mithras (Nov 22, 2016)

Trads certainly do, Rickie. No one argues that. But Amazon seems to be coming down on the indie practice while ignoring the trad practice.

Though I hate ARCs of all forms, I do think it is quite unfair to target indies for this pogrom.


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## NoLongerPosting (Apr 5, 2014)

Removed due to site owner's change to TOS.


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## Dolphin (Aug 22, 2013)

Rickie Blair said:


> The real problem is that Amazon is so opaque with its requirements. Well-meaning indie authors _want_ to comply with the rules. But they have to know what the rules are. I try to steer clear of anything that might _even remotely_ contravene TOS.


I'll agree with that wholeheartedly.

One thing that I suspect complicates things is that KDP Support is probably choked with people who haven't the first earthly idea what's going on in whichever dev group is responsible for fixing the reviews. There could even be multiple bailiwicks on either side, plus additional departments sticking their beaks in. We probably don't have a coherent, universally applied set of rules for this because _there isn't one_. I hate that, and I wish it wasn't so, but it'd square very neatly with my own experiences in the tech sector.

Amazon probably just doesn't see fixing it as a major priority. The crisis management and communications types they're hiring for KDP may either be meant to resolve the problem or simply smooth it over, if that's cheaper.


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## nikkykaye (Sep 24, 2016)

LilyBLily said:


> IMO, the value of reviews is in alerting readers that I'm not publishing p0rn, and specifically giving them a sense of the kind of book I write. Romance is a huge, huge category, and there isn't enough space in a cover or blurb to signal some of the things that reviewers notice and comment on. These are things that I myself never realized until reviewers pointed them out, and they are of use to potential readers.
> 
> I want at least a few reviews from the beginning, because organic reviews are hard come by when you're at the prawny stage like me. Am I supposed to make my books free just to get "organic" reviews? I don't think that's right, either.


I totally agree. These days, blurbs are so competitive, marketing-oriented and stylized (for lack of a better word) that they might not really offer much about the story or style to the reader. Quite often I find reviews are the best source of a capsule synopsis of the book, and they'll tell me if the book is dark or funny or whatever. I certainly rely on them as a reader.

But as an author, sometimes I worry that too many ARC reviews turn new readers off. If you have 50 reviews and 49 of them say "I was given this book and this is my honest opinion," it begins to sound facetious. So I can see both sides of this. If my books aren't being covered by a ton of blogs, then ARC readers are the sourdough starter of my readership (so to speak). I'd love to say that I have 500 organic reviews within 48 hours of release, but I don't have that fan base yet.


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## Dpock (Oct 31, 2016)

When I started researching self-publishing last fall I reviewed a long thread on ARCs. The discussion centered on their management, tracking their reviews, keeping spreadsheets, etc. The general advice was to cull any ARCs who gave you lower than four-star reviews, and this strategy was generally endorsed by thread participants. 

After reading that thread I decided to give ARCs a pass.


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## Hope (Nov 28, 2014)

Dpock said:


> When I started researching self-publishing last fall I reviewed a long thread on ARCs. The discussion centered on their management, tracking their reviews, keeping spreadsheets, etc. The general advice was to cull any ARCs who gave you lower than four-star reviews, and this strategy was generally endorsed by thread participants.
> 
> After reading that thread I decided to give ARCs a pass.


How were they tracking the ARCs reviews? Some reviews are posted as Amazon customer. How would they even know if they had left a review? It sounds like having ARC reveiwers isn't worth it.


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## jaehaerys (Feb 18, 2016)

Dolphin said:


> That's the nub of it, I think. Repeat after me: _*Amazon only cares about customers*_. This is meant to improve reviews for their benefit, and anybody else whose interests get caught up is acceptable collateral damage.
> 
> Besides, we've been complaining to them about unfair reviews since at least the John Locke fiasco half a decade ago. Now they're trying to fix it. I'm receptive to that, even if the initial efforts seem draconian.
> 
> ...


I agree with all of this. Great post.


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## jaehaerys (Feb 18, 2016)

Dpock said:


> When I started researching self-publishing last fall I reviewed a long thread on ARCs. The discussion centered on their management, tracking their reviews, keeping spreadsheets, etc. The general advice was to cull any ARCs who gave you lower than four-star reviews, and this strategy was generally endorsed by thread participants.
> 
> After reading that thread I decided to give ARCs a pass.


I feel the same. I remember reading threads like that, and it was definitely off-putting.


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## Atlantisatheart (Oct 8, 2016)

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Content removed due to new owners; VerticalScope Inc. TOS Change of 2018. I received no notification of a change to TOS, was never asked to agree to their data mining or sharing of my information, including sales of my information and ownership of my posts, intellectual rights, etc, and I do not agree to the terms. 

************************************************************************************************


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## Dolphin (Aug 22, 2013)

Dpock said:


> When I started researching self-publishing last fall I reviewed a long thread on ARCs. The discussion centered on their management, tracking their reviews, keeping spreadsheets, etc. The general advice was to cull any ARCs who gave you lower than four-star reviews, and this strategy was generally endorsed by thread participants.
> 
> After reading that thread I decided to give ARCs a pass.


Please believe there are well-placed staffers at Amazon who read KBoards, among other things. A thread like that could've easily raised alarms.



Atlantisatheart said:


> This happened to a friend of mine and she doesn't have a facebook page. She said she thought it was all to do with goodreads and possibly bookbub considering which reviewers they were taking down.


An interesting addition. I'd love to hear more details from folks who've had an experience with this. We know Amazon won't be sitting us down and filling us in on the nitty-gritty.


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## ImaWriter (Aug 12, 2015)

katygirl said:


> How were they tracking the ARCs reviews? Some reviews are posted as Amazon customer. How would they even know if they had left a review? It sounds like having ARC reveiwers isn't worth it.





cds said:


> Just because all you see is "Amazon Customer" doesn't mean Amazon doesn't know exactly who they are, where they live, where they work, what credit cards they have, where their kids go to school, what size clothes they wear, what toothpaste they use, how much they earn, their criminal record, and use their zillions of lines of data mining from Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google, and every other website in the known universe, to connect them to you.


I understood Katy to mean how would an author know who left reviews. They wouldn't know the name behind "amazon customer," so how accurate is their tracking.


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## 555aaa (Jan 28, 2014)

About 'effing time. ARC "street team" reviews have been yet another reason to avoid indie author/publishers. You can see these in the sales data - they have splurgy launches with gushing reviews far outside the "natural" rate for that sales rank, and then they plummet into obscurity. You also see this as a reader - you keep seeing the same fanboy/fangirl reviews, for each book, within a few days of publication. Readers don't expect authors to have a "launch team" primed to dump a pile of glowing reviews out on release day.  If you were buying toasters, do you think that the toaster company should have a launch team of fans poised to leave a few dozen glowing reviews of their new toaster? It's no different.


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## Hope (Nov 28, 2014)

ImaWriter said:


> I understood Katy to mean how would an author know who left reviews. They wouldn't know the name behind "amazon customer," so how accurate is their tracking.


Yes, that's what I meant, thanks.


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## Dpock (Oct 31, 2016)

ImaWriter said:


> I understood Katy to mean how would an author know who left reviews. They wouldn't know the name behind "amazon customer," so how accurate is their tracking.


There may not be 100% transparency, but they only worry about culling ARCs from their teams who leave three or fewer star reviews.


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## MClayton (Nov 10, 2010)

I mentioned somewhere up-thread that when my friend had ARC reviews removed, there was a lot of speculation that it may have been because she used the same ARC team to review each new release. I do tend to think this is a trigger. That doesn't mean every time we receive a review on a different book from the same reviewer, it'll be removed. I've had the same reviewers review multiple books in my series (I don't have an ARC team, FWIW - these are either review sites or fans), and they've never been removed. I think the difference may be in the way they occur. Mine trickle in over weeks and months - organically, whenever a reader gets to the book - whereas ARC team reviews occur all at once. That could surely throw up a red flag to someone at Amazon.


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## A J Sika (Apr 22, 2016)

LilyBLily said:


> IMO, the value of reviews is in alerting readers that I'm not publishing p0rn, and specifically giving them a sense of the kind of book I write. Romance is a huge, huge category, and there isn't enough space in a cover or blurb to signal some of the things that reviewers notice and comment on. These are things that I myself never realized until reviewers pointed them out, and they are of use to potential readers.
> 
> I want at least a few reviews from the beginning, because organic reviews are hard come by when you're at the prawny stage like me. Am I supposed to make my books free just to get "organic" reviews? I don't think that's right, either.


If you have an appropriate cover and description - readers will most likely know what to expect in your book i.e. genre and heat level.

Let's not kid ourselves; when authors use ARCs they're not doing it for the benefit of the readers. It's a marketing strategy. The more good reviews I have early, the more people will be attracted to my book. It's just like using promo sites to push a new book or applying for a Bookbub. And that's okay because being savvy marketers is part of our job. But let's not pretend that there's some altruism involved in ARCs.

As a marketing strategy it's an okay one. Though suspicious readers like myself tend to side-eye books with primarily positive reviews that have no verified tag and have those words 'I received a FREE copy of this book in exchange....', the ARC way seems to work for some otherwise authors wouldn't be working so hard to from 'street-teams'. The problem with this strategy is that it straddles the line between ethical and unethical quite alarmingly and opens the door to some pretty unsavory practices. For instance culling members of the team who don't give glowing reviews, rewarding reviewers with giveaways (the reader then feels indebted and ends up giving a positive review), ARC buying etc.

Am I pro or anti ARCs? I'm not sure, but I won't don a sack and walk the streets if they are banned.

I've been tempted to use them a couple of times because I have a good list made up of fantastic fans. But every time I do, some part of me always asks what if this is the time Amazon decides to crack down on everyone using ARCs suspiciously and I get caught in the net? Nah! Not worth the hassle. I'll just take my reviews that come a day to a week later and go my way. Thankfully a lack of ARC hasn't affected my sales. On a recent book I got to top 1000 on the store without a single review - so, you know, Whatever!


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## LadyG (Sep 3, 2015)

Dpock said:


> There may not be 100% transparency, but they only worry about culling ARCs from their teams who leave three or fewer star reviews.


Do you have proof of this, or is it just your pet theory?


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## Guest (May 14, 2017)

I wouldn't mind if ARCs were not allowed for anyone. However, the way things are I'm afraid this new policy will end up hurting new writers and writers who don't have a substantial fan base yet. I'm already seeing the bigger authors suggest rotating ARC reviewers from your mailing list to avoid being flagged by Amazon algos but that's easy enough for those with thousands of subscribers. For the rest of us, it won't be so easy, thus we'll have an even greater disadvantage in the future. 

PS. Not saying said successful authors are doing anything wrong, just that Amazon keeps punishing the little guys every time they come up with a new restriction.


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## jaehaerys (Feb 18, 2016)

SummerNights said:


> I wouldn't mind if ARCs were not allowed for anyone. However, the way things are I'm afraid this new policy will end up hurting new writers and writers who don't have a substantial fan base yet. I'm already seeing the bigger authors suggest rotating ARC reviewers from your mailing list to avoid being flagged by Amazon algos but that's easy enough for those with thousands of subscribers. For the rest of us, it won't be so easy, thus we'll have an even greater disadvantage in the future.
> 
> PS. Not saying said successful authors are doing anything wrong, just that Amazon keeps punishing the little guys every time they come up with a new restriction.


Trying to make it in indie publishing is extremely difficult at the best of times, you could even say the entire premise is punishing in and of itself. And like anything else that's probably as it should be. 

Yes, there are established authors with platforms they've built through questionable practices, but there's nothing we can do about that now. We can't go back in time and undo those wrongs. So, there's no reason Amazon should continue to allow these questionable practices to continue just for the sake of 'making things easier' for any new prospective writers looking to jump on that less-than-ethical bandwagon. 

Instead, we can encourage new writers to enter the struggle realizing that yes, it is a struggle, only the cream will rise and it can and should all be done above-board and with genuine success achieved organically. At the same time, we can only hope Amazon will help by closing the loopholes and the schemes and finally putting these other more questionable practices out of commission for good.


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## Laran Mithras (Nov 22, 2016)

As a reader - which is not often - I will click out of a book when I see ARC reviews.

Don't care if that's offensive. Just saying.

And yes, I know how incredibly hard it is to get reviews. Mine are organic and it is aggravating that hundred of books sell and all you get is one review.


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## Guest (May 14, 2017)

dn8791 said:


> Trying to make it in indie publishing is extremely difficult at the best of times, you could even say the entire premise is punishing in and of itself. And like anything else that's probably as it should be.
> 
> Yes, there are established authors with platforms they've built through questionable practices, but there's nothing we can do about that now. We can't go back in time and undo those wrongs. So, there's no reason Amazon should continue to allow these questionable practices to continue just for the sake of 'making things easier' for any new prospective writers looking to jump on that less-than-ethical bandwagon.
> 
> Instead, we can encourage new writers to enter the struggle realizing that yes, it is a struggle, only the cream will rise and it can and should all be done above-board and with genuine success achieved organically. At the same time, we can only hope Amazon will help by closing the loopholes and the schemes and finally putting these other more questionable practices out of commission for good.


I don't see how giving ARCs is a questionable or less-than-ethical practice. I never suggested that. ARCs have a long-standing tradition and are a good way to help spread the word about a new book. My concern is that Amazon will make it next to impossible for newbies to compete but I do believe that the vast majority of established authors absolutely deserve their success and have done nothing wrong or questionable.


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## vstewart (Sep 10, 2016)

nikkykaye said:


> But as an author, sometimes I worry that too many ARC reviews turn new readers off. If you have 50 reviews and 49 of them say "I was given this book and this is my honest opinion," it begins to sound facetious.


I know I, as a reader, have been turned off by reviews that are saturated with ARC copies. I especially dislike how most reviewers of ARCs rarely have anything critical to say. A book with no reviews I might take a chance on. A book with zillions of ARCs, I won't.


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## Dolphin (Aug 22, 2013)

vstewart said:


> I know I, as a reader, have been turned off by reviews that are saturated with ARC copies. I especially dislike how most reviewers of ARCs rarely have anything critical to say. A book with no reviews I might take a chance on. A book with zillions of ARCs, I won't.


This keeps coming up and is fascinating. I wish we could get some good measurements of things like this. Never really occurred to me that a meaningful opportunity cost for doing ARCs is that an appreciable number of readers might shun them altogether.


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## booklette (Mar 5, 2016)

vstewart said:


> I know I, as a reader, have been turned off by reviews that are saturated with ARC copies. I especially dislike how most reviewers of ARCs rarely have anything critical to say. A book with no reviews I might take a chance on. A book with zillions of ARCs, I won't.


I'm with you - if I see a lot ARC reviews on a book I'll click right past it.

The thing is, trade publishers' ARCs are sent out to, in the main, disinterested parties. They're looking for reviews from journals, newspapers, magazines, and although there are some 'tit for tat' review blurbs culled from other authors, the majority of their ARC reviewers aren't directly involved with them.

The indie ARCs, however, are mainly from street teams and newsletter subscribers - people who are already fans of the author's work. They're naturally biased and so, for me as a reader trying to decide whether to purchase the book or not, they're useless.


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## Seneca42 (Dec 11, 2016)

Review systems are utterly, fatally flawed for two simple reasons:

1) They can be gamed very easily (both ways, btw... both to boost an author or to attack an author)
2) They create a chicken-and-egg scenario where readers want reviews before buying. But how do you get those reviews if no one will buy a book with no reviews? Even if they are willing, it's buried so far down that no one knows it exists.

Netflix recently did away with their review system completely. Now, you simply like or dislike a show. Then, they somehow are able to deduce based on your ratings of various shows, the % likelihood you'll enjoy another show.

Long story short, I thought I would absolutely *hate* this new way of doing things. I actually really like it now.

I don't want an amalgamation of everyone's ratings (what a 15-year-old girl thinks of a horror movie has zero bearing on what I, a 40-year-old-male will think of it). What I want, which netflix seems to be doing, is for netflix to identify my "like" profile... then integrate that data with other people who have a similar entertainment profile as I do... then use our data to extrapolate what other shows I'm going to like.

It's really not that hard to do. If Netflix can do this, there's no reason why Amazon can't (in fact, it's sad that Netflix is addressing the review system while Amazon ignores it).

When I read say 10 books, I should just be able to say to Amazon "I liked it" on each one. Then their system should look for other people who exhibit my pattern of likes and then suggest to me books those other people have liked which I haven't read yet.

Amazon will never do this though. Most likely because the "star" system is so simple. Even though it has been gamed to no end and hardly anyone trusts it anymore.

We all need to email Netflix and tell them to expand into ebooks


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## Eugene Kirk (Oct 21, 2016)

A bit off topic, but related. To the more experienced authors, how long does it typically take for organic reviews to start appearing? I did use an ARC process to get initial reviews for my 1st in series. Reading this now, I question continuing it.  I launched a week ago and despite getting around 350 sales and a couple thousand page reads thus far, I still don't have any. I'm trying to gauge if the book is perhaps just not hitting the mark or if these things take more time to happen. Granted I don't have any negative reviews either. Would be interested to know. Thanks.


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## jaehaerys (Feb 18, 2016)

SummerNights said:


> I don't see how giving ARCs is a questionable or less-than-ethical practice. I never suggested that. ARCs have a long-standing tradition and are a good way to help spread the word about a new book. My concern is that Amazon will make it next to impossible for newbies to compete but I do believe that the vast majority of established authors absolutely deserve their success and have done nothing wrong or questionable.


It's questionable because it's the author passing off reviews written by people who are incentivized to leave above average reviews as though they're organic reviews when that isn't the case. 

To the average reader these types of ARC reviews are indistinguishable from organic reviews and so the book appears to have all of these glowing reviews that, unbeknownst to these readers, were not all written by other unaffiliated readers like them. 

So, these readers will see this book with all of these great reviews believing this happened organically, meaning the ARC reviews paint a false picture in the minds of prospective buyers. This false picture then leads to more reads from people who are more willing to give the book a shot given all of the positive reviews and these increased reads leads to a boosted rank. And none of this was actually earned through organic impressions from completely unaffiliated readers, and therein lies the manipulative nature of the practice.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

dn8791 said:


> It's questionable because it's the author passing off reviews written by people who are incentivized to leave above average reviews as though they're organic reviews when that isn't the case.
> 
> To the average reader these types of ARC reviews are indistinguishable from organic reviews and so the book appears to have all of these glowing reviews that, unbeknownst to these readers, were not all written by other unaffiliated readers like them.
> 
> So, these readers will see this book with all of these great reviews believing this happened organically, meaning the ARC reviews paint a false picture in the minds of prospective buyers. This false picture then leads to more reads from people who are more willing to give the book a shot given all of the positive reviews and these increased reads leads to a boosted rank. And none of this was actually earned through organic impressions from completely unaffiliated readers, and therein lies the manipulative nature of the practice.


How do you think readers are incentivized? Genuinely curious.

My review average is about the same on books where I sent ARCs as on those where I didn't. Also, the early reviews tended to come from a lot of the same people in both cases. So I don't really see this.

The other interesting fact is that both KDP and Audible encouraged me to set up an ARC program a year or two into my publishing career. Amazon did not at that time have any problem with indie ARCs. The explanation given to me was that--yes, traditional publishers do it. NetGalley--used by tradpubs and indies both.

Any smart author who does use ARCs is glad for the three- and four-star reviews (ARC readers normally don't give twos, because why would you sign up for an author's books if you don't like them?). They know those add legitimacy. Not everybody loves every book. I've never heard of ethical authors "culling" readers who give below five stars. Yep, I've heard all things about unethical authors and promoters, but what the heck--some people will always try to game.


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## Anarchist (Apr 22, 2015)

dn8791 said:


> It's questionable because it's the author passing off reviews written by people who are incentivized to leave above average reviews as though they're organic reviews when that isn't the case.


Please tell me how I'm incentivizing people to "_leave above average reviews_."

If you're unable to, have the decency to admit you're painting with too broad a brush.

Or don't. It's _your_ reputation.


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## AllyWho (May 16, 2015)

dn8791 said:


> It's questionable because it's the author passing off reviews written by people who are incentivized to leave above average reviews as though they're organic reviews when that isn't the case.


Please give examples of how authors are incentivising reviewers to leave above average reviews?

Some authors have large followings, that means that have large and keen review teams. It also follows that if you have a series, only people who enjoy those books keep reading, so later books do tend to skew to a higher average. That's not gaming the system or doing something shady, it's just a natural function of series and/or review teams. Personally, I've not seen any author tell ARC readers they can only leave 5-star reviews and frankly your comment just comes across as sour grapes.


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## Seneca42 (Dec 11, 2016)

AliceW said:


> Please give examples of how authors are incentivising reviewers to leave above average reviews?


I think I understand what the poster was trying to say. There are many many authors who regularly cull their street teams. If they give out an ARC to say 25 people, and 5 of them leave bad reviews... they axe them from their ARC team for the next book. The "incentivising" is getting a free book... and if you don't rate well, you're cut off from future books. FB is full of authors commented about this and asking if they should cut people... the response from other authors is almost always "YES, GET RID OF THEM."

Which is logical. Why would you want someone on your ARC team that doesn't like your writing? hehe.


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## PhoenixS (Apr 5, 2011)

***********


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## jaehaerys (Feb 18, 2016)

Rosalind J said:


> How do you think readers are incentivized? Genuinely curious.


I think most people, if given an item for free in exchange for a review, will feel somewhat obligated to skew that review toward the positive end of the star-rating scale as opposed to feeling obliged to leave a negative review. Add in the fact that many/most ARCs are going to people already fans of an author, already with goodwill toward the author, already a part of their mailing list.

Does that mean all ARC reviews will be 3-star and up? No, there are always going to be exceptions, of course. But the vast majority? Yes. And really, if an author truly believed that many or even most of those ARCs could or would come back laden with one or two star reviews, do I think that author would still go ahead and do it as a regular practice? No I don't. The entire point of engaging in the practice is to have their book appear more enticing to prospective readers.


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## Dolphin (Aug 22, 2013)

Seneca42 said:


> It's really not that hard to do. If Netflix can do this, there's no reason why Amazon can't (in fact, it's sad that Netflix is addressing the review system while Amazon ignores it)...
> 
> ...Amazon will never do this though. Most likely because the "star" system is so simple. Even though it has been gamed to no end and hardly anyone trusts it anymore.


Whatever they're doing, Amazon isn't ignoring reviews. They're actively trying to improve them, and remember that Netflix started with a 1-5 star system too. We'll see whether or not Amazon lands on something like Netflix's new system in time.

Goodreads introduces a strange wrinkle. Maybe it'd actually make sense for them to switch to a thumbs up/thumbs down system on Amazon and maintain the 1-5 stars regime on Goodreads. Most people put more stock into GR's star system as it is.



Rosalind J said:


> How do you think readers are incentivized? Genuinely curious.
> 
> My review average is about the same on books where I sent ARCs as on those where I didn't. Also, the early reviews tended to come from a lot of the same people in both cases. So I don't really see this...
> 
> ...Any smart author who does use ARCs is glad for the three- and four-star reviews (ARC readers normally don't give twos, because why would you sign up for an author's books if you don't like them?). They know those add legitimacy. Not everybody loves every book. I've never heard of ethical authors "culling" readers who give below five stars. Yep, I've heard all things about unethical authors and promoters, but what the heck--some people will always try to game.


This gets at the pressures that will tend to bias ARC street teams.

We agree that culling reviewers seen as insufficiently positive is unethical, and that's great. So far, so good. The thing is that there's still a lot of implicit bias that will necessarily creep in.

First, where did you find the reviewers? Typically, I think the answer is a call to action in the mailing list, or cold-call volunteers who ask for an ARC. These people have already self-selected as especially active members of your fanbase. Certainly tradpubs have sent ARCs to self-selected fans on much the same basis, or sought _quid pro quo_ blurb exchanges from other authors, but they've also made a point to bombard disinterested critics with ARCs. That's a big difference, and it's not at all typical of indy practices.

Second, I don't think there's any ethical consensus against culling people who never review an ARC. On the contrary, my sense is that it's considered a best practice to rid yourself of free riders, pirates, and laggards. Here's an example from another thread participant:



Anarchist said:


> I let folks know that it's their responsibility to review my books. If they don't, they'll get removed from my list.
> 
> Frankly, I don't rigorously police it. Ain't nobody got time fo' dat. But I set the expectation. Then, if I notice someone has been on my list for several months (I publish every 8 to 10 weeks) and hasn't fulfilled their end of the bargain, I delete them.
> 
> No heads up. No second chances.


Saying "I don't rigorously police it," is plainly no excuse.

I think it's clear on its face that policies like this shape the audience that will be reviewing your ARCs. They're self-selected from the outset, then they're whittled down by pressures, both implicit and explicit, to folks who're diehard fans--as Rosalind said, "the early reviews tended to come from a lot of the same people in both cases." These are folks who're highly motivated to read your work and then quickly review it.

I'm not saying anybody is deliberately trying to manipulate reviews. However, I think you'd have to be naive to believe that the process of building and shaping an ARC list of your own readers has no effect on the reviews. Even if you rotate between a random group of mailing list subscribers, say, you're _still_ creating a pool of ARC reviewers who've self-selected as fans. It's nothing even close to resembling a disinterested sample of genre readers or critics.

A bigger question might be, what's the difference between getting those reviews from ARCs or getting those reviews organically? After all, part of my argument is that the ARCs are going to diehard fans, who Rosalind says will review her books anyway and rate it the same on average. I don't have a great answer for that one. Not sure Amazon would either, unless it's that the organic reviews come from paid sales and ARCs don't (and the risk that some _other_ authors may be using ARCs unethically, of course).

If it's true, though, why bother with the ARC process? You could save time and maybe earn a few bones by scrapping it. Might also save you from rubbing the anti-ARC readers the wrong way. Surely it would be worth waiting a few extra days for the reviews to trickle in, if it means they'll have verified badges and be viewed as more legitimate. Surely it would be worth picking up some extra royalties and sparing yourself an extra step (or several) in the launch process. If not, then why not? What are you gaining from ARCs that justifies your expenses (if only in time)?


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

dn8791 said:


> I think most people, if given an item for free in exchange for a review, will feel somewhat obligated to skew that review toward the positive end of the star-rating scale as opposed to feeling obliged to leave a negative review. Add in the fact that many/most ARCs are going to people already fans of an author, already with goodwill toward the author, already a part of their mailing list.
> 
> Does that mean all ARC reviews will be 3-star and up? No, there are always going to be exceptions, of course. But the vast majority? Yes. And really, if an author truly believed that many or even most of those ARCs could or would come back laden with one or two star reviews, do I think that author would still go ahead and do it as a regular practice? No I don't. The entire point of engaging in the practice is to have their book appear more enticing to prospective readers.


Except that after the beginning, an author's early reviews will be exactly the same. Mostly fans. You'll get a "sooo disappointed" review (from an ARC reviewer or not), you'll get some "her best book yet" reviews, and you'll get some in the middle. My books now are all 4.4-4.8 average, ARC or not, one month, three months, three years post-publication. In fact, all but my first two books are . . . 4.4-4.8. And very, very few of the reviewers got a free book. I did those free ARC copies for a year or two only.

If that same author is exposed to a lot of new readers, her review average will probably slip. Or not. I have a book right now that's old (couple years), but has just been exposed to lots of new folks. Its review average has actually risen, because it doesn't have all the folks being disappointed due to it not being similar to my other series--they're coming to it new.

If you've seen people cutting ARC recipients for non-glowing reviews, they belong on a "bad actors" list. Plus, that's incredibly short-sighted of them.


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## jaehaerys (Feb 18, 2016)

Anarchist said:


> Please tell me how I'm incentivizing people to "_leave above average reviews_."
> 
> If you're unable to, have the decency to admit you're painting with too broad a brush.
> 
> Or don't. It's _your_ reputation.


I think most people, if given an item for free in exchange for a review, will feel somewhat obligated to skew that review toward the positive end of the star-rating scale as opposed to feeling obliged to leave a negative review. Add in the fact that many/most ARCs are going to people already fans of an author, already come with goodwill toward the author, already are part of their mailing list.

Does that mean all ARC reviews will be 3-star and up? No, there are always going to be exceptions, of course. But the vast majority? Yes. And really, if an author truly believed that many or even most of those ARCs could or would come back laden with one or two star reviews, do I think that author would still go ahead and do it as a regular practice? No I don't. The entire point of engaging in the practice is to have their book appear more enticing to prospective readers.

And no, I don't think I am painting with too broad a brush. I'm telling the truth. Amazon is rife with indie published works that feature pages of glowing reviews that were not obtained organically. It's all there in black-and-white for anyone to discover. I'm not sure what your comments about decency or reputation have to do with this.


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## jaehaerys (Feb 18, 2016)

AliceW said:


> Please give examples of how authors are incentivising reviewers to leave above average reviews?
> 
> Some authors have large followings, that means that have large and keen review teams. It also follows that if you have a series, only people who enjoy those books keep reading, so later books do tend to skew to a higher average. That's not gaming the system or doing something shady, it's just a natural function of series and/or review teams. Personally, I've not seen any author tell ARC readers they can only leave 5-star reviews and frankly your comment just comes across as sour grapes.


Sour grapes would imply that I'm upset I don't have a sizable platform similar to others, but the problem with this assumption is I don't feel threatened by authors who are killing it, in fact I look at those authors as something to strive for and be inspired by. I don't have a competitive bone in my body. Also, I actually do believe I will have a sizable platform in due course, it will take time, but I have confidence in my stories, my ideas, my execution, etc. It doesn't mean I have everything figured out, it just means I'm happy doing what I'm doing, and I'm happy watching other authors succeed as well.

That said, what I don't like is seeing platforms being built up by others through gamification or any form of audience/ranking manipulation. I like things being done above-board and results being achieved organically. No, I can't control what others will or won't do, but I can state my opinion on a given subject when it comes up in conversation. 

It may come across as envy, but really it's just me seeing scheme after scheme come up in the indie community and just being tired of it and wishing people would just do things the right way for a change. I also think an organic approach will benefit everyone in the community in the long run, but maybe that's just the utopian in me talking.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

For anybody who sells well, almost ALL their reviews will be 3-star and up. Like--98, 99%. Does that mean they're fake? Nope. Any author who sells well will have mostly positive reviews (unless she writes really polarizing stuff), because . . . that author sells well because she knows how to write books that most readers of that kind of book will like. And she knows how to say, "Hey! This is the kind of book you'll like!" 

I'm sure that some authors use the ARC system to artificially inflate their book's reviews. But I'd also bet that doesn't help with sales all that much long-term.


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## Anarchist (Apr 22, 2015)

dn8791 said:


> I think most people, if given an item for free in exchange for a review, will feel somewhat obligated to skew that review toward the positive end of the star-rating scale as opposed to feeling obliged to leave a negative review. Add in the fact that many/most ARCs are going to people already fans of an author, already come with goodwill toward the author, already are part of their mailing list.


You claimed that authors are incentivizing reviewers to leave above average reviews. That implies action, and it's a claim that is entirely false in my case.

The fact that an ARC recipient might "_feel somewhat obligated to skew that review toward the positive end of the star-rating scale_" doesn't imply any action on my part.

Action and inaction are not ethically equivalent. Stealing a loaf of bread is not ethically equivalent to refusing to stop someone from stealing a loaf of bread. That's moral philosophy 101.



dn8791 said:


> And no, I don't think I am painting with too broad a brush. I'm telling the truth. Amazon is rife with indie published works that feature pages of glowing reviews that were not obtained organically. It's all there in black-and-white for anyone to discover. I'm not sure what your comments about decency or reputation have to do with this.


You've made an accusation that is demonstrably false, at least in my case. And probably Rosalind's case. And probably Kristen's case. And probably Wayne's case. And probably Chris's case. Etc.

_Edited. Drop me a PM if you have any questions. - Becca_


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## jaehaerys (Feb 18, 2016)

Rosalind J said:


> Except that after the beginning, an author's early reviews will be exactly the same. Mostly fans. You'll get a "sooo disappointed" review (from an ARC reviewer or not), you'll get some "her best book yet" reviews, and you'll get some in the middle. My books now are all 4.4-4.8 average, ARC or not, one month, three months, three years post-publication. In fact, all but my first two books are . . . 4.4-4.8. And very, very few of the reviewers got a free book. I did those free ARC copies for a year or two only.
> 
> If that same author is exposed to a lot of new readers, her review average will probably slip. Or not. I have a book right now that's old (couple years), but has just been exposed to lots of new folks. Its review average has actually risen, because it doesn't have all the folks being disappointed due to it not being similar to my other series--they're coming to it new.
> 
> If you've seen people cutting ARC recipients for non-glowing reviews, they belong on a "bad actors" list. Plus, that's incredibly short-sighted of them.


Rosalind, you're one of those guiding lights around here that I continue to be inspired by. Your success has been hard-earned as you've attested to here on the boards, and by your own admission you don't currently use ARCs so your continued success comes from positive word of mouth. You earn your organic reviews by the quality of your work, clearly, which is something to aspire to. And I agree with you, there are 'bad actors' out there, and I agree what they're doing is short-sighted. I just wish it would end.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

dn8791 said:


> Rosalind, you're one of those guiding lights around here that I continue to be inspired by. Your success has been hard-earned as you've attested to here on the boards, and by your own admission you don't currently use ARCs so your continued success comes from positive word of mouth. You earn your organic reviews by the quality of your work, clearly, which is something to aspire to. And I agree with you, there are 'bad actors' out there, and I agree what they're doing is short-sighted. I just wish it would end.


Nope, I did ARCs. And the review average on those books is ... just about the same as on the non-ARC books. My book FIERCE? I gave out 80+ ARCs for that. I think the ARC average was 4.7 or so. Now it's 4.5, because I did a free offer and tens of thousands of new-to-me people read it. Some people hated it--ARC or no--because it was a new direction for me. They said so.

NetGalley is ARCs, and Amazon Publishing uses NetGalley extensively and urges its authors to get NG reviews. The first person who told me to get an ARC group was my KDP rep. I said, "Isn't that gaming?" She said, "Not at all. Traditional publishing has always done it." Maybe Amazon has changed its mind now. Could be. I do wish they'd make borrows "verified purchases," if they're trying to differentiate. But I don't make the rules.

And thank you, but my success hasn't actually been all that hard-earned. i just wrote some books and published them. I work hard to make sure they're my best effort, like most people, that's all.


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## jaehaerys (Feb 18, 2016)

Anarchist said:


> You claimed that authors are incentivizing reviewers to leave above average reviews. That implies action, and it's a claim that is entirely false in my case.
> 
> The fact that an ARC recipient might "_feel somewhat obligated to skew that review toward the positive end of the star-rating scale_" doesn't imply any action on my part.


An author acts to incentivize above average reviews by sending out ARCs in exchange for said reviews. Otherwise, what was the point of sending out the ARCs?



> Action and inaction are not ethically equivalent. Stealing a loaf of bread is not ethically equivalent to refusing to stop someone from stealing a loaf of bread. That's moral philosophy 101.


If an author isn't seeking 'x' as an outcome why would they spend any time or effort toward achieving that end?



> You've made an accusation that is demonstrably false, at least in my case. And probably Rosalind's case. And probably Kristen's case. And probably Wayne's case. And probably Chris's case. Etc.
> 
> _Edited. - Becca_


Now just hold it right there. That is way out of line. I haven't called anyone out by name for what they have or have not done, including you, nor anyone you've mentioned above. I have no idea what you nor those others do in their private business practices. I'm not in a position to know, nor have I pretended to know. But I can see what is being done on Amazon quite clearly and I've called out a practice I believe is manipulative.

From there you've chosen to make a leap with that into saying I'm attempting to sully specific reputations of successful indies and that is demonstrably false by everything I've said in this thread and I respectfully invite you to be more measured in your tone.

_Edited to remove references to material edited out of quote. Drop me a PM if you have any questions. - Becca_


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## Anarchist (Apr 22, 2015)

dn8791 said:


> An author acts to incentivize above average reviews by sending out ARCs in exchange for said reviews. Otherwise, what was the point of sending out the ARCs?


The point is to obtain reviews.

That's the desired outcome. Reviews.

I can't help if someone feels obligated to leave a 5-star review after receiving an ARC. I've never mentioned that a 5-star review was a requirement of the deal.

Suppose I take a lady out to dinner, and there's no mention of sex. I can't help it if she feels obligated to have sex with me just because I took her out to dinner. That sense of obligation stems from factors that have nothing to do with me.



dn8791 said:


> Now just hold it right there. That is way out of line. I haven't called anyone out by name for what they have or have not done, including you, nor anyone you've mentioned above. I have no idea what you nor those others do in their private business practices. I'm not in a position to know, nor have I pretended to know. But I can see what is being done on Amazon quite clearly and I've called out a practice I believe is manipulative.


You claimed the following about authors who give out ARCs:

"_...it's the author passing off reviews written by people who are incentivized to leave above average reviews as though they're organic reviews when that isn't the case._"

Those are your words. Now you're saying the following:

"_I have no idea what you nor those others do in their private business practices. I'm not in a position to know, nor have I pretended to know._"

Either that's a jedi mind trick or you're being disingenuous.



dn8791 said:


> From there you've chosen to make a leap with that into saying I'm attempting to sully specific reputations of successful indies and that is demonstrably false by everything I've said in this thread and I respectfully invite you to be more measured in your tone.
> 
> _Edited. - Becca_


Tell you what. I'll let you have the last word on this matter, at least between you and I. Have at it. Given the chains of reasoning you've demonstrated, I don't think you and I are going to see eye to eye on much.

_Edited. Drop me a PM if you have any questions. - Becca_


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Let's cool it, folks. Multiple views on the ethics of ARCs may be articulated and debated, but we need a respectful tone all around.


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## ......~...... (Jul 4, 2015)

AliceW said:


> Personally, I've not seen any author tell ARC readers they can only leave 5-star reviews


Me neither, though I have seen authors talk about deleting readers that leave negative reviews from their ARC lists so that only those who leave positive reviews remain.


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## Silly Writer (Jul 15, 2013)

Amazon Imprints encourages many of their authors to send out ARC's. You can read the reviews yourself on those book pages where they acknowledge it's an ARC in the review itself and thank Lake Union or NetGallly or Library Things, etc... Once upon a time (not sure if they still do this), they'd even send them 50-100 paperbacks to mail out to their teams.

So I don't think the OP is about ARC's. Not sure why they're pulling reviews, but it's got to be another connection.  

I got one of those same nastygrams about a year ago, accusing me of review manipulation. It scared me to death. They didn't give me specifics so I kept sending emails asking to PLEASE tell me what was the connection...what had I done wrong. The connection ended up being for one particular review from a family that read/reviewed my book and have read all my books--and I'd done them a favor of editing and loading up the MS of their patriarch. An old man who wanted to see his memoirs in print before he died. So there was a connection, but not the way they thought. The review was an honest review and similar to the ones left before I'd ever worked on this man's book.  

So if you get reviews pulled and/or get a nastygram, keep pushing until they give you a reason. They know the reason...they sent me a copy of the review that had been deleted. So it's marked on your account somewhere. In the end, I was allowed to state my case and told it was documented on my account, and that was important to me that they knew why this connection was there, and that it wasn't necessarily review manipulation. 

TL/DR: The connection was my i.p. address


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## jaehaerys (Feb 18, 2016)

Anarchist said:


> The point is to obtain reviews.
> 
> That's the desired outcome. Reviews.


Yes, and honestly, who would make an effort to obtain reviews that are predominantly not positive? So, it's not about the desired outcome being just 'reviews', it's about the desired outcome being positive reviews otherwise why would anyone bother? And it's in seeking predominantly positive reviews that I deem manipulative.



> I can't help if someone feels obligated to leave a 5-star review after receiving an ARC. I've never mentioned that a 5-star review was a requirement of the deal.


You don't have to mention the 5-star review or 4-star or 3-star is a requirement of the deal, it's fairly obvious that most people on an author's mailing list or who've been sent a book for free, or otherwise are engaged with the author in some fashion, will more often than not leave a review that is something other than a 1-star or 2-star review. Authors know this and if they truly believed they'd be just as likely to be given mostly 1 and 2 star reviews by people on these lists then would they still go through with sending out all those ARCs? I think that's doubtful.



> Suppose I take a lady out to dinner, and there's no mention of sex. I can't help it if she feels obligated to have sex with me just because I took her out to dinner. That sense of obligation stems from factors that have nothing to do with me.


The problem with this analogy is you've taken that particular person out for dinner for a reason as opposed to taking someone else out for dinner. There's an underlying rationale there. You're taking someone out likely because you see potential for something to develop with someone you like. It's why you're taking them out as opposed to someone different.




> You claimed the following about authors who give out ARCs:
> 
> "_...it's the author passing off reviews written by people who are incentivized to leave above average reviews as though they're organic reviews when that isn't the case._"
> 
> ...


How is it disingenuous? You'd named specific authors and alluded to the idea that I was calling them out for what they do when in actual fact I haven't said anything about what those specific authors do. I haven't named one name, and for very good reason, which is because I don't know what those specific people you've named do. 

Yes, there are authors who pass off reviews as organic that are not, are those authors you've specifically named doing it? No idea. Never claimed to know if they were either. Same for you. Not once did I say "Anarchist is doing 'x'. Not once.


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## Seneca42 (Dec 11, 2016)

PhoenixS said:


> Interestingly, I saw something new with reviews just this evening along this line that it looks like Amazon is testing. I've got promo going for a handful of books today, so I've been stalking rankings on them. Only one of the stalkees, however, has this currently at the beginning of its review section.


Yep. This should be very simple to do as the data does exist.

In addition, Amazon could *very* easily use it to help new authors get a foothold. For instance, new book comes out. It gets read by a few people who have read TONS of other books in that genre. It's rated very high by those people.

Something should be triggered in Amazon's algos that says "ding ding ding... even though this book is poorly ranked, sells poorly, and has few reviews... the reviewers rating it suggest this one's a winner. Let's expose it to other readers a little more."

Right now though, the way amazon works. is big spenders with an existing base of readers win because they are just what Amazon's algos love.

Amazon's algos thought process today is: "Oh wow, lots of people are buying that book, let's show it to even more people so they can buy it."

The utter flaw is that it has NOTHING to do with quality and everything to do with marketing spend.

That's the true crux of the issue with their whole system. It's a "pay 2 win" model. Yes, on the back end readers will eventually knock a book down with bad ratings... and hence we come full circle front-loading ARCs to offset organic reviews.

hehe... it's all just such a total and utter mess. Hopefully Amazon cleans it up one day. Ultimately we're talking about curation here, which has always been the #1 problem in the SP world.


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## Lysandra_Lorde (Mar 6, 2016)

Just wanna say that I haven't been dinged as of three months ago, and hopefully i will not be dinged for my new release this may. I do not require my readers to leave a POSITIVE review. Obviously I want them to, but I don't go around cutting people. If they think my book sucks, they should let other people know that - because those bad reviews will help the customer, and I don't think they will hurt me super bad... it will just let the people that care about those kinds of things know to keep away, and that's fine.

That's my take on it.


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## Dolphin (Aug 22, 2013)

Anarchist, again I'll refer to what you wrote on this topic less than four months ago:



Anarchist said:


> I let folks know that it's their responsibility to review my books. If they don't, they'll get removed from my list.
> 
> Frankly, I don't rigorously police it. Ain't nobody got time fo' dat. But I set the expectation. Then, if I notice someone has been on my list for several months (I publish every 8 to 10 weeks) and hasn't fulfilled their end of the bargain, I delete them.
> 
> No heads up. No second chances.


That's a cut-and-dry violation of Amazon's Community Guidelines, which state:

[quote author=Amazon.com]
Book authors and publishers may continue to provide free or discounted copies of their books to readers, *as long as the author or publisher does not require a review in exchange* or attempt to influence the review.
[/quote]

Emphasis added.

Amazon thinks that requiring a review necessarily influences its content. You can disagree with that as strenuously as you want, but the contract you signed says it'll fall on deaf ears.

I'm not trying to harass you. Honestly, I hope it helps you and anybody else who thinks requiring a review is okay, because you could be jeopardizing the good standing of your account.


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## sulfiati.hindman (Apr 6, 2017)

I just wanted to give my perspective on how reviews influence my purchases of books on Amazon. I am an avid reader and love to write but I have never published and I wasn't aware of the marketing side of reviews. 

I say this because I often ignore the good reviews. I use the lowest star reviews to see if I will buy or not. If these low star reviews say things like "I hated it" I ignore the review because everyone's taste is different. Instead I look for things that would turn me off reading it like badly edited, weak storyline, writing is self gratification etc. 

I may read the long high star reviews that analyse the story but mostly I buy books that I have read a sample of and liked. 

Sent from my D6653 using Tapatalk


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## elalond (May 11, 2011)

I believe that Amazon isn't against ARC reviewers, but those reviewers that they think have personal connection with authors or are in some other way profiting from reviewing books. I know of a case when one of the top fifty reviewer had almost all of her reviews deleted, even one she did on my book, even though review was never solicited from my side and there was never any contact between us. At that time, I heard the rumors that Amazon was going after reviewers with blogs. I don't know if it's true or not. 

I don't find anything wrong with ARCs as long as those are not done by people pressured or paid to write reviews.  Yes, ARC reviewers are usually positive biased toward the author, which is logical, since why would they otherwise become members of author's ARC team. It's just a marketing practice that has been in use for decades and which, even if everybody use it, doesn't harm the system in place, like those ethically questionable practice that some use; like manipulation of bestseller lists, the use of click farms, etc. do.


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## Alvina (Oct 19, 2015)

What is ARC reviews?


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## elalond (May 11, 2011)

Alvina said:


> What is ARC reviews?


Reviews on Advance Reading Copy - a free copy of the book that is send to readers to read and review.


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## Anarchist (Apr 22, 2015)

Dolphin said:


> Anarchist, again I'll refer to what you wrote on this topic less than four months ago:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


You're conflating two issues.

1. Violating Amazon's Community Guidelines.

2. Incentivizing positive reviews.

I am guilty of number one. (I've always known this, and I'm fine with it.)

I am not guilty of number two.

You can claim that Amazon feels that requiring reviews in exchange for ARCs would influence the content of the reviews. Maybe that's true. Maybe it isn't. For me, it's a matter of inference and speculation.

A quick aside regarding violating Amazon's Community Guidelines: admission of knowingly doing so is likely to prompt gasps from the crowd. But here's my position: do what you will, and be willing to suffer the consequences.

I don't scurry about trying to obey every rule. I break some. And I do so knowingly. If I'm caught, I'm ready to deal with the consequences.

It's no different than driving 75 MPH on the highway when the speed limit is 65 MPH.

I won't be commenting on this issue further in this thread. It's a time sink, and I'd rather devote that time to other things.

_Edited. PM me if you have any questions. --Betsy/KB Mod_


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## Guest (May 15, 2017)

LilyBLily said:


> This really sucks, and it's totally against the traditional publishing standard of repeatedly sending out ARCs to the very same people/organizations most likely to review your books.


The "traditional publishing standard" is to send ARCs to recognized, independent third-party reviewers, not rabid fans.

And to clarify, this distinction is the root of the problem. Indies tend not to differentiate between editorial reviews and reader reviews. They are two different things. Trade publishers focus on independent editorial reviews. Indies focus on reader reviews. That in itself is not the problem. Both types of reviews have value. The problem is that indies want to apply "editorial reviewer" logic to reader reviews.

Trade publishers don't coordinate with editorial reviewers beyond "here is the book. The release date is X. Please don't post reviews before Y." Indies quite often coordinate with their "street teams" to maximize review effect. They will ask them to all post on the same day, or ask them to post reviews in specific places. There are incentives because the street teams get to interact with the author. I don't think people realize what this does to the relationship.

If Disney contacted me and asked me if I wanted to review the next Star Wars movie at an advanced screening, I'd be over-the-moon as a Star Wars geek, but I'd still feel comfortable being honest if the movie didn't meet my expectation. If MARK HAMMILL contacted me directly, invited me to an advanced screening, and then said, "Hey, if you review this movie, I'll make sure you get into_ every advanced screening_ of every future Star Wars movies...my heart would explode and I'd probably be dead.  But if I survived the initial shock, I don't know if I would be able to be as honest with my reviews. Because even if the next movie turned out to be a train wreck like the prequels, I might be tempted to soften my review so as not to jeopardize access to future movies.

The lack of distance between authors and their personal ARC teams is a serious issue. I don't think most people are TRYING to game the system. But I think people are ignoring normal human behavior if they think this is not a real problem that doesn't inflate the ratings.


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## Used To Be BH (Sep 29, 2016)

oakwood said:


> 2) I agree with idea that has been mentioned that many readers see a large amount of arc reviews as a negative. A review offered by anyone who has gotten something free of charge carries much less credibility. This is not about arcs or publishing, it's a universal psychological effect in all marketing. If you were choosing a detergent and you see a bunch of reviews (regardless of if bad or good) from users who have received free samples, VS you see reviews from actual buyers.. whose review do you trust more?
> 
> There are many facets to why the actual buyer carries so much more weight - to start with one can be pretty sure they actually used the product they bought versus the free sample user who may have left a review based on sampling the sample, or perhaps not even touching it. I'm not saying that's the case, but its subconsciously in the back of the customer's head when deciding on a choice.. do I go for the product with many reviews but where 50% are free-sample reviews or do I go for the product with few reviews but 99% being actual customer experience reviews?
> 
> ...


With regard to #2, the truth is we can't be sure how readers in general react. Virtually everyone who comments on that subject is describing how he or she reacts, which may or may not be typical. At best we're drawing on people we know as a sample, which again may or may not be typical. Most of the people I know don't even understand the difference between traditional publishing and self-publishing. Even the few that do don't usually know what an ARC is--and I'm a former English teacher with many well-read friends. Because we know more about the publishing industry than the average person, we know the term and have opinions toward ARCs, but there's really no evidence the general population feels that way. Also, I'm not sure why you're referring to an ARC as a "free sample." It's normally the whole product, not just a sample.

With regard to #3, there is one flaw in the logic. Yes, if I'm an ARC reader, and I leave a negative review, I may be less likely to get another ARC--but if I don't like the author's writing, why would I want one? Your argument assumes that there are people who want free books so much they'll be perfectly happy with bad ones; that just doesn't make sense to me. Consider your restaurant analogy in the same way. Do you really want free food if it's unappetizing? Maybe if you're starving, but otherwise probably not.

Maybe the ARC system is doomed, but that would be a shame from the standpoint of the many authors who use it perfectly ethically. (I've never been well-organized enough to get an ARC team together myself.)

This may be a crazy idea, but perhaps the best way for Amazon to ensure ARCs won't be misused is to offer an alternative to them supervised by Amazon itself. Remember the Vine program, which I think still exists? The current program appears not to be designed for indie authors; instead, it works through vendors who have Amazon seller accounts, and it sounds as if it's expensive. However, if Amazon wanted to, it could create something similar for indie authors. Anyone who wanted to join could offer X number of review copies. Probably, Amazon would have to be somewhat selective to keep prospective reviewers from being flooded with unreadable books. Amazon solicits customers willing to review ARCs. Once the list is established, it distributes ARCs at random to people who have signed up for that genre. Authors have no contact with ARC reviewers and no control over which one(s) they get. Yes, such a system would take time to set up, but it would remove any possible ethical concerns without preventing indie authors from having the benefit of a system trad publishers will doubtless continue to use. (The day Amazon starts pulling reviews from trad books will be the day it starts raining toads.)


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## IreneP (Jun 19, 2012)

Dpock said:


> When I started researching self-publishing last fall I reviewed a long thread on ARCs. The discussion centered on their management, tracking their reviews, keeping spreadsheets, etc. The general advice was to cull any ARCs who gave you lower than four-star reviews, and this strategy was generally endorsed by thread participants.
> 
> After reading that thread I decided to give ARCs a pass.


Or.... uh... just don't follow that advice. I don't have an "ARC team" but I have a list of bloggers who normally review which is similar.

Maybe I'm just ornery, but I don't cull if one of them gives me a lower review. I was rewarded on one of my fall releases by having a critic of a previous book not only love the new release but spend extra effort pushing it to their readers.


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## Quincy (Feb 1, 2017)

I'm a reader who leave reviews, and I have no problem with books that show reviews from ARCs because I too love to read and review ARCs.  I don't, however, feel pressure to leave a positive review.  If leaving a negative review gets me dropped off an author's list, I'm OK with that because if I didn't like the book, then I probably am not eager to read more by the same author.  I read for fun not for a living, so I want to spend my time reading books that I enjoy, not books I suspect I will not.  I don't really know a lot about the ins and outs of marketing, ARC street teams, etc., because I mostly get my books from NetGalley or directly from publishers, but as a reader, it doesn't turn me off to see that a book has several ARC reviews.


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## Used To Be BH (Sep 29, 2016)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> The "traditional publishing standard" is to send ARCs to recognized, independent third-party reviewers, not rabid fans.


Yes, to recognized, independent, third-party reviewers who, for the most part, won't review indie books. In terms of creating a level playing field, it would certainly be nice if indies had some comparable alternative.

It's also worth noting that trad publishers sometimes use the Amazon Vine program or other methods to get _customer_ reviews early. For instance, Dean Koontz's new book, _The Silent Corner_, comes out June 20 in all formats, yet it already has 18 reviews, all Vine Voice reviews. As I suggested in an earlier post, it would be nice if indie authors had a similar opportunity.

Also, Kindle Press (and perhaps other imprints as well) send out prerelease copies. In the case of Kindle Press, the copies go to the folks who nominated the book during its Kindle Scout campaign. Although the copies are free, any reviews they generate get a verified purchase tag, and Amazon encourages reviewing. Nothing wrong with that, but again it would be nice if indies had a comparable opportunity. Note that Amazon is sending copies to people it is pretty certain will write favorable reviews. I'm not sure how, if at all, that differs from an indie author sending a copy to a "rabid fan."

It's certainly true that an author who sends an ARC to a fan has a good idea what kind of review the fan is going to produce, but as long as the review is the fan's honest opinion, I don't really see a problem. A lot of the people leaving customer reviews for trad published works are also rabid fans, yet I've never heard anyone suggest that was wrong.


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## jaehaerys (Feb 18, 2016)

Bill Hiatt said:


> Yes, to recognized, independent, third-party reviewers who, for the most part, won't review indie books. In terms of creating a level playing field, it would certainly be nice if indies had some comparable alternative.


But it's not a level playing field. Should it be? Sure. But the fact that it isn't doesn't create an excuse for indie authors to engage in questionable practices.



> It's certainly true that an author who sends an ARC to a fan has a good idea what kind of review the fan is going to produce, but as long as the review is the fan's honest opinion, I don't really see a problem.


The problem with that is it delegitimizes the integrity of the review just by virtue of the fact that the author has some expectation as to what kind of review said fan is going to leave. And to an unaffiliated reader shopping on Amazon they likely won't know the difference in how that review was obtained and in their seeing that glowing review they are further persuaded to pick up the book and thereby that author's rank is influenced.

So basically the author, who as you've said has a "good idea what kind of review the fan is going to produce", is manipulating rank by encouraging these reviews that are more apt to positively influence prospective buyers into purchasing.



> A lot of the people leaving customer reviews for trad published works are also rabid fans, yet I've never heard anyone suggest that was wrong.


It's one thing for a fan of an author to leave a positive review of their own volition without being incentivized to do so, it's another for the author themselves to send copies of their books to fans in exchange for reviews that said authors more often than not expect will fall on the positive end of the star-rating scale thus influencing other readers to buy. The former is organic. The latter is rank manipulation.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

dn8791 said:


> But it's not a level playing field. Should it be? Sure. But the fact that it isn't doesn't create an excuse for indie authors to engage in questionable practices.
> 
> The problem with that is it delegitimizes the integrity of the review just by virtue of the fact that the author has some expectation as to what kind of review said fan is going to leave. And to an unaffiliated reader shopping on Amazon they likely won't know the difference in how that review was obtained and in their seeing that glowing review they are further persuaded to pick up the book and thereby that author's rank is influenced.
> 
> ...


I understand you don't like it. But Amazon has not so far discouraged it. In fact, the opposite. They've encouraged ARCs. Their imprints use and encourage ARCs as well. If you don't want to do it, don't, but there's nothing wrong with it according to Amazon. It doesn't seem OK to bash other authors as unethical, gaming, or manipulating rank (rank?? How?) for doing something that is permitted and ENCOURAGED by Amazon.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

dn8791 said:


> And to an unaffiliated reader shopping on Amazon they likely won't know the difference in how that review was obtained and in their seeing that glowing review they are further persuaded to pick up the book and thereby that author's rank is influenced.


But isn't a reviewer required to disclose if they were given the book by the author?

As a reader, I don't much care whether it's an ARC review or a verified purchase review or someone who checked the book out from the library but decided to review it.... I care what the review says. I can tell by reading the review if someone took care in writing it and if the things that they look for in a book are the things I look for.

Betsy


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## Guest (May 15, 2017)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> But isn't a reviewer required to disclose if they were given the book by the author?
> 
> As a reader, I don't much care whether it's an ARC review or a verified purchase review or someone who checked the book out from the library but decided to review it.... I care what the review says. I can tell by reading the review if someone took care in writing it and if the things that they look for in a book are the things I look for.
> 
> Betsy


My feelings exactly. The only reason I would remove someone from a list of potential ARC reviewers is if their reviews were one-liners that weren't helpful at all.


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## Guest (May 15, 2017)

A lot of people say that ARC reviews turn off potential readers but what I see when I look at the top 100 (especially in the romance categories) is that most of the books have a ton of ARC reviews and it doesn't seem to hurt the books at all. Quite the opposite.


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## Guest (May 15, 2017)

Bill Hiatt said:


> Yes, to recognized, independent, third-party reviewers who, for the most part, won't review indie books. In terms of creating a level playing field, it would certainly be nice if indies had some comparable alternative.


It is nobody's job to create a "level playing field." If you chose to self-publish, you chose to start a business. And as a business, the responsibility is on you to figure out how to compete.

Let's be blunt for a moment.

Trade publishers tend to send ARCs out MONTHS in advance, and they send print ARCs, not ebooks. There is nothing stopping indies from sending out ARCs in print months in advance to various reviewers except:
1. Not wanting to wait to publish
2. Not wanting to spend money on print copies

And before you say, "Well, why should I send out print copies when there is no guarantee of a review?" The answer is, "For the same reason trade publishers do it." Because you hope that a reviewer with actual credibility will decide to review the book. In all seriousness, trades send out dozens, sometimes hundreds, of review copies to potential media reviewers in hopes that a handful will actually review.

And, surprise, you don't even need to go that far to compete. There are plenty of indie collectives now that split the cost of NetGalley to distribute review copies digitally. Some of them are active right here on KB. If reviews are that important, join one of the collectives to make your book available on NetGalley.


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## Salome Golding (Apr 17, 2017)

Bill Hiatt said:


> Most of the people I know don't even understand the difference between traditional publishing and self-publishing. Even the few that do don't usually know what an ARC is--and I'm a former English teacher with many well-read friends. Because we know more about the publishing industry than the average person, we know the term and have opinions toward ARCs, but there's really no evidence the general population feels that way. ..


I don't think it matters whether a reader knows "the term" "ARC" or not. I certainly didn't until a couple of weeks ago, because I just published one novel on Amazon 5/6 years ago and didn't have any clue about the marketing side of things at the time.

But still, whenever I see a book, or in fact any item on Amazon, that has a bunch of 4 or 5 star reviews that says "I got this item free in exchange for an objective review." I tend to ignore those reviews and in fact look at the item suspiciously.

I wouldn't have known that the review was the result of a so-called "ARC", but the fact that it appears non-organic is usually enough to turn me off.


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## CABarrett (Feb 23, 2017)

Bill Hiatt said:


> This may be a crazy idea, but perhaps the best way for Amazon to ensure ARCs won't be misused is to offer an alternative to them supervised by Amazon itself...


I love this idea! It's obviously compatible with Amazon's efforts in other areas (honoring top reviewers, etc), and could give us authors a more direct line to the relevant audience than NetGallery et al.


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## C. Gockel (Jan 28, 2014)

Amazon is removing a LOT of reviews lately. Sometimes they come down for a day or so, presumably they investigate them, and then they pop back up.

I have noticed though, it isn't just GOOD reviews that have disappeared. Some scathing reviews I had vanished.


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## Dpock (Oct 31, 2016)

CABarrett said:


> I love this idea! It's obviously compatible with Amazon's efforts in other areas (honoring top reviewers, etc), and could give us authors a more direct line to the relevant audience than NetGallery et al.


Probably is some shape or form outlined here:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/vine/help

I guess the author would have to pay to be included (or just "donate" books. Who knows?). If they can monetize it, they will.


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## 555aaa (Jan 28, 2014)

Rosalind J said:


> I understand you don't like it. But Amazon has not so far discouraged it. In fact, the opposite. They've encouraged ARCs. Their imprints use and encourage ARCs as well. If you don't want to do it, don't, but there's nothing wrong with it according to Amazon. It doesn't seem OK to bash other authors as unethical, gaming, or manipulating rank (rank?? How?) for doing something that is permitted and ENCOURAGED by Amazon.


Sure, it's a great tool for authors but it's a lousy tool for readers. Amazon has this systemic problem with review inflation site-wide and ARC "launch teams" make this worse. The average e-book star rating is 4.5, even when you go down into books in the million + ranking. Positive early reviews are the entry point into the most successful paid ad platforms, which incentivizes early glowing reviews. And those promo sites have a vested interest in moving shoppers OFF of Amazon as the discovery platform and onto their own platform, so it actually works to their advantage that the product discovery capability of Amazon is crap.

I posted on this before - even toasters have an average star rating around 4. People don't tend to give mediocre reviews and they also have invested emotional value in their purchases and don't want to say something like gee, I really wish I'd been a smarter shopper and not bought this toaster. There are smarter ways to manage reviews and reviewers which generally involve suppressing or weighting reviews. But most Amazon customers object strenuously to having their reviews removed; so Amazon is in a lose-lose situation; to make reviews more meaningful, they need to be weighted somehow but they don't want customers to have the bad experience of having their reviews removed. The whole situation right now is a giant morass of quicksand.


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## Guest (May 15, 2017)

Dpock said:


> Probably is some shape or form outlined here:
> 
> https://www.amazon.com/gp/vine/help
> 
> I guess the author would have to pay to be included (or just "donate" books. Who knows?). If they can monetize it, they will.


Vendors that offer products through Vine are expected to both pay a fee and provide the physical products. They have no control over who gets the product and cannot dictate any terms.


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## tresero (Jul 27, 2015)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> But isn't a reviewer required to disclose if they were given the book by the author?
> 
> As a reader, I don't much care whether it's an ARC review or a verified purchase review or someone who checked the book out from the library but decided to review it.... I care what the review says. I can tell by reading the review if someone took care in writing it and if the things that they look for in a book are the things I look for.
> 
> Betsy


The correct answer is no. They are not required to mention they received a review copy. It's been discussed before. Most do because they were trained that way. Books are exempt from many of the review requirements the rest of products on Amazon have to follow.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

tresero said:


> The correct answer is no. They are not required to mention they received a review copy. It's been discussed before. Most do because they were trained that way. Books are exempt from many of the review requirements the rest of products on Amazon have to follow.


Yes, they are required to disclose this. Absolutely. I confirmed this with Amazon and was told "yes" in no uncertain terms. (And by somebody qualified to speak definitively.)


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

RobCornell said:


> I do believe it's actually an FCC law requiring the disclosure.


It is both. An FCC regulation and an Amazon requirement.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

Instead of getting so up in arms about books that have ARC reviews called out (as required by federal law and by Amazon), how about getting upset about ARC reviews where the reviewers don't disclose that they got a free copy? A LOT of authors do this. The irony is that the reviews you're saying you "trust" as "organic" may well be undisclosed free ARCs also. 

Better IMHO to focus on reviews that explain what they liked and disliked about the book, whatever the rating, whatever the ARC status, and see if they're, you know . . . helpful to you in determining whether you'll like the book yourself. In any case--I, you, and any other author doesn't get to say what Amazon's rules are, or what other authors do. I focus on doing my own stuff as I best I can, if there's nothing I can do about whatever-thing-it-is-that-bugs-me-about-publishing.


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## Dolphin (Aug 22, 2013)

Rosalind J said:


> Instead of getting so up in arms about books that have ARC reviews called out (as required by federal law and by Amazon), how about getting upset about ARC reviews where the reviewers don't disclose that they got a free copy? A LOT of authors do this. The irony is that the reviews you're saying you "trust" as "organic" may well be undisclosed free ARCs also.


Some of the reviews that have been getting removed haven't been disclosed as ARC reviews. Perhaps Amazon stripped them because they suspected something along those lines. They certainly should be removed if that's what's going on.

This doesn't respond to the legitimate concern that the provision of ARCs to your readers necessarily influences their reviews. Julie and 555aaa were spot-on in their comments on this point (I'm always so pleased when Julie and I agree on something!).



Rosalind J said:


> Better IMHO to focus on reviews that explain what they liked and disliked about the book, whatever the rating, whatever the ARC status, and see if they're, you know . . . helpful to you in determining whether you'll like the book yourself.


But this misses rating inflation, as 555aaa touched on. It's a major factor if you're trying to get a BookBub--and BookBub can vault your entire damn career from a zero to hero. If all that mattered was the text of reviews, and all that readers cared about were the ones that laid out a thoughtful, reasoned critique of the book, then we'd be fine. That's not the world we live in. Ratings matter to promo sites, if nobody else, and none of us can thrive without them.

Maybe your ideal system would be reviews without ratings? I think there'd be a lot to recommend that. It wouldn't entirely remove bias from ARC street teams, but it'd at least mean that any review with the ARC disclosure could be judged purely in that light (as opposed to contributing a potentially inflated, disclosure-proof star rating).



Rosalind J said:


> In any case--I, you, and any other author doesn't get to say what Amazon's rules are, or what other authors do. I focus on doing my own stuff as I best I can, if there's nothing I can do about whatever-thing-it-is-that-bugs-me-about-publishing.


A big part of the problem here is that none of us really know what Amazon's rules are. There's evidence that they support ARCs, and evidence that they don't (certainly not the way many indy authors run them, at the very least). They're cryptic as a sphinx, so all we can do is natter among ourselves. I dunno about anybody else, but personally, I've found this discussion very informative.


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## Used To Be BH (Sep 29, 2016)

555aaa said:


> Sure, it's a great tool for authors but it's a lousy tool for readers. Amazon has this systemic problem with review inflation site-wide and ARC "launch teams" make this worse. The average e-book star rating is 4.5, even when you go down into books in the million + ranking. Positive early reviews are the entry point into the most successful paid ad platforms, which incentivizes early glowing reviews. And those promo sites have a vested interest in moving shoppers OFF of Amazon as the discovery platform and onto their own platform, so it actually works to their advantage that the product discovery capability of Amazon is crap.
> 
> I posted on this before - even toasters have an average star rating around 4. People don't tend to give mediocre reviews and they also have invested emotional value in their purchases and don't want to say something like gee, I really wish I'd been a smarter shopper and not bought this toaster. There are smarter ways to manage reviews and reviewers which generally involve suppressing or weighting reviews. But most Amazon customers object strenuously to having their reviews removed; so Amazon is in a lose-lose situation; to make reviews more meaningful, they need to be weighted somehow but they don't want customers to have the bad experience of having their reviews removed. The whole situation right now is a giant morass of quicksand.


I'm not sure it's so much that reviews are a lousy tool for readers because the ratings are inflated as that reviews of a creative product are inherently subjective. It just isn't the same as reviewing a tool or a cleaning product, something the can be objectively evaluated. I've had people love a book, and other people hate the same book. I've had reviews so divergent on the same title that one might doubt the people read the same book. For that reason, I pay little attention to reviews that don't really give reasons (whether they're ARC, verified purchase, or beamed in from Mars) because I can't tell whether the reviewer has similar tastes to mine. I can only tell that from more developed reviews with actually reasons and examples. Really, what readers ought to do is read the Look Inside, which in most cases would probably give them a clearer impression than the aggregate reviews.

As far as suppressing or weighting reviews, the less of that Amazon does (except with dishonest reviews), the happier I am. A truly useful weighting system would actually involve people reading the reviews and making informed decisions about their usefulness--a very labor-intensive thing that Amazon will never do. Bots just aren't up to the task, and all that approach is likely to do is muddle the situation further.


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## dianapersaud (Sep 26, 2013)

Bill Hiatt said:


> *I'm not sure it's so much that reviews are a lousy tool for readers because the ratings are inflated as that reviews of a creative product are inherently subjective.*
> 
> As far as suppressing or weighting reviews, the less of that Amazon does (except with dishonest reviews), the happier I am.* A truly useful weighting system would actually involve people reading the reviews and making informed decisions about their usefulness--a very labor-intensive thing that Amazon will never do. Bots just aren't up to the task, and all that approach is likely to do is muddle the situation further.*


Amazon has tried to make reviewers more thoughtful (or maybe they were just data gathering) when they ask readers to rate things like too much sex or point of view. I don't remember the questions they asked but quite frankly, I read for pleasure. I don't expect to be tested on it and so when I see those questions pop up, I don't bother leaving a review.

Also they have a 25 word minimum review requirement. I admit I have typed in "only twelve more words to go until I can submit this review" to hit the required word count. Sometimes I just want to say "I loved it." Or "would recommend." If I'm on my kindle, it's harder to type than when I'm at my computer, so I tend to keep things short.

After my reviews didn't show up, I stopped leaving them. I suppose other readers might feel the same way: why spend all that time thinking up of something to say then struggle to type it in the kindle to have it not show up? Waste of time.

ETA:
about the books being subjective: Absolutely. I love Charlaine Harris' Sookie Stackhouse books (I also love her other series Lily Bard I think). Anyway, her Sookie Stackhouse books were made into a popular series on HBO and her books STILL have one stars. You can't please everyone.

I don't let book reviews sway me anyway. If the cover and pitch are intriguing, I get it. I spent DECADES at the library choosing books because of the cover and pitch. Reviews mean nothing to some readers.


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## Used To Be BH (Sep 29, 2016)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> Vendors that offer products through Vine are expected to both pay a fee and provide the physical products. They have no control over who gets the product and cannot dictate any terms.


For the record, I wasn't advocating that we all become Vine vendors. I was recommending that Amazon create a similar program designed for indie authors.

There is precedent for this. Amazon could have opened up its regular advertising options to us as publishers, but the last time I checked, ad buys started at $10,000--well above the typical indie author budget. Instead, Amazon created AMS ads, which are, despite their limitations, probably better than nothing in many cases.

I imagine the fee to be a Vine vendor is pretty steep, so an indie author version would probably need to have a much lower fee. As far as providing products, for a book review that could easily be an ebook file, not that great an expense even if Amazon insisted we buy copies ourselves. At worst that would mean people price at $0.99 until they got their ARCs distributed, and a lot of authors already do low preorder or intro prices.

As to the part about who gets the products, that would probably be true of any indie program as well--but isn't that the point? It sounds as if some of the people here are suspicious of ARCs precisely because they go to fans. Random distribution would address that concern, which may also be Amazon's concern. The inability to set terms wouldn't bother me, either, though I would hope Amazon would purge people from the program itself if they took a lot of books and never reviewed.


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## Used To Be BH (Sep 29, 2016)

dianapersaud said:


> Amazon has tried to make reviewers more thoughtful (or maybe they were just data gathering) when they ask readers to rate things like too much sex or point of view. I don't remember the questions they asked but quite frankly, I read for pleasure. I don't expect to be tested on it and so when I see those questions pop up, I don't bother leaving a review.
> 
> Also they have a 25 word minimum review requirement. I admit I have typed in "only twelve more words to go until I can submit this review" to hit the required word count. Sometimes I just want to say "I loved it." Or "would recommend." If I'm on my kindle, it's harder to type than when I'm at my computer, so I tend to keep things short.
> 
> After my reviews didn't show up, I stopped leaving them. I suppose other readers might feel the same way: why spend all that time thinking up of something to say then struggle to type it in the kindle to have it not show up? Waste of time.


I totally agree that that approach didn't really work. It surprises me your reviews never showed up, though, given the extent to which Amazon tries to avoid removing reviews. If they let reviews that are for the wrong product stand, I'm not sure why they would ever have excluded yours.


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## Dolphin (Aug 22, 2013)

Remember also that Goodreads ratings and reviews are typically less flattering than Amazon. I don't think this is all down to the subjectivity of a creative product. There's a culture of rating and sentiment inflation on Amazon, and there's a lot of issues you could address if you wanted to change it (including ARCs).


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## dianapersaud (Sep 26, 2013)

Bill Hiatt said:


> For the record, I wasn't advocating that we all become Vine vendors. I was recommending that Amazon create a similar program designed for indie authors.
> 
> There is precedent for this. Amazon could have opened up its regular advertising options to us as publishers, but the last time I checked, ad buys started at $10,000--well above the typical indie author budget. Instead, Amazon created AMS ads, which are, despite their limitations, probably better than nothing in many cases.
> 
> ...


When it comes to books, it can't be totally random. For example, you wouldn't send a steamy romance to someone who only wants a clean romance. The time and effort and COST to create such a program would be rather high. And I'm not a fan of pay to play. That ALWAYS puts the little guys at a disadvantage but doesn't really affect those who might scam the system.


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## tresero (Jul 27, 2015)

Rosalind J said:


> Yes, they are required to disclose this. Absolutely. I confirmed this with Amazon and was told "yes" in no uncertain terms. (And by somebody qualified to speak definitively.)


And, this goes for the whole thread BTW.

"Book authors and publishers may continue to provide free or discounted copies of their books to readers, as long as the author or publisher does not require a review in exchange or attempt to influence the review."

No mention of saying it was an ARC copy is required or any other verbiage. The fact that they didn't buy the book on amazon shows when it isn't a verified purchase, at least not at amazon. It also doesn't say you are required to give a reviewer a copy of your next book if they don't review it.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=201929730

And the FTC rule is regarding PAID reviewers. Not given merchandise (i.e. advertising, which a review isn't)


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

Full text of response from my KDP rep. First part from T&C, second part her words.

Promotional content
· Promotional Reviews - In order to preserve the integrity of Customer Reviews, we do not permit artists, authors, developers, manufacturers, publishers, sellers or vendors to write Customer Reviews for their own products or services, to post negative reviews on competing products or services, or to vote on the helpfulness of reviews. For the same reason, family members or close friends of the person, group, or company selling on Amazon may not write Customer Reviews for those particular items.
· Paid Reviews - We do not permit reviews or votes on the helpfulness of reviews that are posted in exchange for compensation of any kind, including payment (whether in the form of money or gift certificates), bonus content, entry to a contest or sweepstakes, discounts on future purchases, extra product, or other gifts.
The sole exception to this rule is when a free or discounted copy of a physical product is provided to a customer up front. In this case, if you offer a free or discounted product in exchange for a review, you must clearly state that you welcome both positive and negative feedback. If you receive a free or discounted product in exchange for your review, you must clearly and conspicuously disclose that fact. Reviews from the Amazon Vine program are already labeled, so additional disclosure is not necessary. Read more about promotional content.
***
So yes, reviewers who receive ARCs need to clearly disclose that in their review.

***

(Me again). FTC guidelines also make it clear that somebody is required to disclose in "clear and conspicuous" fashion that they received the product free.

https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/business-center/guidance/ftcs-endorsement-guides-what-people-are-asking

I don't know why any of this would seem murky. It's always been clear.


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## Mxz (Jan 17, 2015)

Kindle Firsts is more proof that Amazon encourages ARCs.  Just about every one is released in the top 50 with at least 50 if not hundreds of ARC reviews.


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## Dolphin (Aug 22, 2013)

Rosalind J said:


> I don't know why any of this would seem murky. It's always been clear.


In fairness, I can't find any references to the ARC disclosure policy in KDP's knowledge base. Not anymore. I think it was there before, but now...I hope anybody who can find it will correct me.

The closest thing is their page on Customer Reviews, which basically says that 1) they only remove reviews in violation of the Community Guidelines (which don't require ARC disclosure), 2) that you can't influence a review by offering anything other than the book itself or requiring a review as a condition of the gift, 3) that being friends or liking an author on a social media account won't result in your review being removed, and 4) that they won't remove reviews on old editions.

Now, I agree with you that there's a rule that you have to disclose if you received an ARC. I agree that some members of Amazon's staff--your rep included--believe that such a policy exists and would be happy to enforce it. I agree that there _should_ be such a policy. I'm not sure it's written anywhere for authors and customers to see, however. It's not even clear that the stated rules are true, as applied. That's a problem.

It's an old one, of course. If there's one thing I hate about Amazon, it's poor communication and inconsistent application of policies.


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## Guest (May 16, 2017)

tresero said:


> The correct answer is no. They are not required to mention they received a review copy. It's been discussed before. Most do because they were trained that way. Books are exempt from many of the review requirements the rest of products on Amazon have to follow.


NO. This is 100% wrong. And to be clear, this goes beyond Amazon's TOS. This is a matter of federal law. The FTC REQUIRES anyone who endorses a product (including consumer reviews) to disclose if they received a free copy or any compensation. There is no special exemption for books.

From the FTC's Q&A:



> ONLINE REVIEW PROGRAMS
> *My company runs a retail website that includes customer reviews of the products we sell. We believe honest reviews help our customers and we give out free products to a select group of our customers for them to review. We tell them to be honest, whether it's positive or negative. What we care about is how helpful the reviews are. Do we still need to disclose which reviews were of free products?*
> 
> Yes. Knowing that reviewers got the product they reviewed for free would probably affect the weight your customers give to the reviews, even if you didn't intend for that to happen. And even assuming the reviewers in your program are unbiased, your customers have the right to know which reviewers were given products for free. It's also possible that the reviewers may wonder whether your company would stop sending them products if they wrote several negative reviews - despite your assurances that you only want their honest opinions - and that could affect their reviews.


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## Guest (May 16, 2017)

Bill Hiatt said:


> For the record, I wasn't advocating that we all become Vine vendors. I was recommending that Amazon create a similar program designed for indie authors.
> 
> There is precedent for this. Amazon could have opened up its regular advertising options to us as publishers, but the last time I checked, ad buys started at $10,000--well above the typical indie author budget. Instead, Amazon created AMS ads, which are, despite their limitations, probably better than nothing in many cases.


But why? Other than "I'm an indie and I want things cheaper" what is the actual reason why Amazon should give self-publishers cheaper tools to compete? How does it benefit READERS to give indies cheaper programs? In all seriousness, retail doesn't care about the size of your company. "Shelf space" (whether real or virtual) has a price, and you either pay it or you don't. WalMart charges small vendors the same amount of money if they want to place a pallet display in a store as they charge a large corporation. Tha floor space has a fixed price, and you either pay it or you don't.


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## Used To Be BH (Sep 29, 2016)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> But why? Other than "I'm an indie and I want things cheaper" what is the actual reason why Amazon should give self-publishers cheaper tools to compete? How does it benefit READERS to give indies cheaper programs? In all seriousness, retail doesn't care about the size of your company. "Shelf space" (whether real or virtual) has a price, and you either pay it or you don't. WalMart charges small vendors the same amount of money if they want to place a pallet display in a store as they charge a large corporation. Tha floor space has a fixed price, and you either pay it or you don't.


And yet Amazon did give indie authors cheaper tools to compete when it created AMS ads. It could have just said, "Sure, you want to advertise on Amazon, ads start at $10,000." It didn't. True, Amazon makes money on AMS ads, but less than it makes on ads for other vendors.

How it benefits readers is a much more complicated question. I would argue readers benefit from wider variety, which right now means a healthy indie author sector. I know I've read a number of really good indie novels, most of which might not have been picked up by the trads. Some trads are also showing signs of changing some of their patterns in response to competition from the indie sector, creating a much-needed shakeup in publishing.

Also, the issue isn't shelf space. It's ARCs. If Amazon is concerned about ARC reviews, which it may or may not be, I was trying to offer a creative solution to the problem. If that isn't really Amazon's concern, then the idea I was proposing wouldn't be necessary.

I'm not asking for a relative advantage for indies; I'd just like to see as level a playing field as possible.


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## Used To Be BH (Sep 29, 2016)

Dolphin said:


> Remember also that Goodreads ratings and reviews are typically less flattering than Amazon. I don't think this is all down to the subjectivity of a creative product. There's a culture of rating and sentiment inflation on Amazon, and there's a lot of issues you could address if you wanted to change it (including ARCs).


The Amazon/Goodreads dichotomy certainly exists, but I think it's connected to the fact that the review points are defined differently, not necessarily to a culture of rating and sentiment inflation. Why would such a culture exist in the first place? I can't think of an obvious reason.

You're also assuming that Goodreads reviews are more accurate, which may or may not be the case. Lower ratings don't necessarily mean greater accuracy.


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## Used To Be BH (Sep 29, 2016)

dianapersaud said:


> When it comes to books, it can't be totally random. For example, you wouldn't send a steamy romance to someone who only wants a clean romance. The time and effort and COST to create such a program would be rather high. And I'm not a fan of pay to play. That ALWAYS puts the little guys at a disadvantage but doesn't really affect those who might scam the system.


Yes, readers would have to be selected based on genre preferences--but if they're people who've bought very many books, Amazon already knows their preferences. I can't imagine it would take that much effort to deploy that information in a program such as I suggested.

I'm not necessarily a fan of pay-to-play either. I was just trying to find a way to give indies something comparable to what the trads already have. If there is a fear (which I don't share) that excessive gaming of ARCs is going on, my suggestion would create a system an author couldn't game in any obvious way.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

You can't force anybody to read your book, free or not. A free 99-cent or 2.99 or 4.99 book is not enough inducement to want to read somebody's ARC. Look at the free books available online. Only a handful are picked up in any number.  NetGalley, for example--reviewers choose what they want to read. They may be--yep, fans of a particular author, or they've heard of her, or the cover and blurb signal that it's their kind of read. You can randomly send them all the books you want. They won't read them.  

If you want reviews, ARC or otherwise, you'd be best served to work on the things you can control. Write an amazing, hooky book with a great premise in a popular genre. Get it edited. Give it a strong blurb. And for heaven's sake, pay a professional cover artist. And then put it up on NetGalley (you can buy a slot), pay a book tour company for a review tour, announce ARCs on Facebook, or whatever you think is appropriate. If it is appealing, people will want it, free or paid. If it isn't, they won't.


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## Guest (May 16, 2017)

Bill Hiatt said:


> And yet Amazon did give indie authors cheaper tools to compete when it created AMS ads. It could have just said, "Sure, you want to advertise on Amazon, ads start at $10,000." It didn't. True, Amazon makes money on AMS ads, but less than it makes on ads for other vendors.


You seem to think that AMS is specifically for indies. It isn't. It's just a PPC platform available to any vendor, including large companies, that sells on Amazon. It wasn't created for indies. It was created to allow Amazon to monetize its site more effectively.



> How it benefits readers is a much more complicated question. I would argue readers benefit from wider variety, which right now means a healthy indie author sector. I know I've read a number of really good indie novels, most of which might not have been picked up by the trads. Some trads are also showing signs of changing some of their patterns in response to competition from the indie sector, creating a much-needed shakeup in publishing.


The question was not "How do indie books benefit readers?" The question was "How does Amazon providing cheaper advertising for indies to compete against trade publishers benefit readers?" Why should Amazon feel an obligation to provide indies with the proverbial "level playing field" by giving them preferential treatment at lower prices? Which is what you are asking for, because your point seems to be that all the marketing tools available to trades are too expensive for indies, and somehow it is Amazon's job to "correct" this.



> Also, the issue isn't shelf space. It's ARCs. If Amazon is concerned about ARC reviews, which it may or may not be, I was trying to offer a creative solution to the problem. If that isn't really Amazon's concern, then the idea I was proposing wouldn't be necessary.


But this is the point: "Shelf space" is ultimately the issue. Or, rather, premium shelf space. In retail, some shelf space comes at a premium. Do you think that products in a store end up on the eye level shelf by accident? Or did the manufacturer pay a premium for that placement? I work in contract packaging, the amount of negotiation that goes into not just getting a store to stock an item, but also WHERE they stock it, would make your head spin. ARCs influence the virtual "shelf space" on Amazon. Books with lots of reviews get more visibility on Amazon. They get favored treatment in searches, in recommendations, etc. In short, they get premium shelf placement. If Amazon is going to give a product premium placement, it wants to make sure the product will actually be profitable. It doesn't want that space going to a product that is a dud. Which is why Amazon has a vested interest in making sure consumer reviews are HONEST. And it is also why Amazon has no vested interest in giving special treatment to indies just because they don't think publishing is "fair."



> I'm not asking for a relative advantage for indies; I'd just like to see as level a playing field as possible.


Again, what does "level the playing field" mean? You don't want to pay the same rates as large companies. I get that. Nobody does (even the large companies). But how does your non-desire to pay those rates equate to the playing field not being level? Why does anyone have an obligation to subsidize your business for you to help you compete?


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## VayneLine (Mar 3, 2017)

Lolz @ purging ARC reviews.

The biggest crime against the customer (which they claim is what matters) is that terrible VINE program where they are 'professional reviews', I downvote EVERY ONE of their reviews (which are always 5 stars hmm...).  Real unbiased there amazon...


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## crebel (Jan 15, 2009)

VayneLine said:


> Lolz @ purging ARC reviews.
> 
> The biggest crime against the customer (which they claim is what matters) is that terrible VINE program where they are 'professional reviews', I downvote EVERY ONE of their reviews (which are always 5 stars hmm...). Real unbiased there amazon...


Lolz @ your understanding of the VINE program ...


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## notjohn (Sep 9, 2016)

I just read the first page and last page of this thread, but everyone seems to take it for granted that this is fact. But just a couple days ago a major book formatter posted to the effect that Amazon had confirmed to her that there was no problem in "gifting" a book to a potential reviewer and having that reviewer successfully appear on the page. On the strength of that, I gifted two copies yesterday to likely reviewers (who are also friends). I'll post back on the result, provided I can find this thread again. (They disappear awfully fast in my experience. There seems to be no way to put a Watch on a thread.)


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## MClayton (Nov 10, 2010)

Notjohn, if you want to follow a discussion, click the "Notify" button down at the bottom of the page. 

Now if I could only understand how to quote someone else's comment ....


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## ImaWriter (Aug 12, 2015)

MClayton said:


> Now if I could only understand how to quote someone else's comment ....


There is a link that says Quote in the top right section of every comment.


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## Guest (May 16, 2017)

VayneLine said:


> Lolz @ purging ARC reviews.
> 
> The biggest crime against the customer (which they claim is what matters) is that terrible VINE program where they are 'professional reviews', I downvote EVERY ONE of their reviews (which are always 5 stars hmm...). Real unbiased there amazon...


I happen to be a Vine review. I assure you, the majority of my reviews are not five stars. If you want to be bothered to get facts, feel free to go look at my reviews. I review under my real name. I don't hide behind a screen name.

We are not "professional reviewers." We are customer reviewers who had long histories of reviewing on Amazon BEFORE we were invited to participate. Invitations are based on your overall history of reviews.


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## Guest (May 16, 2017)

notjohn said:


> I'll post back on the result, provided I can find this thread again. (They disappear awfully fast in my experience. There seems to be no way to put a Watch on a thread.)


Click "Show new replies to your posts." at the top, beside your avatar. That will filter it to just threads you've commented in that have new posts.


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## ......~...... (Jul 4, 2015)

VayneLine said:


> Lolz @ purging ARC reviews.
> 
> The biggest crime against the customer (which they claim is what matters) is that terrible VINE program where they are 'professional reviews', I downvote EVERY ONE of their reviews (which are always 5 stars hmm...). Real unbiased there amazon...


I used to be a Vine reviewer (still am in the program, but haven't gotten anything in years because their selection/targeting sucks now) and no I'm not a professional reviewer, just an Amazon customer. And no, my reviews aren't all five stars. Some of them are quite scathing one and two-star reviews. Most are in the three to four-star range, though.

Going around downvoting every review by Viners says more about you than the reviews themselves. Sounds more like sour grapes than anything.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Anma Natsu said:


> Click "Show new replies to your posts." at the top, beside your avatar. That will filter it to just threads you've commented in that have new posts.


We also have a bookmark system. The button is at the top right, just above the original post of any thread:










You access (and delete) your saved bookmarks under the "My KBoards" pull-down menu.


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## Quincy (Feb 1, 2017)

dianapersaud said:


> When it comes to books, it can't be totally random. For example, you wouldn't send a steamy romance to someone who only wants a clean romance. The time and effort and COST to create such a program would be rather high. And I'm not a fan of pay to play. That ALWAYS puts the little guys at a disadvantage but doesn't really affect those who might scam the system.


Vine isn't totally random- folks are offered a targeted list and select items from it for review. Targeting is based on a questionnaire and is loose at best, but the ultimate choice to select an item rests with the reader/reviewer. Likely reviewers choose books that they are pre-disposed to like given the time investment to read and review, but of course there are no guarantees.


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## MClayton (Nov 10, 2010)

ImaWriter said:


> There is a link that says Quote in the top right section of every comment.


Thank you!


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## Used To Be BH (Sep 29, 2016)

Julie, I originally posted a much longer response but decided it wasn't really adding all that much to the discussion. Instead, I will just leave the last paragraph from that response:

Although we sometimes disagree, I must compliment you on your patience and thoroughness in responding to me and other posters. Honestly, with a day job, your own writing, and your publishing house, I don't know how you find the time.


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## Dolphin (Aug 22, 2013)

Bill Hiatt said:


> The Amazon/Goodreads dichotomy certainly exists, but I think it's connected to the fact that the review points are defined differently, not necessarily to a culture of rating and sentiment inflation. Why would such a culture exist in the first place? I can't think of an obvious reason.
> 
> You're also assuming that Goodreads reviews are more accurate, which may or may not be the case. Lower ratings don't necessarily mean greater accuracy.


I don't think either reviewing system is necessarily accurate in the way you mean. I think each one captures a snapshot of opinions that are truthful, so far as they go, but not necessarily _representative_ of readers as a whole.

What I'll say is that if Goodreads does a better job than Amazon of capturing critical opinions, then it's probably more helpful to undecided readers and less helpful to authors. That's partly due to design decisions on Amazon's part, partly due to author behavior on things like ARCs (who're motivated in turn by BookBub, et al.), and partly due to culture.

One example would be that Goodreads is built for readers to work through their reading list and comment along the way, for good or ill, whereas Amazon and authors have extra rating and review prompts at the end of each book. DNFs won't get those extra prompts to add their voices on Amazon, which leads to inflation.

It's all just as well for authors, since they need to look pretty for marketers, but I don't think it does readers any favors.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

NeedWant said:


> I used to be a Vine reviewer (still am in the program, but haven't gotten anything in years because their selection/targeting sucks now) and no I'm not a professional reviewer, just an Amazon customer. And no, my reviews aren't all five stars. Some of them are quite scathing one and two-star reviews. Most are in the three to four-star range, though.
> 
> Going around downvoting every review by Viners says more about you than the reviews themselves. Sounds more like sour grapes than anything.


There have been some rather infamous reviewers who really did give just about Every. Single. Book five stars. I think we all know who one of those people was... she may have singlehandedly given a lot of honest reviewers a bad name.


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## ......~...... (Jul 4, 2015)

Jena H said:


> There have been some rather infamous reviewers who really did give just about Every. Single. Book five stars. I think we all know who one of those people was... she may have singlehandedly given a lot of honest reviewers a bad name.


If we're thinking of the same person, she was known for giving only four and five star reviews and her "reviews" were just rewritten blurbs, sometimes not even making much sense! She wasn't in Vine, though, as far as I know. Though I don't doubt that some Viners might be following in her footsteps by selling off the free stuff they get and posting useless reviews.


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## Salome Golding (Apr 17, 2017)

Rosalind J said:


> Better IMHO to focus on reviews that explain what they liked and disliked about the book, whatever the rating, whatever the ARC status, and see if they're, you know . . . helpful to you in determining whether you'll like the book yourself.


For me personally, it's chicken and egg. I'm sure the first time I saw "I got this free in exchange for an objective review." I just observed, which is how I approach anything new until I have sufficient information. But when I had observed enough, I decided I don't trust these "non-organic" reviews because free item reviews are so often trite and sycophantic, and trite and sycophantic reviews are so often free item reviews.


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## notjohn (Sep 9, 2016)

Becca Mills said:


> We also have a bookmark system. The button is at the top right, just above the original post of any thread:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Ah, thank you! (The other system doesn't work for me, because replies aren't listed in the reverse order to which I responded to them, which is the only way to get back to the one I'm after.)


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## Used To Be BH (Sep 29, 2016)

notjohn said:


> I just read the first page and last page of this thread, but everyone seems to take it for granted that this is fact. But just a couple days ago a major book formatter posted to the effect that Amazon had confirmed to her that there was no problem in "gifting" a book to a potential reviewer and having that reviewer successfully appear on the page. On the strength of that, I gifted two copies yesterday to likely reviewers (who are also friends). I'll post back on the result, provided I can find this thread again. (They disappear awfully fast in my experience. There seems to be no way to put a Watch on a thread.)


Wouldn't it be nice if Amazon just had clear policies and enforced them? This particular thread is about ARCs--which Amazon may or may not like--but there are other threads that address whether or not Amazon has a preference in how reviewers get their free copies.

I think most of us would be happy to obey the rules if we just knew what they were with certainty. If Amazon were a government agency, most of its rules would get thrown out in court on the grounds of vagueness.

Wait! You're encouraging reviews from friends? That doesn't sound like you.


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## dianapersaud (Sep 26, 2013)

Bill Hiatt said:


> *Wouldn't it be nice if Amazon just had clear policies* and enforced them? *This particular thread is about ARCs--which Amazon may or may not like--*but there are other threads that address whether or not Amazon has a preference in how reviewers get their free copies.
> 
> I think most of us would be happy to obey the rules if we just knew what they were with certainty. If Amazon were a government agency, most of its rules would get thrown out in court on the grounds of vagueness.
> 
> Wait! You're encouraging reviews from friends? That doesn't sound like you.


Actually Amazon is pretty clear about ARCs. As Rosalind says, her rep encouraged her to send out ARCs. If Amazon encourages their imprint authors to do ARCs, then it's pretty obvious they are all for it.

The OP posted a vague "some author claimed that some reviews have been removed" but no real information has been given. This isn't about ARCs being removed, just reviewers who are "related" which is very clear in Amazon's TOS (no reviews by friends or family). This is a case of Amazon actually _enforcing _their rules.

None of my ARC reviews have been removed, but then again, they explicitly state that they are ARC reviews/"free in exchange for a review".


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## daveconifer (Oct 20, 2009)

Do we have any kind of consensus on this?  Are ARCs okay, but not gifting them?  If yes, does Amazon prefer that we send out MOBIs and provide tech support to guide ARCers on how to side-load the file on their Kindles?  

As Bill Hiatt said, a clear policy would be helpful, but I guess we're not there yet...


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## Laran Mithras (Nov 22, 2016)

daveconifer said:


> As Bill Hiatt said, *a clear policy would be helpful*, but I guess we're not there yet...


LMAO It's Amazon...


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## David VanDyke (Jan 3, 2014)

Salome Golding said:


> For me personally, it's chicken and egg. I'm sure the first time I saw "I got this free in exchange for an objective review." I just observed, which is how I approach anything new until I have sufficient information. But when I had observed enough, I decided I don't trust these "non-organic" reviews because free item reviews are so often trite and sycophantic, and trite and sycophantic reviews are so often free item reviews.


And yet free books get lots of bad reviews, some of them unfair, like "I hated this book because I hate this genre." (Well, why did you read it?)

I doubt that free books, especially ebooks, ever bribed a significant number of people to write unfairly positive reviews.


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## David VanDyke (Jan 3, 2014)

daveconifer said:


> Do we have any kind of consensus on this? Are ARCs okay, but not gifting them? If yes, does Amazon prefer that we send out MOBIs and provide tech support to guide ARCers on how to side-load the file on their Kindles?
> 
> As Bill Hiatt said, a clear policy would be helpful, but I guess we're not there yet...


Gifting a book is not gifting a book, really--it's gifting an e-gift-card for the amount of the book. That may be part of it. We always send our books to our ARC readers directly.


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## ......~...... (Jul 4, 2015)

I think the biggest problem with ARC reviews is that authors have too much control over them. This why I as a reader don't really take them seriously, especially when it comes to indie books.

If a trad publisher offers their book to Vine, they have no control over who picks the book and the rating they give it. Authors on the other hand can control exactly who's on their list. And they can also manipulate that list (deleting all the reviewers giving negative reviews) which in turn is a clear manipulation of the review system.

Personally, I think Amazon should do away with ARC reviews, or at least the ones that are directly curated by the authors.


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## daveconifer (Oct 20, 2009)

David VanDyke said:


> Gifting a book is not gifting a book, really--it's gifting an e-gift-card for the amount of the book. That may be part of it. We always send our books to our ARC readers directly.


Thank you. So, for example, if the reader is Kindle-based, you send them mybookfile.mobi and hope they know how to install it? I'd really rather do it that way (less expense, less risk of Amazon getting irked) so I'm hoping that's the answer. I think I did ARCs this way about eight books ago but it turned me into an IT desk.

Thanks for the 911 -- I mean, 411, David and the rest of ya...


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## daveconifer (Oct 20, 2009)

NeedWant said:


> I think the biggest problem with ARC reviews is that authors have too much control over them. This why I as a reader don't really take them seriously, especially when it comes to indie books.
> 
> If a trad publisher offers their book to Vine, they have no control over who picks the book and the rating they give it. Authors on the other hand can control exactly who's on their list. And they can also manipulate that list (deleting all the reviewers giving negative reviews) which in turn is a clear manipulation of the review system.
> 
> Personally, I think Amazon should do away with ARC reviews, or at least the ones that are directly curated by the authors.


Good points. I have to admit that as a reader, part of my brain is saying "Yeah right..." when I see the first six reviews with five stars each and the "I was provided with a copy..." intro...

ETA: Although I personally know of no way that I can "delete" reviews. I don't think Amazon automatically honors author requests. I've never tried, and don't anticipate ever doing so, so I'll probably never know..


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## Amanda M. Lee (Jun 3, 2014)

NeedWant said:


> Personally, I think Amazon should do away with ARC reviews, or at least the ones that are directly curated by the authors.


I agree. The only way Amazon is going to solve their review problem is to make everything a verified purchase review. If you buy it on Amazon, you can review it. If you borrow it on Amazon, you can review it (they need to come up with a "verified borrow" tag). They haven't gotten there yet, but they will. All of the exploitation of the review system will force it. I can't tell you how many books I've seen with a huge amount of reviews right after release and yet paltry rankings, signifying every review is an ARC review. I give no credence to ARC reviews so I've started bypassing anything that looks like it only has ARC reviews.


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## Elizabeth Barone (May 6, 2013)

Just a heads up, if you're issuing ARCs and sending URLs with tracking code in them, Amazon assumes the user who is posting the review is connected to _your_ account.

Good URL to give to reviewers: http://amazon.com/dp/B00Q5I7AC2

Bad URL to give to reviewers: https://www.amazon.com/Nanny-Skull-Tattoos-Elizabeth-Barone-ebook/dp/B00Q5I7AC2/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1497996272&sr=8-1&keywords=the+nanny+with+the+skull+tattoos

The "B00Q5I7AC2" is your ASIN, which you can find in your KDP dashboard.

All of that gibberish in the second URL is tracking code that Amazon uses to analyze data while you're shopping. So if you're using Amazon.com's search function to grab your books' URLs, you're telling Amazon that all of those reviews are coming from your account.

As far as I know, Amazon doesn't track social media; that's just a myth that's been floating around for years.


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## Rose Andrews (Jun 1, 2017)

NeedWant said:


> I think the biggest problem with ARC reviews is that authors have too much control over them. This why I as a reader don't really take them seriously, especially when it comes to indie books.
> 
> If a trad publisher offers their book to Vine, they have no control over who picks the book and the rating they give it. Authors on the other hand can control exactly who's on their list. And they can also manipulate that list (deleting all the reviewers giving negative reviews) which in turn is a clear manipulation of the review system.
> 
> Personally, I think Amazon should do away with ARC reviews, or at least the ones that are directly curated by the authors.


Agreed. Maybe I'm too skeptical but oftentimes I bypass a book with hundreds of reviews all giving it 4 or 5 stars. Just me tho.


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## ......~...... (Jul 4, 2015)

Amanda M. Lee said:


> I agree. The only way Amazon is going to solve their review problem is to make everything a verified purchase review. If you buy it on Amazon, you can review it. If you borrow it on Amazon, you can review it (they need to come up with a "verified borrow" tag).


I wish they would have a verified borrow tag. I hate that reviews from borrowers are hidden under the current system.

For example, when I review a movie I watched through Amazon Prime Video, it shows up as a Verified Purchase...


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## ......~...... (Jul 4, 2015)

daveconifer said:


> Good points. I have to admit that as a reader, part of my brain is saying "Yeah right..." when I see the first six reviews with five stars each and the "I was provided with a copy..." intro...





Rosie A. said:


> Agreed. Maybe I'm too skeptical but oftentimes I bypass a book with hundreds of reviews all giving it 4 or 5 stars. Just me tho.


There was a book I was interested in recently that had 98% five star reviews and 2% four stars and nothing else. And that was with close to a hundred reviews! It is in a niche category so I guess all his superfans bought or got a copy. I mean it's great that your superfans who love everything you do love it, but I'm more interested in reading some three, two and one star reviews! I think it recently finally got like two two-star reviews and one of them was like "I don't get the hype" and then went in depth as to why they were unimpressed. That review was more helpful to me than all the other reviews combined.

Okay, I'll stop ranting now.


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## amdonehere (May 1, 2015)

elizabethbarone said:


> Just a heads up, if you're issuing ARCs and sending URLs with tracking code in them, Amazon assumes the user who is posting the review is connected to _your_ account.
> 
> Good URL to give to reviewers: http://amazon.com/dp/B00Q5I7AC2
> 
> ...


Thanks! I had no idea. That's good info to know.


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