online customer reviews
TRANSCRIPT
UPPSALA UNIVERSITY
Department of Business Studies
Master Thesis
Spring Semester 2012
E-commerce websites and online customer reviews
in France: analysis of current strategies and
suggestions for improvement
Authors: CAO Yuan
DEBEUF Benjamin
Supervisor: OLSSON Ulf
Date of submission: 05/25/2012
Revised version submission: 08/15/2012
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Abstract
E-commerce distribution channel experiences a dramatic development nowadays. France
witnessed a rapid growth rate of online sales in recent years and now ranks as the second
largest market in Europe in terms of turnover. On E-commerce websites, customer review
system is considered as an efficient tool of E-Word of Mouth, enabling users to write
recommendations which will influence potential purchasers. This paper discusses the crucial
factors of customer review system. Also, a tool to evaluate review system is elaborated with
five criteria such as accessibility, quality, design, interaction and control. Ten case studies of
French E-commerce firms are presented according to those criteria in qualitative study.
Opinions from French customers are collected through online questionnaires in quantitative
study. Researches made from supply (firms) and demand (customers) sides show that
accessibility and quality are the main concerns for users and often weaknesses in current
review systems. Also, the credibility of reviews is questioned by customers. Focusing on
these aspects, the paper aims to give suggestions for designing an ideal customer review
system to firms in French e-commerce industry.
Keywords:
E-commerce websites, customer review system, E-Word of Mouth, User Generated content,
online shopping
Acknowledgement
We would like to thank the teachers of Uppsala Economic Department for their helpful
advice, particularly our supervisor Ulf Olsson. Our families and friends also supported and
helped us during this study. Last but not least, we appreciated that 407 respondents answered
our survey and provided valuable information for the study.
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Table of contents
Abstract ................................................................................................................................................... ii
Acknowledgement ................................................................................................................................... ii
1. Introduction and research question .................................................................................................. 1
1.1 Background and Research question ............................................................................................... 1
1.2 Definition of terms ........................................................................................................................ 2
1.3 Objectives ...................................................................................................................................... 2
2. Literature review ............................................................................................................................. 3
2.1 Benefits of online review system .................................................................................................. 4
2.2 Low participation of customers ..................................................................................................... 4
2.3 Do age and gender make a difference? .......................................................................................... 5
2.4 Balance of positive and negative reviews ..................................................................................... 6
2.6 Model of customer perception to purchasing choice ..................................................................... 8
2.7 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 9
3. Model............................................................................................................................................. 10
4. Research Design, methodology and argumentation ...................................................................... 12
4.1 Qualitative data ............................................................................................................................ 13
4.1.1 Sample .................................................................................................................................. 13
4.1.2 Method .................................................................................................................................. 14
4.1.3 Limitations ............................................................................................................................ 20
4.2 Quantitative Data ......................................................................................................................... 21
4.2.1 Sample .................................................................................................................................. 21
4.2.2 Method .................................................................................................................................. 21
4.2.3 Limitations ............................................................................................................................ 23
4.3 Time Horizon .............................................................................................................................. 23
5. An overview of 10 top e-commerce websites review system ....................................................... 24
5.1 Table 1. Results of the study ................................................................................................. 24
5.2 Analysis ....................................................................................................................................... 25
5.2.1 Pure-Click retailers, with a general product offer ................................................................ 25
5.2.2 Retailers with a cultural goods offer background ................................................................. 27
5.2.3 Bricks and clicks retailers, with a strong offline business background ................................ 29
5.2.4 Clothing and cosmetic specialists ......................................................................................... 31
5.2.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................ 33
6. Insights and expectations from users ............................................................................................. 34
6.1 Introduction ................................................................................................................................. 34
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6.2 Findings ....................................................................................................................................... 34
6.2.1 Most of customers are monthly users, for whom review system is influential and became a
norm .............................................................................................................................................. 34
6.2.2 A majority of readers but a lack of permanent contributors ................................................. 35
6.2.3 Most of users trust reviews, but worry about transparency .................................................. 36
6.2.4 Lack of incentives to contribute ........................................................................................... 36
6.2.5 Opinions about the 5 factors ................................................................................................. 37
7. Discussion and implications for management ................................................................................... 40
7.1 Make people share more, more often ...................................................................................... 40
7.2 Improve quality ....................................................................................................................... 40
7.3 Enhance confidence, solving issues about control .................................................................. 41
7.4 Interaction, design and the perfect mix of factors ................................................................... 42
8. Conclusion and future researches .................................................................................................. 43
9. References ..................................................................................................................................... 45
X. Appendix .......................................................................................................................................... 48
Appendix I: Questionnaire ................................................................................................................ 48
Appendix II: Overall results .............................................................................................................. 52
Appendix III: Results per gender ...................................................................................................... 64
Male respondents ........................................................................................................................... 64
Female respondents ....................................................................................................................... 67
Appendix IV: Results per age ........................................................................................................... 71
Young respondents ........................................................................................................................ 71
Middle-aged respondents............................................................................................................... 73
Older respondents .......................................................................................................................... 76
Appendix V: Results per frequency of use ........................................................................................ 80
Low-users ...................................................................................................................................... 80
Normal-users ................................................................................................................................. 83
Heavy-users ................................................................................................................................... 86
Appendix VI: Results for review writers ........................................................................................... 89
Appendix VII: Results for review readers ......................................................................................... 92
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1. Introduction and research question
1.1 Background and Research question
Most of traditional retailing shops experienced a downturn in the period of global financial
crisis, unlike online shops. France typically illustrates this phenomenon. It witnessed a rapid
growth of 24% in 2010 and exceeded Germany to be the second in Europe just after UK in
terms of total online sales revenue (FEVAD1 report, 2011). However, if this distribution
channel offers new opportunities for firms, it also strengthens consumers’ power. With
development of internet, firms begin to market through social media tools and offer more and
more possibilities for interaction to their customers. Consequently, users openly criticize
brands and products on corporate websites, blogs, forums or social media. Consumers’ voice,
satisfied or not, is louder.
Directly presented on product pages, customer reviews represent one of the aspect of this
consumers’ voice. Previous researches have shown that consumers’ reviews and voice
became an important tool for firms to communicate and to provide transparency. Literature
shows the usefulness of consumers reviews (Mudambi & Schuff, 2010) and the impact on
sales that reviews can create (Zhu & Zhang, 2010), (Öğüt & Onur, 2012). Half of users who
visited online-shop malls consider consumer reviews important in their buying decisions
(Park, Lee & Han , 2007).
Research question:
Customer review system remains a delicate tool to manage. As customer review system
reflects users’ opinion, both positive and negative information about products and companies
are presented. Objectives can be conflicting for firms: putting forward positive reviews to
enhance sales while allowing critics, ensuring control of reviews while remaining transparent.
Further, firms are often victims of fake reviews from competitors who aim to damage their
reputation. In order to reduce these threats, companies must optimize their review system.
Consequently, the study was developed around the following research question, applied to
French market:
How can e-commerce firms improve their customer review system to meet customers’
expectations?
1 French Federation of E-commerce and Distance Selling
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Several stages have to be considered before achieving this goal. Firstly, it is essential to study
the current situation of customer review system in France, analyzing companies’ strategies
and policies. Secondly, French customers’ perception towards customer review systems of E-
commerce websites should be investigated. The last stage consists in giving suggestions after
comparing firms’ and customers’ side.
1.2 Definition of terms
It is necessary to give some definitions about certain terms used in this study.
Customer review: The definition of customer review is “a report about a product written by a
customer on a commercial website to help people decide if they want to buy it” (Cambridge
Business English Dictionary). A slight difference exists between customer and consumer
reviews because customer is the buyer when consumer represents the user. In this thesis, the
topic focus on customer review in a general scope of view from E-commerce websites. The
term “review system” refers to customer review system generated by E-commerce websites.
UGC (User-generated content): Defining UGC is a difficult task because no widely accepted
official definition exists. Generally, UGC is understood very broadly to include all content put
online by users, whether it was created by them or not (Valcke & Lenaerts, 2010). Often UGC
is monitored by companies or website administrator in order to prevent from offensive content
or insulting language as well as protecting copyright issues.
EWOM: The most useful definition of electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) is "Any positive or
negative statement made by potential, actual, or former customers about a product or
company, which is made available to a multitude of people and institutions via the Internet."
(Hennig-Thurau et al. 2004)
PEOU: Perceived ease of use (PEOU) is defined as “the degree to which a person believes
that using a particular system would be free of effort” (Awad & Ragowsky, 2008). The higher
PEOU degree one review system has, the easier it is perceived to be used by customers.
1.3 Objectives
The study focused on a certain kind of tool: reviews generated by users on e-commerce
websites. Consequently, reviews posted on social media, review sharing website or platforms
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did not concern the study. In addition, websites which are specialized in gathering third party
reviews such as E-opinion or hostel.com are not considered in this thesis. This thesis focused
on review interfaces on online shop, directly managed by companies.
The aim of the study is to give directions to firms in terms of consumer review
implementation in e-commerce industry in France. Intermediate objectives can be described
as the following:
First a model aiming to better understand consumer review system mechanisms was
developed based on literature. It includes visions from both company’s perspective and
customer’s perspective. Secondly, 10 successful websites examples in terms of visiting rates
were studied in order to better understand current e-commerce firms’ strategies. Crucial
factors to evaluate customer review systems were proposed, combining with factors
elaborated in previous theoretical background. In order to gain insights from customers, a
quantitative study of online questionnaires was performed. It permitted to draw a picture of
the use and influence of reviews by French customers. The study also tested the value granted
by users to review systems, analyzing customers’ mindset and pointing out their expectations.
Finally suggestions for reviews improvements were given based on qualitative and
quantitative studies.
2. Literature review
In order to link the study of customer reviews with previous researches, a literature review
will be presented in this chapter. Many books, journals and articles are accessible to
understand the relationship between customer reviews and online marketing. Since E-
commerce websites were developed just in latest few decades and customer review system is
still a novelty, many articles associated with this topic were published recently. However,
previous literature about third-party consumer information system is a good introduction to
the importance of customer reviews.
Early in 1978, Jolson and Bushman stated that the mass media third-party source speaks
forcefully among all the information systems available to guide customer choices. When
consumer initiative, personal recommendations and marketer-dominated source are not
appropriate, people tend to search for “expertise” from third-party such as food critics on local
newspapers. Product rating and recommendation by critics proved to be sufficient in guiding
consumer choices.
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From 90s until new century, internet technology has been developed dramatically. Firms
begin to offer more and more possibilities for interaction to their customers, enabling them to
post reviews and comments publicly on internet. Noise generated by customers, more
networked, has more visibility (Cronin-Lukas, 2006). They control more and more the
environment online and give feedbacks.
2.1 Benefits of online review system
Recommendations and customer reviews have a positive impact on customer perception of
the usefulness and social presence of the website. To certain degree, such perceptions enhance
customer loyalty, which is value for practitioners to design B2C website (Kumar & Benbasat,
2006). Kumar states that sometimes negative reviews even create more credibility than only
positive reviews. Customers tend to trust balanced opinion of reviews.
Customer rating websites are new tools of web-marketing as well. According to a CompUSA-
iPerception study, statistics show that 81% of surveyed shoppers consider customer ratings
and reviews important when they are researching or planning a purchase. Further, 63% of
consumers indicated they are more likely to purchase from a site if it has product ratings and
reviews (iPerceptions, 2006).
As customer reviews play a more and more important role in E-WOM (Electronic Word of
Mouth), it is beneficial for companies to have massive amount of comments from customers
on companies’ website. However it is doubtful that a majority of customers is willing to share
their experience and participate in writing reviews.
2.2 Low participation of customers
Researches made by Baird and Parasnis (2011) show that only a small percentage of
customers (5%) are “Engaged authors”. These users are very active on the web, responding to
comments and creating posts. People sharing occasionally their thoughts, called “Casual
participants”, represent the majority of users (75%). The responding rate is quite low from
online customers.
To increase customer participation, it is essential to analyze customers’ motivations for
leaving reviews. Literature identified motivations for people to participate in E-word of mouth
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as following (Hennig-Thurau et al, 2004): “economic rewards, self-enhancement, social
benefits received, post-purchase advice seeking, desire to help the company, hope that the
platform operator will serve as a moderator, expression of positive emotions, and venting of
negative feelings, exertion of power over companies, convenience in seeking redress, concern
for other consumers”. There are four main categories of contributors: “self-interested
helpers”, driven mainly by economic incentives, are the largest segment, representing 34% of
helpers. The second group is the “multiple-motive consumers”, which represents 21% and is
motivated by a large number of factors. The third segment “true altruist” aims to help both
consumers and companies and represents 27% of respondents. The last group, (17%) is
mainly motivated by the concern for other consumers and can be called “consumer advocates”.
The challenge for companies consists in finding efficient methods encouraging customers to
comment on their products.
2.3 Do age and gender make a difference?
Influence of customer content is still in an "early adopter" phase. The most influential
consumers are 24 to 44 year, heavy internet users, and the most influenced are teenagers and
young adults, up to 24, (Riegner, 2007). Previous study shows young people are easier to be
influenced by online reviews, which is a good hint for firms to target marketing group. But
the study does not show if those heavy users or those young reviews readers are also writers
of reviews. It would be worthwhile to know people from which age group are motivated to
write reviews.
Awad and Ragowsky (2008) made a study about online shopping behaviors according to
genders. Their results show that the effect of trust on intention to shop online is stronger for
women than for men. That is to say, women tend to have more e-loyalty than men, once they
trust the brand. Referring to contribution of online reviews, women tend to write personal
issues based on cooperation and network-oriented collaboration. Women write reviews for the
purpose of participating and helping other users in the community. Men tend to post longer
reviews and more informative message than women, for self-promotion and social standing
purposes. In addition, it is expected that an increase in PEOU will have a stronger effect on
online trust for women than for men.
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2.4 Balance of positive and negative reviews
Consumers do not consider positive and negative reviews equally (Zhang, Craciun & Shin,
2010). For example, when consumers are exposed to negative information about a product,
they can categorize the product as low in quality. Negative information may therefore be
considered more useful for decision making purposes and is consequently given greater
weight than positive information. According to prospect theory, one experience of loss
appears to be greater than the gains (Kahneman & Tversky, 1979). In this sense, a negative
WOM message could have a stronger influence on a customer’s brand evaluations and
purchase (Fukuyama, 1995), (Wright, 1974).
That is not to say, firms should censor and delete negative comments. According to Kumar,
sometimes negative reviews can create more credibility than only positive reviews. Customers
tend to trust balanced opinion of reviews. Companies should also present the most persuasive
reviews first. If customers’ interest is raised by other forms of communication, they may be
less influenced by negative WOM (Khare, Labrecque& Asare, 2011). To reduce the amount
of negative WOM, companies should design the review system in a better way such as
keyword searching or review recommendations. Also, marketers should offer incentives to
motivate satisfied customers to share their positive experience. When comments are positive,
marketers should highlight the popularity of the information (number of customers) and the
benefits of conformity (follow the main stream).
Intelligent marketers will design a good review system to gather positive reviews, meanwhile,
prevent negative reviews, in order to reach a balance of opinions. Then it is worthwhile to
study what kind of review system is attractive for customers and what factors of website will
influence customers’ purchasing choices.
2.5 Key factors to better present review system
Online consumer reviews have an effect on consumer purchasing intention. Consumer-created
information is more credible than seller-created information from the perspective of
trustfulness. There are some key factors to present review system in a better way in order to
attract customers and increase online sales. Quantity and Quality of reviews are important
factors which will influence consumer purchasing choice (Park, Lee & Han, 2007).
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Quantity: The number of on-line reviews of a product may be taken as representing the
product’s popularity. Customers tend to relate numbers of reviews to numbers of consumers
who have bought the product (Chen & Xie, 2008). But quantity of reviews is only one
element of showing interaction between E-firms and customers. There are other modern tools
such as possibility to share on social media and ask friends’ opinion.etc.
Quality: The content of on-line reviews varies from short to long and from subjective to
objective (Chatterjee, 2001). A high-quality review is more logical and persuasive with
evaluation based on the facts about a product (Park, Lee & Han, 2007). Different variables
can influence the perceived helpfulness of customers’ reviews (Mudambi & Schuff, 2010):
“review extremity, review depth, and product type”. Moderate reviews or lengthier reviews
will be more adapted to influence consumers, depending on the kind of product (Park, Lee &
Han, 2007). Quality of online consumer review content can be evaluated in terms of
relevance, reliability, understandability and sufficiency.
The credibility of information is influenced by 3 factors: argument strength, source
credibility, and confirmation with receiver’s prior belief (Cheung et al, 2009). People tend
more to accept information that is similar to their own opinion. Recommendation consistency
and aggregate ratings seem to be determinant for influence of reviews. If the reader is less
knowledgeable on the topic, reviews have more influence on him.
Design of review systems contains many details such as attractive box and positions on the
page.etc. “No more than three colors should be used for the body of text and no more than
two should be used for the heading text” (Ivory, 2003). Colors, fonts and graphics of review
systems are part of web-design and they should be closely related to company webpage.
Because slight differences of colors and fonts may affect customers’ perception of companies.
“Unstructured, meaningless content on a page results in users experiencing difficulty finding
information and navigating around the web site” (Badre, 2002). Methods are existing to
improve the presentation of customer reviews (Liu, Karahanna & Watson, 2011), with
different goals: to help consumers in making accurate choices, to lower the cognitive costs of
making these choice, to help consumers have an unbiased understanding of the product, and
to construct a set of evaluative criteria. Retailers could improve the presentation by four
different ways: categorization (by attributes), overview (tag system), linkage (to related
reviews) and filtering (sort reviews by star ratings or helpfulness)
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A complicated web-design may lead customers to lose their interests and quit review system.
It is essential to design a review system which can catch customers’ attention and provide
suitable useful products information. Previous literatures only concentrate on structure of
review systems instead of its contents. Good design of review system should contain
keywords searching, filter of reviews.etc. Those functions are also related to PEOU
(Perceived Ease of Use) to customers, which should be considered as Accessibility of a review
system.
2.6 Model of customer perception to purchasing choice
Zhu and Zhang (2010) develop a model which illustrates the process from customer
perception to purchasing choice in online shopping. In the first stage, customers acquire
products information through online reviews. This builds a basic cognition of product quality,
cost and condition for customers. Thus, various consumers have different internet experience
which leads to different preference as well. In addition, other factors, such as competition,
business models (e.g., business-to-consumer, consumer-to-consumer), or even the online
review system’s design (e.g., how ratings are displayed, how easy it is to rate an item), may
affect consumers’ reliance on reviews. In the second stage, customers build judgment or
reliance based on the characteristics from first stage. Only when consumer’s reliance is
sufficiently high enough, they will enter the third stage of purchasing. In the process of choice
making, many factors such as presentation of website or usefulness of customer review could
easily influence final purchase choice.
Figure 1, Conceptual Framework, Zhu & Zhang (2010)
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This model provides a general outline for how different elements on websites will influence
customer purchasing choice. However, the model does not specify how review system will
affect customer choice. In addition, this model is based on customer’s side and does not take
into account companies. For example, it does not mention what policies firms use to control
information from online reviews and how those policies will affect on customer’s perception.
The present study will also take into consideration companies’ side.
2.7 Conclusion
According to literature review, we can conclude that the main challenges for E-commerce
firms are low participation of contributors, and balance of positive/negative reviews.
Participation is influenced by age group. Women and men have different motives for writing
reviews. In order to encourage people to contribute more to review system, firms should
develop a review system which considers these factors. Literature shows quality and quantity
of comments, design of review system are important factors link to helpfulness of reviews.
Based on these findings, key factors of review system were developed, gathering five main
aspects: Accessibility, Design, Quality, Interaction and Control. Accessibility stands for
PEOU (Perceived Ease of Use) including providing user-friendly tools both for reading and
writing reviews. Design contains visual attractiveness of reviews such as organization of text
and keyword presentation. Interaction factor includes possibilities for customers to
communicate with friends, review writers or even firms. Control stands for the ability of
managing reviews by firms such as having a customer account and review verification. Firms
should improve their review system according to these five main factors.
The contribution of this thesis is that it develops a new model based on the one way customer
online purchasing choice model from Zhu and Zhang (2010). The new model contains both
views from E-commerce firms and customers. In addition, the figures mentioned in literature
reviews are general statistics. Their applicability to French market remains a question. By
quantitative study from French customers, we can draw a better conclusion from the
perception of French E-shopping users, which is more credible to French E-commerce firms
as well.
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3. Model
According to the former chapter, the following model has been elaborated.
E-COMMERCE USERSReview
Readers/Contributors
CUSTOMER REVIEW SYSTEM
E-COMMERCE FIRMS
•Provideinformation to consumers•Transparency and trust gain
Contributors•Economicrewards•Self enhancement•Suggestions to others•Complaints
Value (utility for customers)Evaluated by 5 FactorsAccessibility/Quality/Design/Interaction/Control
Readers•Gain of information beforepurchase
Influence on purchasedecision
and will to contribute
EFFECTS
MOTIVES MOTIVES
DEMAND SIDE SUPPLY SIDE
Feedback on products or services
Chart 1. Thesis Methodology Flow Chart
The research structure will follow this model: the left side (Chart 1) represents E-commerce
users from Demand Side. This thesis gathers ideas and opinions from E-commerce users such
as customer review readers and contributors. The empirical finding results to understand
customer behaviors such as their motivations to write and read reviews before purchasing. On
the other hand, it is supposed to understand reasons of customers’ participation and driving
forces to encourage customers to share their experience on e-commerce review websites.
Although literature review tells us that motivation for readers and contributors are gaining
information, economic rewards. Etc, the situation might be different in the case of French
market and the results might various from woman to man, young adults to old people. To
have an idea of E-commerce users’ preference is one of the purposes of this thesis.
The right side (Chart 1) representes firms of online shopping websites. Obviously, the
motivation of managing an online review system for an E-commerce firm is that product
review is an efficient tool of consumer marketing. On one hand, review system can provide
basic information of products such as pictures, function and price to end-users which is an
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efficient marketing tool at the same time. On the other hand, good review system reveals
management ability of a company and its transparency policy to the public.
The bottom part (Chart 1) of this methodology represents the third entity of the tools which
firms and consumers are interacting with. From cases studies of 10 most visited online
shopping websites in France, we conclude their management of customer review system into
five main domains: Accessibility, Quality, Design, Interaction, Control.
Construction of the model
The previous model was elaborated on the basis of theories found in the literature review.
Users of customer review system can be separated in two different parts: readers and
contributors. Readers’ motives of use come from a research of information which influences
their purchase decision (Zhu&Zhang, 2010 and Iperception). Contributors will use review
system for different purposes such as social status, help to the community or rewards
(Hennig-Thurau et al, 2004). When it comes to the review system itself, 5 factors can
characterize its utility or value for users. Awad & Ragowsky stated that PEOU was an
important phenomenon that could enhance the dynamism of review systems. This can be
related with the first factor: accessibility. Several authors insisted on the fact that quality
should remain a priority for review systems (Chatterjee, 2001), (Park, Lee & Han, 2007),
(Mudambi & Schuff, 2010), (Cheung et al, 2009) and should be considered as the second
factor. Thirdly, the appearance of the system is preponderant as well, as stated (Ivory,
2003)(Badre, 2002)(Liu, Karahanna & Watson, 2011). Design should consequently be the
third factor.
To these 3 factors we can add Interaction and Control. First, social networks websites became
popular a few years ago. As a consequence, within an internet platform, review system should
provide sharing possibilities and integrate social media. Consumptions, review shared not
only on the website but also through social media to maintain E-WOM.
On the other side, firms are providing review system in order to give more transparency, pre-
buying information and consequently reasons for buying. According to Peppers and Rogers
(2012), honesty can become a competitive advantage. Allowing consumers to review your
products is one of the main steps to demonstrate “trustability”. In this angle, firms gain
transparency, and this factor can become a key selling point for customers.
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How to evaluate a review system?
The aim of the thesis is to propose axis of improvements for review systems towards French
customers. Therefore the research performed in the qualitative and quantitative studies
initially permitted to evaluate the current influence of review system on consumers. Most
importantly the value given to current review systems was evaluated.
4. Research Design, methodology and argumentation
The primary purposes of the study are to analyze E-commerce firms’ policies towards
consumer reviews available on the web and to give suggestions for improvement. The
attractiveness of this industry for the study can be explained by its relative novelty and the
important interaction, due to the use of internet, which can be either an advantage or an
inconvenience. A current picture of strategies was elaborated and discussed, insights from
customers were gained through questionnaires and improvements were proposed to conclude
the study. The methodology used in order to respond to the research question will be
presented in following part. The study provides analysis and comparison of different policies
towards consumer reviews in the industry of E-business.
Why France?
The study focused on French market for different reasons. First, France is the second biggest
market of e-commerce in Europe in terms of turnover and market growth. According to
FEVAD report in 2011, the number of online shopping websites in France raised from 64100
to 81900 with an increasing rate of 27.77% in year 2010. That is to say, this dramatic rising
number of e-commerce websites is to meet potential demand from e-commerce users in
France. Secondly, choosing the country of one of the authors’ nationality was a necessity in
order to gather precise and relevant information, through the questionnaire and online data
research. The choice of France was also motivated by the fact that one of the authors has
some professional experience within French e-commerce websites, consequently knows the
industry and has contacts within these firms to better understand reviews’ issues. The question
of consumer reviews also recently emerged in France due to the occurrence of numerous
scandals concerning false reviews. Consequently, certification standards will appear at the end
of the year, in order to better identify review authors and to limit censorship on firms’ side.
Improving these review systems could hopefully permit to sustain the growth of e-commerce
in this country, enhancing credibility of e-shops and enabling to attract more and more
customers.
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For the purpose of having a complete image of the problem, the research strategy was based
on a multiple-method: mixed model-method. A Case study about E-commerce firms and their
current use of reviews and quantitative research on customers were completed. Using both
qualitative and quantitative approaches offered complementarity in the investigation,
providing a better understanding and permitting generalization.
4.1 Qualitative data
4.1.1 Sample
The collection of qualitative data was performed with the case study method. The most
adapted method to analyze and evaluate policies of French E-commerce websites in terms of
customer reviews.
To reach that goal and gain a broad image of the industry, ten companies of different activities
were selected for the study. The selection criterion was the following: all companies belong to
the top 15 of French e-commerce websites (in terms of average number of visitors per month,
FEVAD report, 2011) and provide a customer review system for goods (which excludes
Ebay.fr, Vente Privée and Darty for instance). An exception has been made for Yves Rocher,
which is not in Top 15, but stands for the leader in the cosmetics industry in e-commerce in
France. In this way, the cases gained diversity, presenting different industries.
Figure 1: Ranking of Websites for the last quarter 2011, in terms of unique visitors
(FEVAD report, 2011)
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Selected companies overview
Amazon.fr (B2C/C2C) Historically selling cultural products, this company became one of
the world leaders of e-commerce, diversifying its offer while
expanding internationally
Fnac.com (B2C/C2C) Originally a brick and mortar store chain, specialized in cultural
goods, Fnac activities has today 3 main poles (cultural goods,
electronics and small appliances, travel and entertainment)
PriceMinister.com
(B2C/C2C)
On the model of Amazon, online store with a broad offer of
products (from books to fashion retailing)
Cdiscount.com (B2C) Online store with a wide range of activities (cultural goods,
electronics, home appliances, food or travel). The main
characteristic of this website relies in its positioning, very
aggressive on promotions
La Redoute.fr (B2C) Specialized in clothing industry on the internet, leader in France
Pixmania.com (B2C) Stands out by its wide presence in Europe and wide range of offer
on the model of Cdiscount.
3 Suisses.fr (B2C) Main competitor of La Redoute on the online clothing market
Decathlon.fr (B2C) Specialized in distributing sporting goods (main competitors
Intersport) with a worldwide presence
Leroy Merlin.fr (B2C) Specialized in construction, DIY and gardening goods
Yves Rocher.fr (B2C) Leader in cosmetics on e-commerce channel, their brand identity
revolves in offering natural and organic products
4.1.2 Method
To understand firms’ current strategies, case study is the most suitable research method.
Choosing ten French leading B2C websites gives a comprehensive view of customer review
system in France from the supply side. A selection of different industries collected various
and complete information of E-commerce websites. Comparison between ten websites
revealed strength and weakness of different review systems.
How to evaluate online reviews system?
The selected companies review systems were evaluated with the following criteria:
accessibility, quality, design, interaction and control.
15
The different criteria were detailed with 5 items in each category. These items were
elaborated on the basis of the main factors, they are the practical illustration of each factor.
For instance, the number of clicks to access a review naturally illustrates the aspect of
accessibility.
In order to evaluate each review system, the following coding method was used: one point
was counted depending on the presence of each sub-criterion on the website. The addition of
points gives a mark for each criterion, with a maximum of 5.
Data was analyzed through spider web graphs, characterizing the review system of each firm.
Analytic tool: Radar Chart
The use of spider-web graphs was motivated by the fact that it allows the representation of 5
quantitative variables such as the 5 factors chosen (accessibility, quality, design interaction
and control). This kind of graph is adapted and clear for data presentation. What’s more, it
allows characteristics to be compared for each firm (the scale remains unchanged and
possibility to superimpose each graph in order to compare).
Radar charts are a useful way to display multivarite observations with an arbitrary number of
variables (Chambers et al, 1983). We use it in our study because of we do not know the
difference of importance between five driving forces (Accessibility, Quality, Interaction,
Design, Control) before empirical finding. We can not know which factor is more important
than others so we suppose they are equally important variable. This might be a limitation of
analysis because of our restricted marketing academic knowledge and limitation of
researching time. And the fact that we choose an informative data analysis method might be
also one of the limitations of this thesis.
The radar chart is composed of several dimensions including lines. A line is drawn connecting
the data values for each spoke. So the plot of each chart looks like star. The star represents a
single observation. In our qualitative study, the performance of customer review system in
each E-commence firm is considered as a star plot. We scored them according to the criteria
we made in 4.1 Qualitative Data Method/ 4.1.2 Method.
Typically, radar charts are generated in a multi-plot format with many stars on each page and
each star representing one observation (NIST/SEMATECH, 2003). It is somewhat easier to
16
see patterns in the data if the observations are arranged in some non-arbitrary order (if the
variables are assigned to the rays of the star in some meaningful order) (Friendly. M, 1991).
According to our empirical researching such as observing each firm’s website and registering
as a E-commerce user for each website, we give points to each firm as in Table 1(Results of
Quantitative Study) as being a client of those ten companies. We use our personal energy and
effort to experience each website’s customer review system. We sent some fake complaining
information to test the ‘Control’ factor including information transparency of those companies.
The result is showed in the Chapter 5 including the big table and some other graphs. Every
red word in Table 1 means one negative point which represents 0 point for this sub-criterion
of certain company. Every black word in Table 1 means one positive point which represents 1
point for this sub-criterion of certain company. For example, ‘Necessity of having a customer
account’ for Amazon is ‘Yes’ (In Red), which means that’s inconvenient for customers to
leave their comments. So we give Amazon 0 point for this sub-criterion under ‘Accessibility’
factor. If we look through ‘Accessibility’ of Amazon, it has three black words and two red
words which mean Amazon has 3 points as showed in the Chart under 5.2.2 Retailers with a
cultural goods offer background (Accessibility 3 in the Radar Chart of Amazon). It is also
showed in Summary of marks Amazon/Accessibility (Table 2, under 5.1).
Accessibility
This first factor is essential for review systems. The objective consists in facilitating users’
participation, providing adapted and user-friendly tools, both for reading and writing reviews.
In order to evaluate accessibility, five items have been studied:
-number of clicks to access a review and number of clicks to write a review (prior to the
access of product page)
The less access is time consuming, the more users will see reviews. In e-commerce industry,
reducing the number of clicks to purchase facilitates sales. Applying this principle to reviews
should motivate users to write reviews.
-help to prepare content
Some websites offer fixed-frame structure to create a review. For instance, different questions
or topics will help contributors in different manners: help them to provide a structured review
and assist them in being more specific on one aspect of the product (design, technical
characteristics…).
17
-necessity of having a customer account
Having a customer account on a website is necessary to write a review for security reasons.
However, creating an account can be considered time consuming or complicated, and simply
discourages users to write reviews.
-filter of reviews (by age, gender…)
Certain review system can provide a filter in order to make the comments posted on the
website more readable. For instance, a user interested in the opinions of people with the same
profile will be able to rank and select reviews or reviewers by criteria such as gender, age,
date or mark.
Quality
The second priority for review systems relies in quality. In order to ensure the credibility of
information and enhance review quality, firms should provide several tools developed
hereafter. Doing so, trust of users will be improved.
-review evaluation
Marking reviews can be a quality indicator. Usually, reviews can be evaluated by readers,
according to their usefulness. The score published can be the following “30 users out of 50
find this review useful”.
-reviewer evaluation
Reviewers can be marked as author, which can reveal the quality of reviews.
-identification of reviewer
Seeing reviewers’ profile also helps the user to judge quality of review. On the reviewer
profile page, much information is available such as age, date of registration, or number of
comments posted. For instance, in the cosmetic industry, revealing the color of hair/eyes on
this kind of profile will help user to judge the relevance of the product and review for them.
-different criteria of notation
The mark given in the review can be separated in different items that bring more precision to
the reader. For a garment, the mark can be composed of three sub-marks: quality, size and
comfort.
-organization of review, text (by characteristics/topic)
In terms of content, the organization of review is a factor of quality. Publishing the review
with different sub-categories by topic for instance brings more clarity to the final user.
18
Design
An attractive and adapted design enhances review system efficiency, catching attention of
users and motivating them to contribute. Generally, a good design should bring more
harmony, visibility and dynamism to the review system.
-attractive presentation of reviews
Placed in a page full of information, the review must stand out to be more visible. Usually
firms use different colors, separate in different boxes to improve the clarity and let users take
reviews into consideration.
-represented notation of product
Marks given by reviewers are possibly the most banal and the most important item of a
review system. It is essential for design to represent it in a clear and appealing manner.
-position on the page, visual
According to the user reading habits, reviews are more visible if placed on a particular part of
the page. Again, more visibility should bring more dynamism and increase the effect of
review system, catching more users.
-direct visual on the product page
Reviews should appear directly on the same page, under the product information to be directly
visible. One more click or tab decreases the number of users reading the reviews.
-keywords presentation
An interesting and efficient way of improving reviews’ design consists in providing key-
words at the top of the review. That way, the product and its main characteristics can stand
out, as well as the review itself.
Interaction
Another important aspect relies in interaction, between firms and users as well as between
customers themselves. By interaction is meant all the exchanges possible from an actor to
another, such as information or even rewards. The objective is to communicate around
products and review system, to enhance the dynamic of sharing knowledge and to create a
relationship even for brand image.
-possibility to share on social media
Offering the possibility to link reviews to social media permit to create informal internet
communication, from friends to friends. As seen in the literature, friend as advisor can be
more influential on customers than classic communication.
19
-opinion about the comment
This refers to the possibility of giving an opinion about the usefulness of a review. Unlike in
the quality part, it does not concern the score, but the presence of the following question “Was
this comment useful or not?”
-incentives to write a review
In order to motivate people to write reviews, incentives from firms can be offered such as
discount or gift. This way of interacting is used to enhance the dynamism of review system.
-access to the reviewer
To have a deeper conversation and feedback on products purchased, contacting directly the
reviewer could help users in their shopping process. This goes beyond a simple review and
establishes a relationship among users’ community.
-possibility to ask friends’ opinion
A direct link is given for users to send the product page to their friends, and ask for a
comment. In that sense, friends undertake the role of advisors and reviewers in private.
Control
The last essential aspect for firms to provide a review system of quality is control. As content
generated by users belongs to their websites and product pages, this kind of information
becomes real selling points. It is also essential to control information, in terms of vulgarity
and slurs in link with the quality. Consequently, firms have to set up several safeguards in
their review system.
-having a customer account
If users must log-in to post a review, the risk of letting outsiders commenting is reduced. It
enables company to better control the resource of reviews and keep customer relationship.
-possessing the product
Naturally, having tested the product you are commenting on is essential to ensure the viability
of the review. Sometimes, the reviews written by non-users of products are low quality
because they do not have an experience of using products. Firms should check if users
commenting have the product in their order history.
-feedback/alert on the content
In order to limit vulgarity and slurs, the possibility is offered to denounce a comment to the
firm.
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-word limit
Controlling the number of words is a kind of limitation, to provide clarity and to maintain a
framed format of reviews. On the other hand, word limit should not be too short because it is
important to have complete customer’s opinions and encourage their co-creation.
-review verification
Last safeguard, the firm reserves the right to keep or not a review, according a delay of
generally 24h before publishing on the website. Companies who have this function of review
system have a high control of all the reviews. Questions of censorship and ethics are raised
because firms could limit the number of negative reviews which could tarnish the image of
products and decrease sales. This sub-criterion is still considered as a beneficial policy in
terms of review management.
4.1.3 Limitations
The main limitation of the study relies in the fact that the number of selected companies is
small comparing with 81 900 active e-commerce websites in France (FEVAD report, 2011).
However the study has focused on the leading companies of the sector, in different industries,
which can give a good picture of the market, as e-commerce users are at least customer of one
of the companies selected.
Also, the cases offered an external view of companies’ policies. There is a lack of internal
study inside companies. On the other hand, feasibility of proposals needs to be further tested
in reality of companies as well.
The five factors are also not equally important. It is assumed that they are equal in the
framework, but it might be different proportion in their importance to measure a review
system. For example, the accessibility part could be less important than design for customers.
Finally, the main category that could have been included is quantity of reviews. Chen & Xie
(2008) and Park, Lee & Han (2007) stated that quantity remain a quality indicators for users.
The more comments are numerous, the more representative and valuable is the information.
However, it is difficult to observe and compare the number of comments from one website to
another. The product offer is different, as well as the presentation, number of sales, Etc.
Different factors influence the success of a product and number of comments. More than a
precise and fair evaluation of quantity, one can just notice a global trend concerning the
number of comments on each website.
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4.2 Quantitative Data
Quantitative interviews will provide information concerning users’ mindset and expectations
towards reviews. In a second time, the possibility is given to propose some tracks of
improvements for the company’s strategy. Combining case study and quantitative research
permits to respond to the second step of the study (propose some improvements for firms).
Questions focus on customers’ opinions concerning products reviews. What do they think of
current company’s strategy towards consumers’ reviews? Does the website show transparency
of comments and reviews? Is the layout of product review attractive, practical or confusing?
How could it be improved? How to motivate people to share reviews? How much does
products reviews influence customer choice?
Data collected through questionnaire and analyze should permit to generalize conclusions to
E-commerce industry in France. It is aimed to understand the current situation and respond to
the research question.
4.2.1 Sample
The questionnaire was handled through internet, to facilitate distribution and being practical
in financial terms. The objective is to reach a representative sample to be able to generalize
findings in the French market.
The quantitative research was based on around 400 respondents: according to the size of the
market (27.7 million of e-commerce users in France in 2011, FEVAD report). With a margin
of error of 5%, the adapted sample size for a ten million population or more is 384, according
to Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009).
The following conditions shall be respected: different ages, gender and if possible social
background, they must be E-commerce Users, who have already experienced online reviews
reading or writing.
4.2.2 Method
The objectives of this questionnaire are multiple. It first completes the case study, offering
insights from customers. It also permits to test the value given by users with the 5 factors
(accessibility, quality, design, interaction and control). Trends and expectations shall be
pointed out as well as directions to improve current strategies in terms of customer reviews.
22
All the questions in the questionnaire are designed and written by authors of this thesis
(Appendix I). The questions were created on the basis of the theory (5 factors) in order to
match the qualitative analysis. In that way, it would be more practical to compare the current
situation of review system and the expectations of users on the same subject. To justify the
rationality of questions, they are designed in the purpose of understanding consumer behavior
and preference.
Data was collected through social media (Facebook, LinkedIn), personal email lists, alumni of
school and review forums. This method had the advantage of offering the possibility of
targeting interrogated people and also to reach an adequate number of respondents quite
rapidly (three weeks in our study). All the data was gathered by Google docs and analyzed
through Excel by the authors of this thesis.
The questionnaire is designed on three different parts. Q1 to Q3 (Gender, Age and Occupation)
are general questions of customer segmenting. It is for the purpose of analyzing empirical
finding results. Q4 to Q5 (Frequency of purchasing online, Do you read reviews before
shopping? Do you contribute to write reviews?) are subdivided questions to distinguish heavy
users and common users of customer review system. Q7 (Trust of reviews) and Q8
(Companies are neutral in publication?) is to test French consumers’ general opinion towards
E-commerce websites’ transparency policy. We want to know if French customers believe
what is showed in firms’ review system. We wonder if they notice that those reviews might be
propaganda from firms which are probably sent by employees of firms. The answers are
divided from 1(Strongly disagree) to 7(Strongly agree) in order to segment different opinions.
Q9 (Necessity of review system for a company) and Q10 (Influence on purchasing choice) is
to ask respondents’ opinion towards importance of review system. Q11 (Most important
factor among 5 driving forces of review system) is to ask respondents to select one most
important factor among Accessibility, Quality, Design, Interaction and Control. Due to
limitation of one choice, the result tends to be ‘Accessibility’ and ‘Quality’ which is possibly
to be a limitation of this thesis. Q 12 to Q 17 focus on detail question towards 5 main driving
forces in order to test importance of each of them. Q18 and Q 19 are in aim of testing
motivations for customers to participate or contribute to write reviews. The answers are
created according to previous literature review such as economic rewards and sharing
experience.
23
For the analysis, age groups are separated by decades 15-24, 25-34, 35-44, 45-54, 55-64 and
+64, which is a compromise between the five-year definition of INSEE2 and a larger
acceptation, fitting more in terms of customer profile.
The socioprofessional categories respect the definition of INSEE. In order to gain precision,
the groups of jobseekers, students and interns are added, replacing the category “other persons
without occupation”.
In order to present collected date, different kinds of charts were used. Pie-charts graphs are
adapted to illustrate quantitative data, representing all its diversity and proportions for each
group. As for them, bar charts have the advantage to facilitate the comparison between
different groups of data. It enables also to recognize the norm and the weight of each side,
useful for data extraction, comparison and analysis.
4.2.3 Limitations
Conclusions cannot be expanded worldwide because the population selection is only
composed by French E-commerce users. It might be different in other countries with various
customer preference and habits. Also, biases may exist in the sample, due to shortcomings
concerning representativeness of certain groups. Unfortunately, the study could not ensure to
avoid this problem, mainly because of the non-existence of a budget for the research.
4.3 Time Horizon
This thesis is a cross-sectional study, evaluating customer reviews phenomenon in a short
period of time. Firstly, there is a time limitation for tracing changes of opinions between
marketers and end-users in long term. Time schedule of this research project is 5 months.
Secondly, this thesis focuses on current customer reviews management policies instead of
observing customer review development in a long term. What can be ensured is that this
thesis gave customer review management suggestions to companies according to end-users’
feeling and expectations.
2 French National Institute for Statistics and Economic Studies
24
5. An overview of 10 top e-commerce websites review system
5.1 Table 1. Results of the study The following table is summarizing the study of the ten selected companies, according to the methodology developed in
section 4.1.2. (Red color means 0 point)
Criteria Amazon Fnac Price Minister Cdiscount La Redoute Pixmania 3 Suisses Decathlon Leroy
Merlin
Yves
Rocher
ACCESSIBILITY
number of clicks to access a review
1 click 1 click 1 click 1 click 2 clicks 1 click 1 click 1 click 2 clicks 2 clicks
help to prepare content No No No No Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes
number of clicks to write a
review
2 clicks 2
clicks
2 clicks 2 clicks 3 clicks 2 clicks 2 clicks 2 clicks 3 clicks 3 clicks
necessity of having a customer account
Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No Yes
filter of reviews (by age, sex, usefulness, date)
Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes No Yes Yes
Total Points 3 3 3 3 3 3 4 4 5 4
QUALITY
review evaluation Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
reviewer evaluation Yes No No Yes No No No No No No
identification of reviewer Yes Yes Yes Yes No No Yes No No Yes
different criteria of notation No No No Yes No No Yes No Yes Yes
organization of review, text (by characteristics/topic)
No No No Yes Yes Yes No Yes No No
Total Points 3 2 2 5 1 2 3 2 2 3
DESIGN
attractive presentation of reviews
No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
represented notation of
product
Star
rating
Star
rating
Star rating Star rating
and scale
Star rating Star rating Star rating
and scale
Note Star
rating
Star
rating
position on the page, display End Center Center Center End Center End End End Center
direct visual on the product page
Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes No Yes
keywords presentation No No No Yes Yes No No No No Yes
Total Points 2 4 4 5 3 4 3 3 2 5
INTERACTION
possibility to share on social media
No Yes No Yes No No Yes No Yes Yes
opinion about the comment Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
incentives to write a review No No 500 euro voucher,
loyalty points
No 10 Euro voucher for the first
review written
100 euro voucher
No No No No
access to the reviewer No No No No No No No No No No
possibility to ask friends’
opinion
No Yes No No Yes No Yes No No Yes
Total Points 1 3 2 2 3 2 3 1 2 3
CONTROL
having a customer account Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes No No Yes
possessing the product No No No No No No No No No No
feedback/alert on the content Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes No Yes
word limit (min/max) Yes Yes No Yes No No Yes Yes Yes No
review verification Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Total Points 4 4 3 3 3 2 4 3 2 3
25
Table 2. Summary of marks
Amazon Fnac Price
Minister
Cdiscount La
Redoute
Pixmania 3
suisses
Decathlon Leroy
Merlin
Yves
Rocher
Average
per
factor
Accessibility 3 3 3 3 3 3 4 4 5 4 3,5
Quality 3 2 2 5 1 2 3 2 2 3 2,5
Design 2 4 4 5 3 4 3 3 2 5 3,5
Interaction 1 3 2 2 3 2 3 1 2 3 2,2
Control 4 4 3 3 3 2 4 3 2 3 3,1
Average per
company
2,6 3,2 2,8 3,6 2,6 2,6 3,4 2,6 2,6 3,6
According to the strict factor notation, firms are putting forward accessibility, design and
control in their review interface. Motivations such as enhancing the number of contributors,
readers and the quality of reviews can explain this phenomenon. Top companies in terms of
reviews interface are Cdiscount, Yves Rocher and 3 Suisses, with different strong points.
When Yves Rocher focuses on design and accessibility, Cdiscount reaches top mark in terms
of quality and design. 3 Suisses obtains good marks in all factors.
5.2 Analysis
5.2.1 Pure-Click retailers, with a general product offer
Cdiscount, Pixmania and Priceminister are pure click retailers with exclusive product offer
online, from cultural goods to electronics or furniture.
-Cdiscount.com
Cdiscount.com reviews stand out by its design and quality. Presentation of marks is clear and
attractive. Keywords displayed under the topics “What I liked” and “What I disliked” improve
visibility. Reviews’ organization is efficient. In terms of quality, the fact that marks are
separated in different criteria is appreciable (quality/price ratio, performance, ease of use,
design). The possibilities to send images and videos improve the quality of reviews.
Accessibility is average in spite of a disordered presentation, due to the quantity of
information displayed. However, interactions are insufficient. It is only possible to share
reviews on social media and to judge other reviews. Control is standard, providing classic
safeguards such as verification delay.
-Pixmania.com
Pixmania stands out by its attractive design thanks to efficient graphics and organization.
Accessibility is on an average level. Seeing and sharing reviews remain convenient.
Readability is enhanced by the filter of “date” and “marks”. One of the weak points is quality.
The website only offers evaluation and organization of review text. Interaction is low, there
26
are no links to social media. However it is one of the three companies offering a monetary
incentive for writing reviews: possibility to win a voucher of 100€ if sending comment.
Control is quite low with only customer account and review verification as control policies.
There is no feedback/ alert on the content which means reviewers cannot inform the company
if there is insulting language in reviews. Low control from companies could create problems
concerning security and reliability of reviews.
-PriceMinister.com
The website does not offer any specificity in terms of accessibility and control. Quality of
review system is low, providing only a review evaluation and identification of reviewer
without different criteria of marks or organization by topic. But for example, statements such
as “307 of 349 people think this review is useful” added credibility of reviews. Design can be
considered as the strongest point because presentation of reviews is very clear and simple.
Colors of reviews are attractive and the light display makes reviews pleasant to read. The
website provides a quite weak level of interaction without links to social media. But
incentives to write reviews are proposed by the firm, consisting in a contest to gain a 500€
voucher and points in a loyalty program when users are active (posting comments). Control is
average, the firm offering the classic safeguard described before. However, the number of
reviews posted is high comparing to other websites, the firm policy in terms of incentive
seeming to really motivate users to share.
0 1 2 3 4 5
Accessibility
Quality
Design Interaction
Control
Price Minister
0 1 2 3 4 5
Accessibility
Quality
Design Interaction
Control
CDiscount
0 1 2 3 4 5
Accessibility
Quality
Design Interaction
Control
Pixmania
27
Comparison
Similarities can be observed between these three websites, especially Pixmania and
Priceminister, whose profiles are similar. More generally, the common characteristics stand
for the high level of design. High standards in terms of presentation can be explained by the
fact that Pure Click retailers are only present online and must care about their image. These
companies manage in a second time to provide acceptable reviews system in terms of
accessibility and quality on such websites. Their weak point relies generally in the lack of
interaction and control, which could constitute the next step to improve review systems. A
summary of comparison between these three companies is listed as following.
Company name Positive aspect Negative aspect
C Discount Clear and attractive marks
Keywords under “What I liked” and
“what I disliked”
Video comment
Less interaction tool
Disordered presentation and massive
information displayed
Pixmania Efficient graphics and layout
Filter of “Date” and “Marks”
Possibility to win a 100€ voucher
No identification of reviewer
Single criteria for mark instead of
different criteria
No interaction with social media
Low control of security
PriceMinister Attractive colors adding pleasure to
read
Large amount of reviews because
of 500€ voucher contest and loyalty
points
Absence of different criteria for marks
Weak interaction with social media
5.2.2 Retailers with a cultural goods offer background
Amazon and Fnac stand for the two leading e-commerce websites on the French market in
terms of visits and built their reputation on cultural goods.
-Amazon.fr
Amazon review system is one of the most dynamic cases among firms studied in terms of
participants. Its main strength relies in control of reviews publication. Accessibility and
quality reaching an average mark. Overall the review system is accessible, one can easily see
and share reviews under the condition of having a customer account. However there is a lack
of instructions in the process of writing. The strong point of the website is to display the most
useful positive and negative comments at the top of the reviews: the interface gains both
transparency and clarity.
Quality is standard. Reviews can be evaluated by a system of votes (“x number of persons
found that review useful”) and reviewers can be ranked according to the number of useful
28
reviews they shared. This is a good method for encouraging customers to write more reviews:
they may feel more confident, knowing that their contributions are useful. The possibility for
the user to make a video comment enhanced also the quality of reviews. However, for certain
type of products such as electronics, separate the mark in different criteria would be helpful
for customers (performance/autonomy/design). The weaknesses of Amazon reviews are
design and interaction, the presentation remaining not very attractive and reviews being
unlinked to social media.
-Fnac.com
The accessibility of Fnac.com review system is in the average. A few clicks permit to read
and share reviews on products pages. The main weak point relies in the lack of clarity due to
the absence of guidance when writing reviews and filter to search for the reviews. Quality
does not characterize Fnac.com. The review offers only a single mark, which is quite
insufficient according to Fnac products portfolio (Electronics, High-tech). A separated mark
for design or technical characteristics, and a better organization would be useful for users in
the purchase process. In terms of design, the website provides an attractive presentation and
reviews are directly presented on the product page. Reviews stand out thanks to differentiated
boxes and colors. Interactions with social media are developed but hardly compensate the lack
of exchange with the users. Fnac’s review system is open with connections to eleven different
social media websites. However interaction could be brought between firm and users with
more incentives and exchanges. Control is also the main characteristic of Fnac.com review
system, which obtained a high score on this criterion.
0 1 2 3 4 5
Accessibility
Quality
Design Interaction
Control
Amazon
0 1 2 3 4 5
Accessibility
Quality
Design Interaction
Control
Fnac
29
Comparison
The main similarity concerns the level of control provided by the two companies. Being
historically cultural goods retailers, the high level of exigency of their customers in terms of
relevance of information for instance has possibly forced them to enhance the control level for
reviews.
Company name Positive aspect Negative aspect
Amazon Presentation of most useful positive
and negative reviews
Ranking of reviewers according to
popularity of their reviews
Video comment
Less interaction tool
Poor design of reviews
Absence of different sub-criteria for
marks
Fnac Attractive presentation of reviews
Differentiated boxes and colors
Eleven links to social media
Good level of control over the
review system
No guidance to write reviews
No filter to search reviews
Absence of different sub-criteria for
marks
5.2.3 Bricks and clicks retailers, with a strong offline business background
The second group is composed by firms benefiting from a high brand reputation and
implementation on French market. Leroy Merlin has 111 stores and Decathlon 250 in France.
They recently made the choice of opening e-commerce platform, in order to diversify their
channels of distribution and increase their presence online.
-Decathlon.fr
This review system stands out by its accessibility. It is possible to write reviews with different
accounts: membership, facebook and online user. Having customer account to post review is
not compulsory. But there is no filter of reviews such as age and gender. Design is maybe the
most attractive element among all the cases studied, with a nice and clear presentation, no
overload of information. The presentation of + and – is also a strong point for the readability
and transparency for reviews. However, these reviews are only displayed at the end of the
page, which decrease accessibility for readers. Interaction offered is insufficient. Users only
have possibility to judge usefulness of reviews. Quality suffers from the lack of control,
reviews contain spelling mistakes.
-Leroy Merlin.fr
This review system stands for the best in terms of accessibility, reaching the full score. It is
very easy to see and share a review, even without customer account. However the four other
factors reach a low score. Quality is only improved by the possibility of sending images and
30
video in the reviews. But it provides keywords choices for customers to write reviews. Design
is not very attractive even if its lightness enhances the clearness. However, reviews appear
only at the end of the page, which is less accessible for the reader. Interaction offers the
minimum level, only sharing product information to social media websites. However, it
provides a “Pin” button to share product picture directly on Pinterest.com. Consequence of a
high accessibility, the level of control is low. Some products only have negative comments in
the first page. There is a lack of management of reviews.
Comparison
These firms are characterized by a high level of accessibility. Indeed, their experience and
culture in terms of distribution benefits their way of managing review system: facilitating
access to products on offline channels is their main concern, which could explain an
accessibility concern on their websites/review system. On the other hand, the lack of
experience on online channels probably accounts for low scores in other factors.
Company name Positive aspect Negative aspect
Decathlon Facebook account to log in
Clear presentation
+ and – top useful reviews
Reviews in the bottom of page
Less interaction tool
Poor quality of reviews because of low
control
No filter of reviews
Leroy Merlin Facebook account to log in
Easy to see and share reviews
Video comment
Keyword suggestions for writing
reviews
Share product picture through
Pinterest button
Low control level
Reviews in the bottom of page
Poor organization of reviews
0 1 2 3 4 5
Accessibility
Quality
Design Interaction
Control
Decathlon
0 1 2 3 4 5
Accessibility
Quality
Design Interaction
Control
Leroy Merlin
31
5.2.4 Clothing and cosmetic specialists
The last group of firms gathers La Redoute, 3 Suisses and Yves Rocher. Their offer is mainly
related to clothing and cosmetics.
-La Redoute.fr
Accessibility represents one of the main strong points of La Redoute review system. There is
a complete structure for writing reviews which helps and leads reviewer to write information
(size, pros, best use of products). The second priority was given to control, in order to
maintain a high level of security and credibility. Quality is not ideal on this website. Except
the separation of reviews in subtopics (size, design), the website does not seem to ensure
enough quality and precision due to the absence of review/reviewer evaluation and different
criteria of evaluation. Design does not stand out but remain pleasant and uncluttered.
However, the visibility of reviews is reduced because they are not highlighted on product
pages. A positive effect is given by the presentation of keywords over reviews. In terms of
interaction, La Redoute is in the average. The absence of link with social media can be
regretted. It is one of the only three websites offering incentives to write, 10€ discount for the
first reviews published. An interesting possibility consists in asking a friends’ opinion before
buying through facebook, twitter or email.
-3 Suisses.fr
Accessibility and control are the main advantages of 3 Suisses review system. The system is
simple, light and accessible, as well as being secured by numerous safeguards (account,
verification, word limit). Writing reviews is facilitated by framing (advantages/inconvenient),
making reviews more readable. Quality is average. Different criteria of notation are present
(ratio price/quality, design, comfort, shape). Reviews can be evaluated and reviewer identified.
In terms of Design, the presentation is well organized and attractive. One can just regret the
heaviness of the page, displaying too many information. Interaction has no specificity. There
are classic links to social media and possibilities to ask a friend’s opinion and to evaluate the
review. Control is quite high and reaches almost the maximum mark.
-Yves Rocher.fr
Yves Rocher’s strong points rely in accessibility and design. The review system is clear and
motivating for users to share. Customers have the possibility to write and see reviews rapidly
and the content is well framed. Design is elaborated and attractive. Reviews are highlighted
by the different ways described in the criteria, in particular with the presentation of keywords
above and in the reviews.
32
Quality can be assessed by customers thanks to the different criteria offered by the website.
The mark is presented in 4 parts: Average, Fun to use, Effectiveness and Quality/Price ratio.
Also, if the reviewer cannot be evaluated, a “Top Contributors” label present the most
participative users. However, in spite of the framing, reviews appear a bit disorganized.
Interaction and control earned a satisfactory evaluation. Overall, interactions possibilities on
the website are limited to several social media (Facebook and Twitter) and to friends’ email.
The absence of incentives for sharing can be regretted. Concerning control, classical
safeguards are used such as having a customer account.
Comparison
The profiles show globally a balance with acceptable or good marks on all factors, the
exception is the lack of quality of La Redoute. Being clothes or cosmetic suppliers obliged to
enhance quality of their review system on all factors. In order to provide credibility of reviews,
3 suisses and Yves Rocher demands customer accounts with identification of reviewers. On
the same time, these two websites provide keyword searching of age and sex which increase
convenience for customers to reach reviews of similar background users.
Company name Positive aspect Negative aspect
La Redoute Complete structure to write reviews
with a clear route
High level of security and credibility
10€ discount for the first reviews
published
Presentation of keywords over reviews
Consult a friend’s opinion before
purchasing through email
Lack of review/reviewer
evaluation
Lack of different criteria of
evaluation
No link of social media
Low visibility of reviews
0 1 2 3 4 5
Accessibility
Quality
Design Interaction
Control
La Redoute
0 1 2 3 4 5
Accessibility
Quality
Design Interaction
Control
3 suisses
0 1 2 3 4 5
Accessibility
Quality
Design Interaction
Control
Yves Rocher
33
3 suisses Simple, light and accessible system
High level of security including
account, verification and word limit
Fixed frame to write reviews
Different criteria of notation
Identification of reviewers
Long page with massive
information
No incentives to motivate review
writers
Yves Rocher Fast access to write and see reviews
Elaborated and attractive design
Presentation of keywords
Different criteria of notation
“Top Contributors” label present the
most participative users
Disorganized layout of review
No incentives to motivate review
writers
5.2.5 Conclusion
According to the average marks in each criterion, the general strong points are accessibility
and design, while quality and interaction stand for weaknesses. Reviews are easy to write and
see but websites should develop openness, authorizing the use of different accounts (such as
Facebook) to write reviews. It is much easier for customers to write reviews through
Facebook or Twitter account than registering in E-commerce website.
Design is often clear and attractive even if the presentation of keywords could be generalized.
In terms of quality, the main axis of improvement relies in reviewer evaluation (such as
labeling system), presentation of different criteria of notation, efforts for framing and
organization. Interaction does not reach expectations, it is never possible to contact the
reviewer and there are often no incentives offered by firms (only 3 websites are proposing
monetary reward to motivate users to share).
The level of control is high. Several safeguards have been developed to ensure authenticity
and credibility of reviews. An important weakness relies in the non-verification if writers
0 1 2 3 4 5
Accessibility
Quality
Design Interaction
Control
Average marks of 10 review systems
34
actually bought and tested the product. Reviews’ spelling mistakes are often not corrected by
the company, which decreases the quality of reviews.
In order to test transparency, false positive and negative reviews were sent to the websites.
The result is that 9 of them published the reviews, whether positive or critical, showing a high
level of transparency which decreases at the same time credibility: these invented reviews
were all published.
6. Insights and expectations from users
6.1 Introduction
The sample has reached 393 usable answers out of 407 (removed the unusable data and “I
never purchased online”). It is balanced in terms of gender, due to the method of propagation
of the questionnaire (e-mail and personal messages). In terms of age and occupation, an over
representativeness of the class 15-24 and students as well as executives can be noticed. This
limitation is caused by the nature of our personal networks and the limits of budget in the
project. However these biases can be attenuated by the fact that e-commerce users are more
frequently young and belonging to upper class in France (FEVAD report, 2011).
6.2 Findings
All the data is available in the appendices part: the general results in appendix 2 (p 52), results
per gender in appendix 3 (p 62), per age in appendix 4 (p 68), frequency of use in appendix 5
(p 77), for review writers in appendix 6 (p 86) and review readers in appendix 7 (page 89).
6.2.1 Most of customers are monthly users, for whom review system is influential and became
a norm
Heavy users of online shopping represent a minority (5% use it once a week or more).
Customers purchase mainly once a month or more (48%) or quite rarely (44% once a year or
more). Results show that people are attached to review systems: 67.5% find that providing a
review system is essential or important. Consumers are expecting e-commerce websites to
offer review system, it became a norm. Common users of reviews are more attached to
reviews, especially heavy readers (for 78%) and writers (for 77.5%). However older
respondents over 45 show less enthusiasm towards review systems (58% find it important or
essential).
In terms of purchasing influence, most of the customers declare to be influenced by reviews.
30% of customers consider customer review system influence their purchasing choice a lot.
35
Diagram 1: Overall answers to question 10
Especially heavy users of e-commerce (purchase once a week or more), who declare to be
influenced a lot (42%). 44% of heavy readers think review system influences their purchasing
choice a lot.
6.2.2 A majority of readers but a lack of permanent contributors
A great majority of customers have the habit of consulting reviews (often or always for 65%,
rarely and never for 11%). However, only 4% of customers are contributors who often or
always write reviews after their purchases. 55% of respondents declare they already tried to
write, including those who write rarely and sometimes. People are not motivated enough to
continue to share, they are not retained as long-term contributors.
Diagram 2: Overall answers to question 6
A lot
Moderately
Not at all
A little
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
50
%
To what extent do you think customer reviews influence your purchasing choice?
Never 45%
Sometimes 15%
Rarely 36%
Often 3%
Always 1%
Do you write customer reviews after purchasing on the Internet?
36
Heavy users of e-commerce tend to be more active. 10.5% of them write frequently and 84%
of them already tried to write. 17.5% of respondents over 45 years old write reviews often and
always. This means older users have a higher participation rate than general population.
Heavy readers of reviews are not heavy writers, only a few percent of them are contributing.
However, the opposite is true: writers (81.5% of them) are heavy readers.
6.2.3 Most of users trust reviews, but worry about transparency
A majority of users declare trusting reviews (58%). The youth (15-24 years old) tends to trust
reviews more (67%) as well as heavy readers (68.5%) and heavy writers (70.5%). This
confirms the article of Riegner (2007) that the most influenced consumers are teenagers and
young adults up to 24 years old. Our finding also proves literature is correct among French
population and that young people tend to trust reviews more than other age group of people.
Adults between 25-44 and over 45 have a tendency to trust less (only 48,5% and 49% agree
that reviews are trustable).The degree of confidence placed in customer reviews is overall
high. However, more than 55% of people find that companies are not neutral in their selection
of published reviews (censorship of negative reviews). As mentioned in the case studies,
negative and positive comments were sent on 10 websites. 9 of 10 companies published the
comments even they are critics. Only one of them (Fnac) did not publish our comment after
24h verification. This shows E-commerce websites in France have a high transparency in
general. Nevertheless, only 21% of heavy users think companies are neutral, which indicates
that experienced online shopping customers are more suspicious towards companies’ policies.
6.2.4 Lack of incentives to contribute
Most of people feel not motivated to write reviews. 60% percent of users think they don't
have something to win, when only 23.5% disagree. Consequently, users are not motivated to
write reviews, which could explain the lack of dynamism observed in review systems.
Diagram 3: Overall answers to question 18
Not at all
Totally
0
5
10
15
20
25
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
%
Do you think you have something to gain by posting customer reviews?
37
Respondents over 45 years old tend to be more aware of possible benefits of sharing. Less
than 50% of them find they have nothing to win. It is the same case for heavy users (52.5%)
and writers (45.5%). Firms should then develop some incentives policies targeting on old
people and heavy users in order to enhance participation of users. Reasons that would
encourage people to write are the following:
-Share experience and give useful information to other customers (33%)
-Complain about a bad purchase (26%)
-Gifts and discounts (23%)
-Give a feedback (16%)
-Social status and community (2%)
Share experience turns out to be first reason of writing reviews, which illustrates the purpose
of helping other users. However, the motivation of complaining is high as well. Many
customers tend to show their dissatisfaction on websites. Firms should therefore provide tool
for customers to complain outside of review system. Monetary rewards stand for the third
main motivation. We notice in the case study that monetary rewards do have effects on
encouraging customers to write reviews. For example, Price Minister gives 500€ voucher to
attract comments. Their amounts of comments are higher than C Discount which does not
provide any monetary reward. Another interesting finding is that older respondents and
review writers are more motivated by sharing their experience (42% and 40%) and less by
monetary rewards such as gifts (11% and 17%). So for this group of people, encouraging
policies should focus on building up their confidence of sharing useful reviews.
6.2.5 Opinions about the 5 factors
Quality and accessibility stand for the most important factors for users (49.5% and 41%).
Control, Interaction and Design only occupy a small percentage in all. Heavy users find that
quality is the most important factor (63%) as well as writers (61.5%).
38
Diagram 4: Overall answers for question 11
Accessibility is generally judged satisfactory by customers. Users find reviews easy to access
and to read generally (73%), especially men (78%), youngsters (79%), heavy users (79%),
heavy readers (81%) and writers (77.5%). However, it tends to be less accessible for older
people (67%) and women (68%). Literature shows that an increase in PEOU (Perceived Ease
of Use) will have a stronger effect on online trust for women than for men (Awad &
Ragowsky, 2008). Our research also shows women perceive review system less easy to be
used than men. For E-commerce websites targeting female customers, more efforts should be
paid on the PEOU of review system. A high accessible and user-friendly review system will
potentially increase e-loyalty of female customers. 49% of general users find reviews easy to
write while 22% do not agree. But only 40% of adults between 25-44 years old think it is easy
to write review. Firms should increase PEOU of review system for this group of people as
well. On the contrary, heavy users and writers find that reviews are easy to write (73.5% and
66.5%).
In terms of quality, a majority of customers are satisfied as well. 54% of users find reviews'
quality is good when only 17% do not agree. Heavy users are less satisfied with quality (42%)
unlike heavy readers (63.5%).
Accessibility
Interaction
Quality
Control Design
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
%
According to you, the most important feature of a customer reviews interface should be:
39
Diagram 5: Overall answers to question 14
Design is quite passable for most of the customers. 40% believe reviews' design is good when
27% don't agree. However, women tend to be less satisfied towards design (only 32% find it
satisfying). Consequently, websites should pay more attention to presentation if their user
community is mainly composed by women.
44% of users wish there could be more interaction in the review systems. 34% of customers
don't agree on interactions with social media or the firms. These show the opinions of
interaction are quite balanced among users. Heavy users tend to care less about interaction
(31.5% expect more interaction which is less than average).
Most of users find there should be less control on reviews (64%) when 20.5% believe the
opposite. Heavy and normal users want less control (73.5% and 68%) as well as heavy readers
(71.5%). The image of high control and censorship is still high, in contradiction with findings
of the case study mentioned in 6.2.3. Consequently, firms should make more campaign about
transparency and freedom of speech they allow for review contribution.
Very bad Very good
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
%
How do you evaluate the quality of customer reviews in general?
40
7. Discussion and implications for management
Findings of Qualitative research/Supply
side
Findings of Quantitative research/Demand
side
-Accessibility, design and control level are
acceptable
-Interaction and Quality are weaknesses
-High transparency
-Issues about control
- Reviews became a norm and are influential
- A majority of readers but a lack of
permanent contributors
- Most of users trust reviews, but worry
about transparency
-Lack of incentives to contribute
-Quality and accessibility are critical factors
-Interaction should be improved
-Image of high control
Reading customer reviews is perceived important for most of users before purchasing. Many
E-commerce websites emphasize a lot on commercial promotion and products introduction.
However, neglecting review system may be a strategic mistake for those companies. For
existing review systems, the study reveals several aspects of improvements that can be
discussed in this chapter.
7.1 Make people share more, more often
In terms of accessibility, reviews are easily seen and shared but a gap exists between the
number of viewers and contributors. First, reviews dynamism can be considered for other
customers as a hint of product success and a motivation to purchase. Products with numerous
comments seem to be more popular than those with fewer comments. Second, a higher
number of reviews can reduce the weight of false comments and as a matter of fact improve
credibility. The lack of contribution can be related to the lack of efficient tool to motivate
users to share reviews. How to make customers share their experience after purchase instead
of collecting complaints? The study reveals a lack of incentives offered for writing reviews.
Companies should therefore develop efficient policies to push users to write, using efficient
levers such as monetary or solidarity motives. However, improving the number of reviews by
giving more incentives is not a guarantee of quality.
7.2 Improve quality
Quality of reviews stands for one of the most important characteristics of reviews for users
and the qualitative research reveals that it is often a weakness. Ensuring quality constitutes a
challenge for companies, especially when relying on user generated content. Raising quality
standard does not compulsorily mean increase the level of censorship. Two ways of
41
improving quality indeed exist: develop pre-writing help (such as frame and guidance for
contributors) or a post-writing selection by the moderator. According to case studies, we
discovered that many companies are using fixed structure of reviews. It follows a complete
procedure of writing reviews such as providing keywords options for positive or negative
reviews which is very user-friendly. But it may also have shortcomings such as users being
discouraged by fixed structure, which reduces their creativity. Post-writing selection is carried
out by companies, which helps to correct spelling mistake, delete insulting language and
consequently ensure a certain level of quality. But on the other hand, customers perceive
companies’ processing negatively, with high censorship. The quantitative study reveals a
dilemma: users want more quality, but they are also critic about the high level of control. It is
incumbent for firms to strike a balance between these two aspects.
7.3 Enhance confidence, solving issues about control
A critical point was raised by the study. If users generally trust reviews, they also broadly
believe that companies overindulge in censorship. Power of moderator is perceived as too
important, all the more so that rules of publication are not transparent. However the
qualitative research shows that firms are often transparent, 9 out of 10 published critical
reviews sent. Consequently, there could be a misconceived image of control which can affect
review system. To avoid reactions such as “My review will never get published” or “Most of
negative reviews are deleted by moderation”, firms should be more transparent, promoting
authenticity by concrete examples (heavy contributors) and communicate more about
publishing process for instance.
Another way of improving confidence could be through social media: contributions written by
friends, persons I trust as advisors, could be presented as a priority. The main motivation of
writing reviews is “sharing experience and giving useful information to others” according to
quantitative study. The network is identified and familiar in social media, enhancing trust of
users. Customers might be more motivated by sharing their knowledge among their network
and receive positive feedbacks. We suggest E-commerce websites to strengthen their
cooperation with social media websites such as using “Facebook account to log in” or “Ask
your friend’s opinion of this product”. On the other hand, reviews are more credible from
customer’s friends or relatives. E-commerce website could provide a filter that “show your
friend’s reviews on the top” if customers log in with social media account.
42
Another problem concerns business ethics. Reviews are often considered false (sent by the
company or non-users of products, published by competitors to criticize products).
Consequently, companies should ensure credibility of reviews for readers. For instance
develop policies to check if contributors really possessed or tested the products (questions
about detail of products such as completed name and series number.etc), before allowing to
write reviews. Dilemma again: putting forward confidence and quality could reduce quantity
of reviews posted, because it is time consuming.
7.4 Interaction, design and the perfect mix of factors
The case study reveals general shortcomings in terms of interaction such as lack of linkage
with social media, lack of exchanges with the firm (incentives or feedback). Users claim more
interaction but do not consider it as a critical aspect. It is the same opinion for design,
generally satisfying and not considered as a strategic factor.
In the study, 5 factors were tested both in a qualitative and quantitative research. The perfect
review system should provide a high rank in the 5 factors. But results show that accessibility
and quality are the two most important characteristics for users. The reality is more complex:
as seen previously, it is a bit unrealistic to consider that factors are independent. For instance,
making reviews more accessible could reduce the level of control (allowing user to write
without customer account). Also, developing quality (more frame and organization, more time
to write) could reduce accessibility. Firms should consequently develop an adapted balance of
the 5 factors, fitting their own customers’ community.
To conclude, the quantitative study shows certain tendencies about customers’ expectation
and attitudes towards reviews. Differences appear in terms of gender, age, frequency of using
e-commerce and role towards reviews as expected from the literature. Consequently, each
brand should be aware of their community of users’ characteristics in order to provide an
adapted service in general and for review interface in particular.
43
8. Conclusion and future researches
The novelty of subject did not facilitate the research project. The growth of e-commerce
remains recent and most of the companies do not have precise policies in terms of reviews. As
mentioned before, the main limitations of this study relied in the over representativeness of
several groups in the sample of respondents (youth, students and executives). Also,
conclusions of this research are geographically limited to France.
However, studying both supply and demand side permitted us to have a general view about
strengths and shortcomings of review systems. It enabled us to propose suggestions of
improvements for firms in France by answering the research objectives. As asserted
previously, French companies should prioritize three main directions in order to improve their
review interface: foster and sustain participation of contributors, improve quality and resolve
credibility issues.
In terms of factors, the research aimed to evaluate the mix of characteristics for review
interface. Accessibility and quality are considered as the two most important factors for
customers. Different profiles were noticed, general strengths and weaknesses of 10 websites
were pointed out through case studies. Moreover, a set of evaluation was created in order to
study different review systems. That is another contribution of the study.
If insights given by the qualitative and quantitative studies meet the objectives stated in
introduction, several areas of reflection could be explored in further researches. Focusing on
customer reviews, this research did not talk about consumer reviews. Which one is more
beneficial for companies? Should they use both? Further research could focus on this
differentiation and give insights for companies to improve their use of reviews.
Also the type of review system or interface may differ according to the website general
audience. Future research could narrow the study down in terms of target. How to make
seniors share reviews? How reviews could influence more youngsters? Companies targeting
women may put forward reviews design of increasing PEOU, or more accessibility for
seniors. Consequently, further research could have a refined approach instead of dealing with
reviews in general.
The five factors created for the study may also be differentially studied. For example, what
are the effects of a better design on participation or trust? Would the benefits be more
44
important if the firm improve accessibility? If factors are not equally important for customers,
is it possible to formulate a weighting system for 5 factors?
Finally a differentiation could also be made between specified brands owned e-shops and
diversified online retailers. Do they have to apply the same strategy toward reviews? Do they
benefit or suffer from reviews on the same plan? Different strategies, according to the nature
of e-shop may exist as well.
Since this study is based on 10 most visited E-commerce websites in France and respondents
of online questionnaires are French, it is possible to do further researches on other countries
or regions.
As stated in the study, access to reviews became a norm in customer’s mind. Therefore,
companies should not neglect this strategic point. However, reviews management belongs to a
set of policies designed to satisfy the customer. Efforts on this aspect depend on strategic
priorities of companies as well as budget limitations. But an adapted policy concerning
reviews has to be developed. As in the E-word of mouth era, any error or shortcoming (such
as a fake review scandal) of a company can affect brand reputation.
45
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48
X. Appendix
Appendix I: QuestionnaireQUESTIONNAIRE
Bonjour, Nous sommes à l'université et dans le
cadre de notre thèse de fin d'études nous réalisons
une enquête sur les avis clients postés dans les sites
e-commerce tels que Fnac ou Amazon. Nous vous
remercions pour les quelques minutes consacrées à
ce questionnaire.
1. Quel est votre sexe ?
A. Masculin
B. Féminin
2. Quel est votre âge ?
Age : ____
3. Votre catégorie socioprofessionnelle
A. Agriculteur
B. Artisan, commerçant et chef d’entreprise
C. Cadre, profession intellectuelle supérieure
D. Professions Intermédiaire
E. Employé
F. Ouvrier
G. Retraité
H. Stagiaire
I. Etudiant
J. Demandeur d’emploi
4. A quelle fréquence achetez-vous des
produits sur internet ?
A. Une fois ou plus par semaine
B. Une fois ou plus par mois
C. Une fois ou plus par an
D. J'ai déjà essayé par le passé
E. Je n'ai jamais essayé
5. Lisez-vous les avis postés par les
consommateurs avant vos achats sur
internet ?
A. Toujours
B. Souvent
C. Parfois
D. Rarement
E. Jamais
6. Ecrivez-vous des avis clients après vos
achats sur internet ?
A. Toujours
B. Souvent
C. Parfois
D. Rarement
E. Jamais
7. On peut faire confiance aux avis clients:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Pas
d'accord
Tout à
fait
d'accord
QUESTIONNAIRE
Hello, we are university student realizing
an investigation for our Thesis about
customer reviews on e-commerce
websites, such as Fnac or Amazon. We
thank you for the few minutes devoted to
this questionnaire.
1. What is your gender? A. Male
B. Female
2. How old are you? Age: ____
3. Your occupation A. Farmer
B. Artisan, merchant and entrepreneur
C. Executive, higher intellectual
profession
D. Intermediate occupations
E. Employee
F. Worker
G. Retired
H. Trainee
I. Student
J. Jobseeker
4. How often do you purchase
products online? A. Once a week or more
B. Once or more per month
C. Once or more per year
D. I already tried in the past
E. I never tried
5. Do you read customer reviews
before shopping on the internet? A. Always
B. Often
C. Sometimes
D. Rarely
E. Never
6. Do you write customer reviews
after purchasing on the Internet? A. Always
B. Often
C. Sometimes
D. Rarely
E. Never
7. We can trust customer reviews :
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Stron
gly
disag
ree
Stron
gly
agree
49
8. Les entreprises sont neutres dans la
publication des avis clients et
montrent tous les avis, même
négatifs: *
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Pas
d'acc
ord
Tout
à fait
d'acc
ord
9. Pour vous, le fait que les sites e-
commerce proposent ce système
d’avis clients est :
A. Essentiel
B. Important
C. Normal
D. Secondaire
E. Inutile
10. Dans quelle mesure pensez-vous que
les avis clients influencent votre
choix d’achat ?
A. Beaucoup
B. Moyennement
C. Un peu
D. Pas du tout
11. Selon vous, la caractéristique la plus
importante d'une interface d'avis
clients doit être:
A. L’accessibilité (les avis sont faciles à
écrire et à lire)
B. La qualité (contenu/organisation,
évaluation des auteurs/avis)
C. Le design (attractif et convivial)
D. L’interaction (échange avec
l’entreprise, lien vers les réseaux
sociaux)
E. Le contrôle (sécurité et filtrage par
l’entreprise)
12. En général, lire et accéder aux avis
clients est rapide:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Pas
d'acc
ord
Tout
à fait
d'acc
ord
13. En général, écrire un avis client est
facile:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Pas
d'acc
ord
Tout
à fait
d'acc
ord
8. Companies are neutral in the
publication of reviews and show
customers all opinions, even
negative:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Stron
gly
disag
ree
Stron
gly
agree
9. For you, the fact that e-commerce
websites offer a customer review
system is:
A. Essential
B. Important
C. Normal
D. Secondary
E. Unnecessary
10. To what extent do you think the
customer reviews influence your
purchasing choice?
A. A lot
B. Moderately
C. A little
D. Not at all
11. According to you, the most
important feature of a customer
reviews interface should be:
A. Accessibility (reviews are easy to
write and read)
B. Quality (content/organization,
evaluation of authors/reviews)
C. Design (attractive and user
friendly)
D. Interaction (with the company,
links to social medias)
E. Control (security and filter by the
company)
12. In general, reading and
accessing customer reviews is fast:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Stron
gly
disag
ree
Stron
gly
agree
13. In general, writing a customer
review is easy:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Stron
gly
disag
ree
Stron
gly
agree
50
14. Comment jugez-vous la qualité des
avis clients en général ?
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Très
mauva
ise
Très
bon
ne
15. Que pensez-vous du design et de la
présentation générale des avis
clients ?
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Très
mauv
ais
Tr
ès
bo
n
16. Il faudrait plus d'interaction par
rapport aux avis clients (liens vers
réseaux sociaux, échanges avec les
entreprises):
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Pas
d'acc
ord
Tout
à fait
d'acc
ord
17. Les entreprises devraient plus
filtrer et contrôler les avis clients
publiés sur leur site:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Pas
d'acc
ord
Tout
à fait
d'acc
ord
18. Pensez-vous avoir quelque chose à
gagner à poster des avis clients?
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Pa
s
du
tou
t
To
ut à
fait
14. How do you evaluate the quality
of customer reviews in general?
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Ver
y
bad
Ver
y
goo
d
15. What do you think of design and
the overall presentation of customer
reviews?
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Ver
y
bad
Ver
y
goo
d
16. There should be more
interaction in customer reviews
(links to social media, exchanges
with companies):
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Stron
gly
disagr
ee
Stron
gly
agree
17. Companies should filter and
control over the customer reviews
posted on their website:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Stron
gly
disagr
ee
Stron
gly
agree
18. Do you think you have
something to gain by posting
customer reviews?
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
N
ot
at
all
Total
ly
51
19. Ce qui pourrait vous pousser à
poster un avis client (COCHEZ 2
CASES MAXIMUM)
A. Un cadeau, des promotions/avantages
de la part de l'entreprise
B. Gagner la reconnaissance et l'attention
des autres utilisateurs et de la
communauté
C. Partager mon expérience et donner
des informations utiles aux autres
utilisateurs
D. Interagir avec l'entreprise et donner
mon retour sur les produits
E. Me plaindre d'un mauvais achat
F. Autre
19. What would motivate you to post a
customer review (CHECK
MAXIMUM 2 BOXES)
A. A gift, promotions or benefits from
the company
B. Gain recognition and attention from
other users and the community
C. Share my experience and give useful
information to other users
D. Interact with the company and give
my feedback on products
E. Complain about a bad purchase
F. Other
Appendix II: Overall results Sample Respondents Number of
modalities
Mode Mode (size) Modalities Size by
modality
Frequency by
modality (%)
Question 1 393 2 Male 197 Female 196.000 49.873
Male 197.000 50.127
Question 2 393 6 15-25 194 15-24 194.000 49.364
25-34 104.000 26.463
35-44 38.000 9.669
45-54 31.000 7.888
55-64 14.000 3.562
+64 12.000 3.053
Question 3 393 10 Student 140 Farmer 1.000 0.254
Artisan,
merchant and
entrepreneur
16.000 4.071
Executive, higher
intellectual
profession
96.000 24.427
Jobseeker 18.000 4.580
Employee 60.000 15.267
Student 140.000 35.623
Worker 5.000 1.272
Intermediate
occupation
16.000 4.071
Retired 16.000 4.071
Intern 25.000 6.361
Question 4 393 5 Once or more
per month
189 I already tried
in the past
14.000 3.562
Once or more per year
171.000 43.511
Once or more
per month
189.000 48.092
Once a week
or more
19.000 4.835
Question 5 393 5 Often 184 Never 10.000 2.545
Sometimes 95.000 24.173
Rarely 32.000 8.142
Often 184.000 46.819
Always 72.000 18.321
Question 6 393 5 Never 176 Never 176.000 44.784
Sometimes 58.000 14.758
Rarely 142.000 36.132
Often 12.000 3.053
Always 5.000 1.272
Question 7 393 7 5 157 1 Strongly
disagree
2.000 0.509
2 13.000 3.308
3 53.000 13.486
4 98.000 24.936
5 157.000 39.949
6 69.000 17.557
7 Strongly
agree
1.000 0.254
Question 8 393 7 3 101 1 Strongly disagree
39.000 9.924
2 81.000 20.611
53
3 101.000 25.700
4 73.000 18.575
5 64.000 16.285
6 25.000 6.361
7 Strongly
agree
10.000 2.545
Question 9 393 5 Important 189 Essential 73.000 18.575
Important 189.000 48.092
Unnecessary 1.000 0.254
Normal 108.000 27.481
Secondary 22.000 5.598
Question 10 393 4 Moderately 170 A lot 119.000 30.280
Moderately 170.000 43.257
Not at all 26.000 6.616
A little 78.000 19.847
Question 11 393 5 Quality
(content/organization,
evaluation of
authors/reviews)
195 Accessibility
(reviews are easy to write
and read)
161.000 40.967
Interaction
(with the
company, links to social
medias)
13.000 3.308
Quality
(content/organization,
evaluation of
authors/reviews)
195.000 49.618
Control
(security and
filter by the company)
19.000 4.835
Design
(attractive and
user friendly)
5.000 1.272
Question 12 393 6 6 155 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 9.000 2.290
3 32.000 8.142
4 65.000 16.539
5 99.000 25.191
6 155.000 39.440
7 Strongly
agree
33.000 8.397
Question 13 393 7 4 114 1 Strongly disagree
5.000 1.272
2 20.000 5.089
3 61.000 15.522
4 114.000 29.008
5 98.000 24.936
6 76.000 19.338
7 Strongly
agree
19.000 4.835
Question 14 393 7 5 164 1 Very bad 1.000 0.254
2 5.000 1.272
3 60.000 15.267
4 114.000 29.008
54
5 164.000 41.730
6 45.000 11.450
7 Very good 4.000 1.018
Question 15 393 6 4 128 1 Very bad 0 0
2 29.000 7.379
3 78.000 19.847
4 128.000 32.570
5 116.000 29.517
6 35.000 8.906
7 Very good 7.000 1.781
Question 16 393 7 4 86 1 Strongly disagree
34.000 8.651
2 52.000 13.232
3 47.000 11.959
4 86.000 21.883
5 77.000 19.593
6 67.000 17.048
7 Strongly
agree
30.000 7.634
Question 17 393 7 1 103 1 Strongly disagree
103.000 26.209
2 87.000 22.137
3 62.000 15.776
4 61.000 15.522
5 37.000 9.415
6 29.000 7.379
7 Strongly
agree
14.000 3.562
Question 18 393 7 1 93 1 Not at all 93.000 23.664
2 81.000 20.611
3 62.000 15.776
4 65.000 16.539
5 43.000 10.941
6 25.000 6.361
7 Totally 24.000 6.107
Question 19 393 6 Share my
experience and give
useful
information to other users
243 A gift,
promotions or benefits from
the company
168 22.982
Gain
recognition
and attention from other
users and the
community
16 2.189
Share my experience
and give
useful information to
other users
243 33.242
Interact with
the company and give my
feedback on
products
117 16.005
Complain about a bad
purchase
187 25.581
55
Diagram 1: Overall answers to question 1
Diagram 2: Overall answers to question 2
Female 50% Male
50%
What is your gender?
15-24 49%
25-34 26%
35-44 10%
45-54 8%
55-64 4%
+64 3%
How old are you?
Other 0 0
56
Diagram 3: Overall answers to question 3
Diagram 4: Overall answers to question 4
Farmer 0%
Artisan, merchant and entrepreneur
4%
Executive, higher
intellectual profession
25%
Jobseeker 5% Employee
15%
Student 36%
Worker 1%
Intermediate occupations
4%
Retired 4%
Trainee 6%
Occupation
I already tried in the past
3%
Once or more per
year 44%
Once or more per
month 48%
Once a week or
more 5%
How often do you purchase products online?
57
Diagram 5: Overall answers to question 5
Diagram 6: Overall answers to question 6
Never 3%
Sometimes 24%
Rarely 8% Often
47%
Always 18%
Do you read reviews posted by consumers before shopping on the internet?
Never 45%
Sometimes 15%
Rarely 36%
Often 3%
Always 1%
Do you write consumer reviews after purchasing on the
Internet?
58
Diagram 7: Overall answers to question 7
Diagram 8: Overall answers to question 8
Strongly disagree
Strongly agree
0
10
20
30
40
50
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
%
We can trust customer reviews :
Strongly disagree
Strongly agree
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
%
Companies are neutral in the publication of reviews and show
customers all opinions, even negative:
59
Diagram 9: Overall answers to question 9
Diagram 10: Overall answers to question 10
Essential
Important
Unecessary
Normal
Secondary
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
%
For you, the fact that e-commerce websites offer a customer review system
is:
A lot
Moderately
Not at all
A little
0
10
20
30
40
50
%
To what extent do you think the customer reviews influence your purchasing choice?
Accessibility
Interaction
Quality
Control Design
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
%
According to you, the most important feature of a customer reviews interface
should be:
60
Diagram 11: Overall answers to question 11
Diagram 12: Overall answers to question 12
Diagram 13: Overall answers to question 13
Strongly disagree
Strongly agree
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
%
In general, reading and accessing customer reviews is fast:
Strongly disagree
Strongly agree
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
% In general, writing a customer review is easy:
61
Diagram 14: Overall answers to question 14
Diagram 15: Overall answers to question 15
Very bad Very good 0
10
20
30
40
50
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
%
How do you evaluate the quality of customer reviews in general?
Very bad Very good
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
%
What do you think of design and the overall presentation of customer reviews?
Strongly disagree
Strongly agree
0
5
10
15
20
25
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
%
There should be more interaction in customer reviews (links to social media, exchanges with
companies):
62
Diagram 16: Overall answers to question 16
Diagram 17: Overall answers to question 17
Diagram 18: Overall answers to question 18
Strongly disagree
Strongly agree
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
%
Companies should filter and control over the customer reviews posted on their website:
Not at all
Totally
0
5
10
15
20
25
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
%
Do you think you have something to gain by posting customer reviews?
63
Diagram 19: Overall answers to Question 19
A gift, promotions or
benefits from the company
23%
Gain recognition and attention
from other users and the
community 2%
Share my experience and
give useful information to
other users 33%
Interact with the company and
give my feedback on products
16%
Complain about a bad
purchase 26%
What would motivate you to post a customer review (CHECK MAXIMUM 2 BOXES)
64
Appendix III: Results per gender
Male respondents
Sample Respondents Number of
modalities
Mode Mode (size) Modalities Size by
modality
Frequency by
modality (%)
Question 1 197 1 Male 197 Male 197.000 100
Question 2 197 6 15-24 107 15-24 107.000 54.315
25-34 54.000 27.411
35-44 16.000 8.122
45-54 10.000 5.076
55-64 3.000 1.523
+64 7.000 3.553
Question 3 197 10 Student 82 Farmer 1.000 0.508
Artisan,
merchant and entrepreneur
10.000 5.076
Executive,
higher
intellectual profession
55.000 27.919
Jobseeker 7.000 3.553
Employee 18.000 9.137
Student 82.000 41.624
Worker 3.000 1.523
Intermediate occupation
3.000 1.523
Retired 7.000 3.553
Intern 11.000 5.584
Question 4 197 4 Once or more per month
89 I already tried in the past
6.000 3.046
Once or more
per year
89.000 45.178
Once or more per month
89.000 45.178
Once a week
or more
13.000 6.599
Question 5 197 5 Often 91 Never 3.000 1.523
Sometimes 42.000 21.320
Rarely 21.000 10.660
Often 91.000 46.193
Always 40.000 20.305
Question 6 197 5 Never 86 Never 86.000 43.655
Sometimes 32.000 16.244
Rarely 72.000 36.548
Often 4.000 2.030
Always 3.000 1.523
Question 7 197 6 5 86 1 Strongly
disagree
2.000 1.015
2 8.000 4.061
3 26.000 13.198
4 41.000 20.812
5 86.000 43.655
6 34.000 17.259
7 Strongly agree
0 0
Question 8 197 7 3 63 1 Strongly
disagree
17.000 8.629
65
2 32.000 16.244
3 63.000 31.980
4 31.000 15.736
5 36.000 18.274
6 15.000 7.614
7 Strongly agree
3.000 1.523
Question 9 197 4 Important 98 Essential 43.000 21.827
Important 98.000 49.746
Unnecessary 44.000 22.335
Normal 12.000 6.091
Secondary 43.000 21.827
Question 10 197 4 Moderately 85 A lot 63.000 31.980
Moderately 85.000 43.147
Not at all 15.000 7.614
A little 34.000 17.259
Question 11 197 5 Quality (content/organ
ization,
evaluation of authors/revie
ws)
100 Accessibility (reviews are
easy to write
and read)
83.000 42.132
Interaction
(with the company,
links to social
medias)
5.000 2.538
Quality
(content/organ
ization, evaluation of
authors/revie
ws)
100.000 50.761
Control (security and
filter by the
company)
6.000 3.046
Design (attractive and
user friendly)
3.000 1.523
Question 12 197 6 6 86 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 5.000 2.538
3 9.000 4.569
4 29.000 14.721
5 58.000 29.442
6 86.000 43.655
7 Strongly agree
10.000 5.076
Question 13 197 7 4 56 1 Strongly
disagree
1.000 0.508
2 7.000 3.553
3 31.000 15.736
4 56.000 28.426
5 49.000 24.873
6 45.000 22.843
7 Strongly
agree
8.000 4.061
Question 14 197 6 5 87 1 Very bad 1.000 0.508
2 4.000 2.030
3 29.000 14.721
66
4 51.000 25.888
5 87.000 44.162
6 25.000 12.690
7 Very good 1.000 0.508
Question 15 197 6 5 74 1 Very bad 0 0
2 17.000 8.629
3 33.000 16.751
4 52.000 26.396
5 74.000 37.563
6 20.000 10.152
7 Very good 1.000 0.508
Question 16 197 7 4 39 1 Strongly
disagree
16.000 8.122
2 29.000 14.721
3 29.000 14.721
4 39.000 19.797
5 39.000 19.797
6 33.000 16.751
7 Strongly agree
12.000 6.091
Question 17 197 7 2 48 1 Strongly
disagree
46.000 23.350
2 48.000 24.365
3 34.000 17.259
4 25.000 12.690
5 23.000 11.675
6 15.000 7.614
7 Strongly
agree
6.000 3.046
Question 18 197 7 2 49 1 Not at all 44.000 22.335
2 49.000 24.873
3 34.000 17.259
4 31.000 15.736
5 21.000 10.660
6 11.000 5.584
7 Totally 7.000 3.553
Question 19 197 6 Share my experience
and give
useful information to
other users
111 A gift, promotions or
benefits from
the company
88 23.592
Gain
recognition and attention
from other
users and the community
11 2.949
Share my
experience
and give useful
information to
other users
111 29.759
Interact with the company
and give my
feedback on products
62 16.622
Complain
about a bad
101 27.078
67
Female respondents
purchase
Other 0 0
68
Sample Respondents Number of
modalities
Mode Mode (size) Modalities Size by
modality
Frequency by
modality (%)
Question 1 196 1 Female 196 Female 196.000 100
Question 2 196 6 15-24 87 15-24 87.000 44.388
25-34 50.000 25.510
35-44 22.000 11.224
45-54 21.000 10.714
55-64 11.000 5.612
+64 5.000 2.551
Question 3 196 9 Student 58 Farmer 0 0
Artisan,
merchant and
entrepreneur
6.000 3.061
Executive,
higher
intellectual
profession
41.000 20.918
Jobseeker 11.000 5.612
Employee 42.000 21.429
Student 58.000 29.592
Worker 2.000 1.020
Intermediate
occupation
13.000 6.633
Retired 9.000 4.592
Intern 14.000 7.143
Question 4 196 4 Once or more per month
100 I already tried in the past
8.000 4.082
Once or more
per year
82.000 41.837
Once or more
per month
100.000 51.020
Once a week or more
6.000 3.061
Question 5 196 5 Often 93 Never 7.000 3.571
Sometimes 53.000 27.041
Rarely 11.000 5.612
Often 93.000 47.449
Always 32.000 16.327
Question 6 196 5 Never 90 Never 90.000 45.918
Sometimes 26.000 13.265
Rarely 70.000 35.714
Often 8.000 4.082
Always 2.000 1.020
Question 7 196 6 5 71 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 5.000 2.551
3 27.000 13.776
4 57.000 29.082
5 71.000 36.224
6 35.000 17.857
7 Strongly agree
1.000 0.510
Question 8 196 7 2 49 1 Strongly
disagree
22.000 11.224
2 49.000 25.000
3 38.000 19.388
4 42.000 21.429
5 28.000 14.286
69
6 10.000 5.102
7 Strongly
agree
7.000 3.571
Question 9 196 5 Important 91 Essential 30.000 15.306
Important 91.000 46.429
Unnecessary 1.000 0.510
Normal 64.000 32.653
Secondary 10.000 5.102
Question 10 196 4 Moderately 85 A lot 56.000 28.571
Moderately 85.000 43.367
Not at all 11.000 5.612
A little 44.000 22.449
Question 11 196 5 Quality
(content/organ
ization, evaluation of
authors/revie
ws)
95 Accessibility
(reviews are
easy to write and read)
78.000 39.796
Interaction (with the
company,
links to social medias)
8.000 4.082
Quality
(content/organization,
evaluation of
authors/reviews)
95.000 48.469
Control
(security and
filter by the company)
13.000 6.633
Design
(attractive and
user friendly)
2.000 1.020
Question 12 196 6 6 69 1 Strongly disagree
0 0
2 4.000 2.041
3 23.000 11.735
4 36.000 18.367
5 41.000 20.918
6 69.000 35.204
7 Strongly
agree
23.000 11.735
Question 13 196 7 4 58 1 Strongly
disagree
4.000 2.041
2 13.000 6.633
3 30.000 15.306
4 58.000 29.592
5 49.000 25.000
6 31.000 15.816
7 Strongly
agree
11.000 5.612
Question 14 196 6 5 77 1 Very bad 0 0
2 1.000 0.510
3 31.000 15.816
4 63.000 32.143
5 77.000 39.286
6 20.000 10.204
7 Very good 4.000 2.041
70
Question 15 196 6 4 76 1 Very bad 0 0
2 12.000 6.122
3 45.000 22.959
4 76.000 38.776
5 42.000 21.429
6 15.000 7.653
7 Very good 6.000 3.061
Question 16 196 7 4 47 1 Strongly disagree
18.000 9.184
2 23.000 11.735
3 18.000 9.184
4 47.000 23.980
5 38.000 19.388
6 34.000 17.347
7 Strongly
agree
18.000 9.184
Question 17 196 7 1 57 1 Strongly
disagree
57.000 29.082
2 39.000 19.898
3 28.000 14.286
4 36.000 18.367
5 14.000 7.143
6 14.000 7.143
7 Strongly agree
8.000 4.082
Question 18 196 7 1 49 1 Not at all 49.000 25.000
2 32.000 16.327
3 28.000 14.286
4 34.000 17.347
5 22.000 11.224
6 14.000 7.143
7 Totally 17.000 8.673
Question 19 196 6 Share my
experience
and give useful
information to
other users
132 A gift,
promotions or
benefits from the company
80 22.346
Gain recognition
and attention
from other users and the
community
5 1.397
Share my
experience and give
useful
information to other users
132 36.872
Interact with
the company
and give my feedback on
products
55 15.363
Complain
about a bad purchase
86 24.022
Other 0 0
71
Appendix IV: Results per age
Young respondents
Sample Respondents Number of
modalities
Mode Mode (size) Modalities Size by
modality
Frequency by
modality (%)
Question 1 194 2 Male 107 Female 87.000 44.845
Male 107.000 55.155
Question 2 194 1 15-24 194 15-24 194.000 100
Question 3 194 9 Student 133 Farmer 1.000 0.515
Artisan, merchant and
entrepreneur
2.000 1.031
Executive,
higher intellectual
profession
13.000 6.701
Jobseeker 7.000 3.608
Employee 15.000 7.732
Student 133.000 68.557
Worker 1.000 0.515
Intermediate
occupation
2.000 1.031
Retired 0 0
Intern 20.000 10.309
Question 4 194 4 Once or more
per year
95 I already tried
in the past
6.000 3.093
Once or more per year
95.000 48.969
Once or more
per month
90.000 46.392
Once a week
or more
3.000 1.546
Question 5 194 5 Often 88 Never 4.000 2.062
Sometimes 44.000 22.680
Rarely 16.000 8.247
Often 88.000 45.361
Always 42.000 21.649
Question 6 194 4 Never 99 Never 99.000 51.031
Sometimes 23.000 11.856
Rarely 70.000 36.082
Often 2.000 1.031
Always 99.000 51.031
Question 7 194 6 5 92 1 Strongly disagree
0 0
2 4.000 2.062
3 20.000 10.309
4 40.000 20.619
5 92.000 47.423
6 37.000 19.072
7 Strongly
agree
1.000 0.515
Question 8 194 7 3 52 1 Strongly
disagree
16.000 8.247
2 38.000 19.588
3 52.000 26.804
4 33.000 17.010
5 39.000 20.103
72
6 11.000 5.670
7 Strongly
agree
5.000 2.577
Question 9 194 4 Important 93 Essential 44.000 22.680
Important 93.000 47.938
Unnecessary 47.000 24.227
Normal 10.000 5.155
Secondary 44.000 22.680
Question 10 194 4 Moderately 75 A lot 69.000 35.567
Moderately 75.000 38.660
Not at all 10.000 5.155
A little 40.000 20.619
Question 11 194 5 Quality
(content/organ
ization, evaluation of
authors/revie
ws)
95 Accessibility
(reviews are
easy to write and read)
84.000 43.299
Interaction (with the
company,
links to social medias)
5.000 2.577
Quality
(content/organization,
evaluation of
authors/reviews)
95.000 48.969
Control
(security and
filter by the company)
6.000 3.093
Design
(attractive and
user friendly)
4.000 2.062
Question 12 194 6 6 86 1 Strongly disagree
0 0
2 5.000 2.577
3 11.000 5.670
4 24.000 12.371
5 50.000 25.773
6 86.000 44.330
7 Strongly
agree
18.000 9.278
Question 13 194 6 5 56 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 9.000 4.639
3 32.000 16.495
4 45.000 23.196
5 56.000 28.866
6 41.000 21.134
7 Strongly
agree
11.000 5.670
Question 14 194 6 5 96 1 Very bad 0 0
2 2.000 1.031
3 24.000 12.371
4 53.000 27.320
5 96.000 49.485
6 18.000 9.278
7 Very good 1.000 0.515
73
Middle-aged respondents
Question 15 194 6 5 63 1 Very bad 0 0
2 14.000 7.216
3 37.000 19.072
4 57.000 29.381
5 63.000 32.474
6 21.000 10.825
7 Very good 2.000 1.031
Question 16 194 7 5 43 1 Strongly disagree
21.000 10.825
2 28.000 14.433
3 23.000 11.856
4 35.000 18.041
5 43.000 22.165
6 32.000 16.495
7 Strongly
agree
12.000 6.186
Question 17 194 7 1 48 1 Strongly
disagree
48.000 24.742
2 45.000 23.196
3 37.000 19.072
4 24.000 12.371
5 19.000 9.794
6 14.000 7.216
7 Strongly agree
7.000 3.608
Question 18 194 7 1 47 1 Not at all 47.000 24.227
2 45.000 23.196
3 35.000 18.041
4 32.000 16.495
5 20.000 10.309
6 8.000 4.124
7 Totally 7.000 3.608
Question 19 194 6 Share my
experience
and give useful
information to
other users
109 A gift,
promotions or
benefits from the company
95 26.316
Gain recognition
and attention
from other users and the
community
12 3.324
Share my
experience and give
useful
information to other users
109 30.194
Interact with
the company
and give my feedback on
products
48 13.296
Complain
about a bad purchase
97 26.870
Other 0 0
Sample Respondents Number of
modalities
Mode Mode (size) Modalities Size by
modality
Frequency by
modality (%)
74
Question 1 142 2 Female 72 Female 72.000 50.704
Male 70.000 49.296
Question 2 142 2 15-24 104 25-34 104.000 73.239
35-44 38.000 26.761
Question 3 142 8 Executive,
higher intellectual
profession
65 Farmer 0 0
Artisan,
merchant and entrepreneur
8.000 5.634
Executive,
higher
intellectual profession
65.000 45.775
Jobseeker 10.000 7.042
Employee 36.000 25.352
Student 7.000 4.930
Worker 4.000 2.817
Intermediate occupation
7.000 4.930
Retired 0 0
Intern 5.000 3.521
Question 4 142 4 Once or more
per month
73 I already tried
in the past
5.000 3.521
Once or more
per year
52.000 36.620
Once or more per month
73.000 51.408
Once a week
or more
12.000 8.451
Question 5 142 5 Often 72 Never 3.000 2.113
Sometimes 35.000 24.648
Rarely 12.000 8.451
Often 72.000 50.704
Always 20.000 14.085
Question 6 142 5 Rarely 59 Never 53.000 37.324
Sometimes 25.000 17.606
Rarely 59.000 41.549
Often 3.000 2.113
Always 2.000 1.408
Question 7 142 6 4 45 1 Strongly
disagree
2.000 1.408
2 6.000 4.225
3 20.000 14.085
4 45.000 31.690
5 43.000 30.282
6 26.000 18.310
7 Strongly agree
0 0
Question 8 142 7 3 40 1 Strongly
disagree
16.000 11.268
2 31.000 21.831
3 40.000 28.169
4 24.000 16.901
5 18.000 12.676
6 8.000 5.634
7 Strongly agree
5.000 3.521
75
Question 9 142 4 Important 68 Essential 24.000 16.901
Important 68.000 47.887
Unnecessary 41.000 28.873
Normal 9.000 6.338
Secondary 24.000 16.901
Question 10 142 4 Moderately 66 A lot 37.000 26.056
Moderately 66.000 46.479
Not at all 10.000 7.042
A little 29.000 20.423
Question 11 142 5 Quality
(content/organization,
evaluation of
authors/reviews)
69 Accessibility
(reviews are easy to write
and read)
58.000 40.845
Interaction
(with the
company,
links to social
medias)
4.000 2.817
Quality
(content/organization,
evaluation of
authors/reviews)
69.000 48.592
Control
(security and
filter by the company)
10.000 7.042
Design
(attractive and
user friendly)
1.000 0.704
Question 12 142 6 6 49 1 Strongly disagree
0 0
2 4.000 2.817
3 17.000 11.972
4 26.000 18.310
5 38.000 26.761
6 49.000 34.507
7 Strongly
agree
8.000 5.634
Question 13 142 7 4 48 1 Strongly disagree
2.000 1.408
2 8.000 5.634
3 27.000 19.014
4 48.000 33.803
5 31.000 21.831
6 22.000 15.493
7 Strongly
agree
4.000 2.817
Question 14 142 7 4 48 1 Very bad 1.000 0.704
2 2.000 1.408
3 27.000 19.014
4 48.000 33.803
5 46.000 32.394
6 15.000 10.563
7 Very good 3.000 2.113
Question 15 142 6 4 51 1 Very bad 0 0
2 12.000 8.451
76
Older respondents
3 31.000 21.831
4 51.000 35.915
5 39.000 27.465
6 6.000 4.225
7 Very good 3.000 2.113
Question 16 142 7 4 40 1 Strongly disagree
9.000 6.338
2 13.000 9.155
3 18.000 12.676
4 40.000 28.169
5 25.000 17.606
6 24.000 16.901
7 Strongly
agree
13.000 9.155
Question 17 142 7 1 37 1 Strongly
disagree
37.000 26.056
2 31.000 21.831
3 19.000 13.380
4 27.000 19.014
5 12.000 8.451
6 13.000 9.155
7 Strongly
agree
3.000 2.113
Question 18 142 7 1 39 1 Not at all 39.000 27.465
2 23.000 16.197
3 19.000 13.380
4 27.000 19.014
5 16.000 11.268
6 6.000 4.225
7 Totally 12.000 8.451
Question 19 393 6 Share my
experience
and give useful
information to other users
88 A gift,
promotions or
benefits from the company
61 23.462
Gain
recognition
and attention from other
users and the
community
2 0.769
Share my experience
and give
useful information to
other users
88 33.846
Interact with
the company and give my
feedback on
products
46 17.692
Complain about a bad
purchase
63 24.231
Other 0 0
Sample Respondents Number of
modalities
Mode Mode (size) Modalities Size by
modality
Frequency by
modality (%)
77
Question 1 57 2 Female 37 Female 37.000 64.912
Male 20.000 35.088
Question 2 57 3 45-54 31 45-54 31.000 54.386
55-64 14.000 24.561
+64 12.000 21.053
Question 3 57 6 Executive, higher
intellectual profession
18 Farmer 0 0
Artisan,
merchant and
entrepreneur
6.000 10.526
Executive, higher
intellectual
profession
18.000 31.579
Jobseeker 1.000 1.754
Employee 9.000 15.789
Student 0 0
Worker 5.000 1.272
Intermediate occupation
7.000 12.281
Retired 16.000 28.070
Intern 0 0
Question 4 57 4 Once or more
per month
26 I already tried
in the past
3.000 5.263
Once or more per year
24.000 42.105
Once or more
per month
26.000 45.614
Once a week
or more
4.000 7.018
Question 5 57
5 Often 24 Never 3.000 5.263
Sometimes 16.000 28.070
Rarely 4.000 7.018
Often 24.000 42.105
Always 10.000 17.544
Question 6 57 5 Never 24 Never 24.000 42.105
Sometimes 10.000 17.544
Rarely 13.000 22.807
Often 7.000 12.281
Always 3.000 5.263
Question 7 57 5 5 22 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 3.000 5.263
3 13.000 22.807
4 13.000 22.807
5 22.000 38.596
6 6.000 10.526
7 Strongly
agree
0 0
Question 8 57 6 4 16 1 Strongly
disagree
7.000 12.281
2 12.000 21.053
3 9.000 15.789
4 16.000 28.070
5 7.000 12.281
78
6 6.000 10.526
7 Strongly
agree
7.000 12.281
Question 9 57 4 Important 28 Essential 5.000 8.772
Important 28.000 49.123
Unnecessary 1.000 1.754
Normal 20.000 35.088
Secondary 3.000 5.263
Question 10 57 4 Moderately 29 A lot 13.000 22.807
Moderately 29.000 50.877
Not at all 6.000 10.526
A little 9.000 15.789
Question 11 57 4 Quality
(content/organization,
evaluation of
authors/revie
ws)
31 Accessibility
(reviews are easy to write
and read)
19.000 33.333
Interaction
(with the
company, links to social
medias)
4.000 7.018
Quality (content/organ
ization,
evaluation of authors/revie
ws)
31.000 54.386
Control
(security and filter by the
company)
3.000 5.263
Design
(attractive and user friendly)
0 0
Question 12 57 5 6 20 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 0 0
3 4.000 7.018
4 15.000 26.316
5 11.000 19.298
6 20.000 35.088
7 Strongly agree
7.000 12.281
Question 13 57 7 4 21 1 Strongly
disagree
3.000 5.263
2 3.000 5.263
3 2.000 3.509
4 21.000 36.842
5 11.000 19.298
6 13.000 22.807
7 Strongly
agree
4.000 7.018
Question 14 57 5 5 22 1 Very bad 0 0
2 1.000 1.754
3 9.000 15.789
4 13.000 22.807
5 22.000 38.596
6 12.000 21.053
79
7 Very good 0 0
Question 15 57 6 4 20 1 Very bad 0 0
2 3.000 5.263
3 10.000 17.544
4 20.000 35.088
5 14.000 24.561
6 8.000 14.035
7 Very good 2.000 3.509
Question 16 57 7 6 11 1 Strongly disagree
4.000 7.018
2 11.000 19.298
3 6.000 10.526
4 11.000 19.298
5 9.000 15.789
6 11.000 19.298
7 Strongly
agree
5.000 8.772
Question 17 57 7 1 18 1 Strongly disagree
18.000 31.579
2 11.000 19.298
3 6.000 10.526
4 10.000 17.544
5 6.000 10.526
6 2.000 3.509
7 Strongly
agree
4.000 7.018
Question 18 57 7 2 13 1 Not at all 7.000 12.281
2 13.000 22.807
3 8.000 14.035
4 6.000 10.526
5 7.000 12.281
6 11.000 19.298
7 Totally 5.000 8.772
Question 19 57 6 Share my
experience and give
useful
information to other users
46 A gift,
promotions or benefits from
the company
12 10.91
Gain
recognition
and attention from other
users and the
community
2 1.82
Share my experience
and give
useful
information to
other users
46 41.82
Interact with
the company and give my
feedback on
products
23 20.91
Complain about a bad
purchase
27 24.55
Other 0 0
80
Appendix V: Results per frequency of use
Low-users
Sample Respondents Number of
modalities
Mode Mode (size) Modalities Size by
modality
Frequency by
modality (%)
Question 1 185 2 Male 95 Female 90.000 48.649
Male 95.000 51.351
Question 2 185 6 15-24 101 15-24 101.000 54.595
25-34 47.000 25.405
35-44 10.000 5.405
45-54 17.000 9.189
55-64 5.000 2.703
+64 5.000 2.703
Question 3 185 10 Student 78 Farmer 1.000 0.541
Artisan,
merchant and entrepreneur
9.000 4.865
Executive,
higher
intellectual profession
26.000 14.054
Jobseeker 9.000 4.865
Employee 27.000 14.595
Student 78.000 42.162
Worker 4.000 2.162
Intermediate occupation
10.000 5.405
Retired 8.000 4.324
Intern 13.000 7.027
Question 4 185 2 Once or more
per year
171 I already tried
in the past
14.000 7.568
Once or more
per year
171.000 92.432
Question 5 185 5 Often 72 Never 6.000 3.243
Sometimes 50.000 27.027
Rarely 15.000 8.108
Often 72.000 38.919
Always 42.000 22.703
Question 6 185 5 Never 95 Never 95.000 51.351
Sometimes 16.000 8.649
Rarely 65.000 35.135
Often 6.000 3.243
Always 3.000 1.622
Question 7 185 7 5 74 1 Strongly
disagree
1.000 0.541
2 9.000 4.865
3 25.000 13.514
4 47.000 25.405
5 74.000 40.000
6 28.000 15.135
7 Strongly
agree
1.000 0.541
Question 8 185 7 3 49 1 Strongly disagree
14.000 7.568
2 39.000 21.081
3 49.000 26.486
81
4 38.000 20.541
5 28.000 15.135
6 13.000 7.027
7 Strongly agree
4.000 2.162
Question 9 185 5 Important 83 Essential 38.000 20.541
Important 83.000 44.865
Unnecessary 1.000 0.541
Normal 49.000 26.486
Secondary 14.000 7.568
Question 10 185 4 Moderately 89 A lot 50.000 27.027
Moderately 89.000 48.108
Not at all 12.000 6.486
A little 34.000 18.378
Question 11 185 5 Quality
(content/organ
ization,
evaluation of
authors/revie
ws)
88 Accessibility
(reviews are
easy to write
and read)
76.000 41.081
Interaction (with the
company,
links to social medias)
5.000 2.703
Quality
(content/organ
ization, evaluation of
authors/revie
ws)
88.000 47.568
Control (security and
filter by the
company)
13.000 7.027
Design (attractive and
user friendly)
3.000 1.622
Question 12 185 6 6 70 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 2.000 1.081
3 13.000 7.027
4 42.000 22.703
5 43.000 23.243
6 70.000 37.838
7 Strongly
agree
15.000 8.108
Question 13 185 7 4 56 1 Strongly
disagree
5.000 2.703
2 11.000 5.946
3 29.000 15.676
4 56.000 30.270
5 42.000 22.703
6 32.000 17.297
7 Strongly agree
10.000 5.405
Question 14 185 7 5 73 1 Very bad 1.000 0.541
2 2.000 1.081
3 29.000 15.676
4 61.000 32.973
5 73.000 39.459
82
6 18.000 9.730
7 Very good 1.000 0.541
Question 15 185 6 4 73 1 Very bad 0 0
2 15.000 8.108
3 28.000 15.135
4 73.000 39.459
5 55.000 29.730
6 11.000 5.946
7 Very good 3.000 1.622
Question 16 185 7 4 49 1 Strongly
disagree
18.000 9.730
2 25.000 13.514
3 19.000 10.270
4 49.000 26.486
5 30.000 16.216
6 28.000 15.135
7 Strongly agree
16.000 8.649
Question 17 185 7 1 48 1 Strongly
disagree
48.000 25.946
2 32.000 17.297
3 29.000 15.676
4 31.000 16.757
5 21.000 11.351
6 16.000 8.649
7 Strongly agree
8.000 4.324
Question 18 185
7 2 41 1 Not at all 36.000 19.459
2 41.000 22.162
3 31.000 16.757
4 36.000 19.459
5 12.000 6.486
6 20.000 10.811
7 Totally 9.000 4.865
Question 19 185 6 Share my
experience
and give useful
information to
other users
113 A gift,
promotions or
benefits from the company
84 24.28
Gain recognition
and attention
from other users and the
community
10 2.89
Share my
experience and give
useful information to
other users
113 32.66
Interact with
the company and give my
feedback on
products
42 12.14
Complain about a bad
purchase
97 28.03
83
Normal-users
Other 0 0
Sample Respondents Number of
modalities
Mode Mode (size) Modalities Size by
modality
Frequency by
modality (%)
Question 1 189 2 Female 100 Female 100.000 52.910
Male 89.000 47.090
Question 2 189 6 15-24 90 15-24 90.000 47.619
25-34 48.000 25.397
35-44 25.000 13.228
45-54 11.000 5.820
55-64 9.000 4.762
+64 6.000 3.175
Question 3 189 9 Executive, higher
intellectual
profession
59 Farmer 0 0
Artisan, merchant and
entrepreneur
6.000 3.175
Executive,
higher intellectual
profession
59.000 31.217
Jobseeker 9.000 4.762
Employee 31.000 16.402
Student 58.000 30.688
Worker 1.000 0.529
Intermediate
occupation
6.000 3.175
Retired 7.000 3.704
Intern 12.000 6.349
Question 4 189 1 Once or more
per month
189 Once or more
per month
189.000 100
Question 5 189 5 Often 102 Never 4.000 2.116
Sometimes 41.000 21.693
Rarely 14.000 7.407
Often 102.000 53.968
Always 28.000 14.815
Question 6 189 5 Never 78 Never 78.000 41.270
Sometimes 35.000 18.519
Rarely 70.000 37.037
Often 4.000 2.116
Always 2.000 1.058
Question 7 189 6 5 77 1 Strongly
disagree
1.000 0.529
2 3.000 1.587
3 23.000 12.169
4 48.000 25.397
5 77.000 40.741
6 37.000 19.577
7 Strongly
agree
0 0
Question 8 189 7 3 47 1 Strongly disagree
23.000 12.169
84
2 37.000 19.577
3 47.000 24.868
4 32.000 16.931
5 32.000 16.931
6 12.000 6.349
7 Strongly agree
6.000 3.175
Question 9 189 4 Important 96 Essential 33.000 17.460
Important 96.000 50.794
Unnecessary 0 0
Normal 53.000 28.042
Secondary 7.000 3.704
Question 10 189 4 Moderately 75 A lot 61.000 32.275
Moderately 75.000 39.683
Not at all 13.000 6.878
A little 40.000 21.164
Question 11 189 5 Quality (content/organ
ization,
evaluation of authors/revie
ws)
95 Accessibility (reviews are
easy to write
and read)
79.000 41.799
Interaction
(with the company,
links to social
medias)
8.000 4.233
Quality
(content/organ
ization, evaluation of
authors/revie
ws)
95.000 50.265
Control (security and
filter by the
company)
5.000 2.646
Design (attractive and
user friendly)
2.000 1.058
Question 12 189 6 6 76 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 6.000 3.175
3 19.000 10.053
4 20.000 10.582
5 52.000 27.513
6 76.000 40.212
7 Strongly agree
16.000 8.466
Question 13 189 6 4 55 1 Very bad 0 0
2 8.000 4.233
3 31.000 16.402
4 55.000 29.101
5 55.000 29.101
6 33.000 17.460
7 Very good 7.000 3.704
Question 14 189 6 5 86 1 Very bad 0 0
2 2.000 1.058
3 27.000 14.286
4 47.000 24.868
85
5 86.000 45.503
6 24.000 12.698
7 Very good 3.000 1.587
Question 15 189 6 5 56 1 Strongly disagree
0 0
2 13.000 6.878
3 45.000 23.810
4 50.000 26.455
5 56.000 29.630
6 21.000 11.111
7 Strongly
agree
4.000 2.116
Question 16 189 7 5 43 1 Strongly disagree
14.000 7.407
2 22.000 11.640
3 26.000 13.757
4 33.000 17.460
5 43.000 22.751
6 39.000 20.635
7 Strongly
agree
12.000 6.349
Question 17 189 7 1 50 1 Not at all 50.000 26.455
2 50.000 26.455
3 29.000 15.344
4 28.000 14.815
5 15.000 7.937
6 12.000 6.349
7 Totally 5.000 2.646
Question 18 189 7 1 52 1 Not at all 52.000 27.513
2 36.000 19.048
3 30.000 15.873
4 24.000 12.698
5 28.000 14.815
6 4.000 2.116
7 Totally 15.000 7.937
Question 19 393 6 Share my
experience and give
useful
information to other users
117 A gift,
promotions or benefits from
the company
76 21.78
Gain
recognition
and attention from other
users and the
community
6 1.72
Share my experience
and give
useful information to
other users
117 33.52
Interact with
the company and give my
feedback on
products
68 19.48
Complain about a bad
purchase
82 23.50
86
Heavy-users
Other 0 0
Sample Respondents Number of
modalities
Mode Mode (size) Modalities Size by
modality
Frequency by
modality (%)
Question 1 19 2 Male 13 Female 6.000 31.579
Male 13.000 68.421
Question 2 19 5 25-34 9 15-24 3.000 15.789
25-34 9.000 47.368
35-44 3.000 15.789
45-54 3.000 15.789
55-64 1.000 5.263
+64 3.000 15.789
Question 3 19 5 Executive,
higher
intellectual profession
11 Farmer 0 0
Artisan,
merchant and
entrepreneur
1.000 5.263
Executive, higher
intellectual
profession
11.000 57.895
Jobseeker 0 0
Employee 2.000 10.526
Student 4.000 21.053
Worker 0 0
Intermediate
occupation
0 0
Retired 1 5.263
Intern 0 0
Question 4 19 1 Once or more per week
19 Once a week or more
19.000 100
Question 5 19 4 Often 10 Never 0 0
Sometimes 4.000 21.053
Rarely 3.000 15.789
Often 10.000 52.632
Always 2.000 10.526
Question 6 19 4 Rarely 7 Never 3.000 15.789
Sometimes 7.000 36.842
Rarely 7.000 36.842
Often 2.000 10.526
Always 0 0
Question 7 19 5 5 6 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 1.000 5.263
3 5.000 26.316
4 3.000 15.789
5 6.000 31.579
6 4.000 21.053
7 Strongly agree
0 0
Question 8 19 5 2 5 1 Strongly
disagree
2.000 10.526
2 5.000 26.316
3 5.000 26.316
87
4 3.000 15.789
5 4.000 21.053
6 0 0
7 Strongly agree
0 0
Question 9 19 4 Important 10 Essential 2.000 10.526
Important 10.000 52.632
Unnecessary 0 0
Normal 6.000 31.579
Secondary 1.000 5.263
Question 10 19 4 A lot 8 A lot 8.000 42.105
Moderately 6.000 31.579
Not at all 1.000 5.263
A little 4.000 21.053
Question 11 19 3 Quality
(content/organ
ization,
evaluation of
authors/revie
ws)
12 Accessibility
(reviews are
easy to write
and read)
6.000 31.579
Interaction (with the
company,
links to social medias)
0 0
Quality
(content/organ
ization, evaluation of
authors/revie
ws)
12.000 63.158
Control (security and
filter by the
company)
1.000 5.263
Design (attractive and
user friendly)
0 0
Question 12 19 5 6 9 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 1.000 5.263
3 0 0
4 3.000 15.789
5 4.000 21.053
6 9.000 47.368
7 Strongly
agree
2.000 10.526
Question 13 19 6 6 11 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 1.000 5.263
3 1.000 5.263
4 3.000 15.789
5 1.000 5.263
6 11.000 57.895
7 Strongly agree
2.000 10.526
Question 14 19 5 4 6 1 Very bad 0 0
2 1.000 5.263
3 4.000 21.053
4 6.000 31.579
5 5.000 26.316
88
6 3.000 15.789
7 Very good 0 0
Question 15 19 5 5 5 1 Very bad 0 0
2 1.000 5.263
3 5.000 26.316
4 5.000 26.316
5 5.000 26.316
6 3.000 15.789
7 Very good 0 0
Question 16 19 6 2 5 1 Strongly
disagree
2.000 10.526
2 5.000 26.316
3 2.000 10.526
4 4.000 21.053
5 4.000 21.053
6 2.000 10.526
7 Strongly agree
0 0
Question 17 19 7 2 5 1 Strongly
disagree
5.000 26.316
2 5.000 26.316
3 4.000 21.053
4 2.000 10.526
5 1.000 5.263
6 1.000 5.263
7 Strongly agree
1.000 5.263
Question 18 19 6 4 5 1 Not at all 5.000 26.316
2 4.000 21.053
3 1.000 5.263
4 5.000 26.316
5 3.000 15.789
6 1.000 5.263
7 Totally 0 0
Question 19 19 4 Share my experience
and give
useful information to
other users
13 A gift, promotions or
benefits from
the company
8 22.222
Gain recognition
and attention
from other users and the
community
0 0.000
Share my
experience and give
useful
information to other users
13 36.111
Interact with
the company
and give my feedback on
products
7 19.444
Complain
about a bad purchase
8 22.222
Other 0 0
89
Appendix VI: Results for review writers
Sample Respondents Number of
modalities
Mode Mode (size) Modalities Size by
modality
Frequency by
modality (%)
Question 1 75 2 Male 39 Female 36.000 48.000
Male 39.000 52.000
Question 2 75 6 15-24 25 15-24 25.000 33.333
25-34 23.000 30.667
35-44 7.000 9.333
45-54 7.000 9.333
55-64 7.000 9.333
+64 6.000 8.000
Question 3 75 9 Executive,
higher intellectual
profession
24 Farmer 0 0
Artisan,
merchant and entrepreneur
4.000 5.333
Executive,
higher
intellectual profession
24.000 32.000
Jobseeker 3.000 4.000
Employee 11.000 14.667
Student 17.000 22.667
Worker 1.000 1.333
Intermediate occupation
2.000 2.667
Retired 8.000 10.667
Intern 5.000 6.667
Question 4 75 3 Once or more per month
41 I already tried in the past
0 0
Once or more
per year
25.000 33.333
Once or more
per month
41.000 54.667
Once a week or more
9.000 12.000
Question 5 75 4 Often 41 Never 13.000 17.333
Sometimes 1.000 1.333
Rarely 41.000 54.667
Often 20.000 26.667
Always 13.000 17.333
Question 6 75 3 Sometimes 58 Sometimes 58.000 77.333
Often 12.000 16.000
Always 5.000 6.667
Question 7 75 6 5 40 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 1.000 1.333
3 7.000 9.333
4 14.000 18.667
5 40.000 53.333
6 12.000 16.000
7 Strongly
agree
1.000 1.333
Question 8 75 7 4 17 1 Strongly 9.000 12.000
90
disagree
2 15.000 20.000
3 15.000 20.000
4 17.000 22.667
5 13.000 17.333
6 5.000 6.667
7 Strongly
agree
1.000 1.333
Question 9 75 4 Important 37 Essential 21.000 28.000
Important 37.000 49.333
Unnecessary 15.000 20.000
Normal 2.000 2.667
Secondary 21.000 28.000
Question 10 75 4 A lot 37 A lot 32.000 42.667
Moderately 31.000 41.333
Not at all 4.000 5.333
A little 8.000 10.667
Question 11 75 5 Quality
(content/organization,
evaluation of
authors/reviews)
46 Accessibility
(reviews are easy to write
and read)
22.000 29.333
Interaction
(with the
company, links to social
medias)
4.000 5.333
Quality
(content/organization,
evaluation of
authors/reviews)
46.000 61.333
Control
(security and
filter by the company)
2.000 2.667
Design
(attractive and
user friendly)
1.000 1.333
Question 12 75 6 6 26 1 Strongly disagree
0 0
2 1.000 1.333
3 2.000 2.667
4 14.000 18.667
5 21.000 28.000
6 26.000 34.667
7 Strongly
agree
11.000 14.667
Question 13 75 6 6 24 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 1.000 1.333
3 10.000 13.333
4 14.000 18.667
5 20.000 26.667
6 24.000 32.000
7 Strongly
agree
6.000 8.000
Question 14 75 5 5 27 1 Very bad 0 0
2 1.000 1.333
91
3 8.000 10.667
4 24.000 32.000
5 27.000 36.000
6 15.000 20.000
7 Very good 0 0
Question 15 75 6 4 22 1 Very bad 0 0
2 4.000 5.333
3 14.000 18.667
4 22.000 29.333
5 22.000 29.333
6 12.000 16.000
7 Very good 1.000 1.333
Question 16 75 7 4 18 1 Strongly disagree
4.000 5.333
2 14.000 18.667
3 10.000 13.333
4 18.000 24.000
5 10.000 13.333
6 12.000 16.000
7 Strongly
agree
7.000 9.333
Question 17 75 7 1 24 1 Strongly
disagree
24.000 32.000
2 11.000 14.667
3 14.000 18.667
4 11.000 14.667
5 6.000 8.000
6 5.000 6.667
7 Strongly agree
4.000 5.333
Question 18 75 7 2 16 1 Not at all 10.000 13.333
2 16.000 21.333
3 8.000 10.667
4 13.000 17.333
5 12.000 16.000
6 6.000 8.000
7 Totally 10.000 13.333
Question 19 75 6 Share my
experience
and give useful
information to
other users
60 A gift,
promotions or
benefits from the company
25 16.779
Gain recognition
and attention
from other users and the
community
4 2.685
Share my
experience and give
useful
information to other users
60 40.268
Interact with
the company and give my
feedback on
products
25 16.779
92
Appendix VII: Results for review readers
Complain about a bad
purchase
35 23.490
Other 0 0
Sample Respondents Number of
modalities
Mode Mode (size) Modalities Size by
modality
Frequency by
modality (%)
Question 1 256 2 Male 131 Female 125.000 48.828
Male 131.000 51.172
Question 2 256 6 15-24 130 15-24 130.000 50.781
25-34 76.000 29.688
35-44 16.000 6.250
45-54 17.000 6.641
55-64 10.000 3.906
+64 7.000 2.734
Question 3 256 9 Student 98 Farmer 0 0
Artisan,
merchant and
entrepreneur
11.000 4.297
Executive, higher
intellectual
profession
56.000 21.875
Jobseeker 15.000 5.859
Employee 41.000 16.016
Student 98.000 38.281
Worker 4.000 1.563
Intermediate
occupation
7.000 2.734
Retired 9.000 3.516
Intern 15.000 5.859
Question 4 256 4 Once or more per month
130 I already tried in the past
3.000 1.172
Once or more
per year
111.000 43.359
Once or more
per month
130.000 50.781
Once a week or more
12.000 4.688
Question 5 256 2 Often 184 Often 184.000 71.875
Always 72.000 28.125
Question 6 256 5 Rarely 104 Never 91.000 35.547
Sometimes 46.000 17.969
Rarely 104.000 40.625
Often 10.000 3.906
Always 5.000 1.953
Question 7 256 6 5 116 1 Strongly
disagree
0 0
2 5.000 1.953
3 18.000 7.031
4 58.000 22.656
5 116.000 45.313
6 58.000 22.656
7 Strongly
agree
1.000 0.391
93
Question 8 256 7 3 69 1 Strongly disagree
19.000 7.422
2 49.000 19.141
3 69.000 26.953
4 45.000 17.578
5 48.000 18.750
6 19.000 7.422
7 Strongly
agree
7.000 2.734
Question 9 256 4 Important 133 Essential 67.000 26.172
Important 133.000 51.953
Unnecessary 52.000 20.313
Normal 4.000 1.563
Secondary 67.000 26.172
Question 10 256 4 Moderately 113 A lot 112.000 43.750
Moderately 113.000 44.141
Not at all 2.000 0.781
A little 29.000 11.328
Question 11 256 5 Quality
(content/organ
ization, evaluation of
authors/revie
ws)
135 Accessibility
(reviews are
easy to write and read)
106.000 41.406
Interaction (with the
company, links to social
medias)
6.000 2.344
Quality
(content/organization,
evaluation of
authors/reviews)
135.000 52.734
Control
(security and
filter by the company)
6.000 2.344
Design
(attractive and
user friendly)
3.000 1.172
Question 12 256 6 6 114 1 Strongly disagree
0 0
2 3.000 1.172
3 19.000 7.422
4 27.000 10.547
5 69.000 26.953
6 114.000 44.531
7 Strongly
agree
24.000 9.375
Question 13 256 7 4 70 1 Strongly
disagree
1.000 0.391
2 11.000 4.297
3 37.000 14.453
4 70.000 27.344
5 69.000 26.953
6 54.000 21.094
7 Strongly agree
14.000 5.469
Question 14 256 6 5 118 1 Very bad 0 0
94
2 1.000 0.391
3 26.000 10.156
4 66.000 25.781
5 118.000 46.094
6 41.000 16.016
7 Very good 4.000 1.563
Question 15 256 6 5 118 1 Very bad 0 0
2 13.000 5.078
3 44.000 17.188
4 82.000 32.031
5 85.000 33.203
6 25.000 9.766
7 Very good 7.000 2.734
Question 16 256 7 6 53 1 Strongly
disagree
25.000 9.766
2 32.000 12.500
3 35.000 13.672
4 46.000 17.969
5 47.000 18.359
6 53.000 20.703
7 Strongly
agree
18.000 7.031
Question 17 256 7 1 82 1 Strongly disagree
82.000 32.031
2 58.000 22.656
3 43.000 16.797
4 35.000 13.672
5 15.000 5.859
6 15.000 5.859
7 Strongly
agree
8.000 3.125
Question 18 256 7 1 93 1 Not at all 57.000 22.266
2 51.000 19.922
3 44.000 17.188
4 40.000 15.625
5 28.000 10.938
6 15.000 5.859
7 Totally 21.000 8.203
Question 19 256 6 Share my
experience and give
useful
information to other users
159 A gift,
promotions or benefits from
the company
115 23.81
Gain
recognition and attention
from other
users and the community
10 2.07
Share my
experience
and give useful
information to
other users
159 32.92
Interact with the company
and give my
feedback on
79 16.36
95
products
Complain
about a bad
purchase
120 24.84
Other 0 0