drtbear1967
Musclechemistry Board Certified Member
by Matt Weik
You’re in search of a new supplement to try… What do you do? Look for reviews on new products, right? What if I told you most of the reviews out there today are fake and paid for by supplement companies? One of the largest online supplement retailers is the worst offender, and they don’t seem to care. Their excuse is “everyone is doing it these days”. What kind of answer is that? I won’t throw out their name, but it’s not too hard to figure it out.
I noticed these fraudulent reviews back when I was working for a supplement company and growing our business on their website. I would notice that a company would launch a product on this site and the very same day that company would have reviews touting the product is a 10/10 and the best product they have ever used. HUH? How in the hell could they possibly launch a product, order it that same day, receive their package the same daythey ordered, try the product, already get results, and post a review? Obviously they can’t. Herein lies the problem.
Supplement companies are paying people to give positive reviews on sites like the one I described above. Not only that, but some companies have taken it to a new extreme. They have figured out that people will only take their product review seriously if they purchase the product and have a “verified buyer” tag next to their user name. So guess what companies are doing? They are having consumers as well as their athletes buy the product on the website in question, wait until they receive shipping confirmation, and then they can log into the site and review the product with “verified buyer” under their user name. So this is a workaround to the non-verified buyer reviews. So what else does the company do? They give the person who they asked to review the product a full refund. How shady can things get?
Who can you trust these days? Honestly, it’s impossible to say anymore. I’ve purchased several products based off of reading positive reviews and have been totally disappointed. People were making it seem like these products were the greatest thing since sliced bread when all they did was either send me to the bathroom or do nothing at all. What a waste of money! And who has time to spend the day on the toilet?
Do yourself a favor, stop reading reviews and start becoming more educated about ingredients, efficacious dosages of the ingredients, what research is saying about certain ingredients, and base your purchasing habits off of that. Unless you want to throw your money at something and hope it works, this is the route to take when decision-making on the next new product you’re planning to try.
You’re in search of a new supplement to try… What do you do? Look for reviews on new products, right? What if I told you most of the reviews out there today are fake and paid for by supplement companies? One of the largest online supplement retailers is the worst offender, and they don’t seem to care. Their excuse is “everyone is doing it these days”. What kind of answer is that? I won’t throw out their name, but it’s not too hard to figure it out.
I noticed these fraudulent reviews back when I was working for a supplement company and growing our business on their website. I would notice that a company would launch a product on this site and the very same day that company would have reviews touting the product is a 10/10 and the best product they have ever used. HUH? How in the hell could they possibly launch a product, order it that same day, receive their package the same daythey ordered, try the product, already get results, and post a review? Obviously they can’t. Herein lies the problem.
Supplement companies are paying people to give positive reviews on sites like the one I described above. Not only that, but some companies have taken it to a new extreme. They have figured out that people will only take their product review seriously if they purchase the product and have a “verified buyer” tag next to their user name. So guess what companies are doing? They are having consumers as well as their athletes buy the product on the website in question, wait until they receive shipping confirmation, and then they can log into the site and review the product with “verified buyer” under their user name. So this is a workaround to the non-verified buyer reviews. So what else does the company do? They give the person who they asked to review the product a full refund. How shady can things get?
Who can you trust these days? Honestly, it’s impossible to say anymore. I’ve purchased several products based off of reading positive reviews and have been totally disappointed. People were making it seem like these products were the greatest thing since sliced bread when all they did was either send me to the bathroom or do nothing at all. What a waste of money! And who has time to spend the day on the toilet?
Do yourself a favor, stop reading reviews and start becoming more educated about ingredients, efficacious dosages of the ingredients, what research is saying about certain ingredients, and base your purchasing habits off of that. Unless you want to throw your money at something and hope it works, this is the route to take when decision-making on the next new product you’re planning to try.
