Authors & Reviewers discussion
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Ratings Bomber
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Any luck with Goodreads? When I hear about bot review scams, my first question is how are they making money? Because let's be real. Any scammer only scams for $$$. It's not personal, although it definitely FEELS personal. With Amazon reviews, it's easy to get the math. The bots on there are part of review companies that charge for reviews, but they can't give all 5-star reviews, so they look for low-cost items (free or 99 cents often) and that's books - and they'll give some 1 or 2-star reviews to balance the bot's review accounts so it doesn't get flagged by Amazon AI searching for bots. I have reported a few of these to Amazon but they left the reviews - even though it was obviously a bot account that reviewed a ton of random from China products (like power tools) and only one or two book reviews. With Goodreads, I have a theory these bad bot accounts are also from "review companies". By lowering the review rating, the thought may be that the author will be more open to paying for reviews. In a recent release, I had a one-star and a two-star from new accounts with almost no reviews, blocked from public view, no review copy, and the profile image had all the markings of a bot account. For days I was getting messaged from people noticing what a great book I had and they'd love to review it for a price. It's just a theory, but it would be easy enough to write a script that targeted books with a low enough number of reviews that a one-star review would impact the rating, then send auto messages offering services. It's an awful thing to do. Unfortunately, I feel like Amazon is more likely to crack down on that behavior on Amazon, where too many bot reviews can hurt them financially. On Goodreads, I don't think they'd care unless it was for a book one of the publishers they own released.
Isabel wrote: "Any luck with Goodreads? When I hear about bot review scams, my first question is how are they making money? Because let's be real. Any scammer only scams for $$$. It's not personal, although it de..."David wrote: "Authors please be aware that there is a ratings bomber profile by the current name of "QW" (which previously was "SD"). I had noticed that three of my books had received a 1-star rating from this p..."
I called the Goodreads service number. I got a recording: "The mailbox of the person you are calling is full and cannot accept new messages. Please try your call again later." Great. Kind of operation where they don't bother keeping up with their calls. Thanks GoodReads.
Hey David, I also received a 1-star rating from "QW” on 11/21/23. I reported the user to Goodreads support, but they only provided a generic response without taking any action. It's truly disappointing.
Joey wrote: "Hey David, I also received a 1-star rating from "QW” on 11/21/23. I reported the user to Goodreads support, but they only provided a generic response without taking any action. It's truly disappoin..."Yes, I am very disappointed in GoodReads. My big seller book can take the hit, but my fledgling books are suffering from this right now. It is beyond irresponsible for GoodReads to take such an indifferent attitude and allow a malicious account to defame an author's good work.
The QW profile is now up to 20,496 posted ratings with an average rating value of 1.00 Their account is still up and active and bombing away, and GoodReads has done nothing about it.
I was just hit by QW. I am not seeing any option for reporting the account, now up to 25074 ratings all 1 star.
Adeline wrote: "I was just hit by QW. I am not seeing any option for reporting the account, now up to 25074 ratings all 1 star."This is the report link. https://www.goodreads.com/flagged/new...
Absolutely incredible that this has been going on for at least two years. What are we doing???!?
I will attempt a phone call to GoodReads and hopefully will contact someone who will rectify this. In the meantime, if anyone checks their books' ratings and finds this same problem, please report it to GoodReads so that something will be done. Authors like me who have very few ratings on their books can be seriously hurt by this, as it brings the average rating significantly down.