A Newbie's Guide to Epinions: Getting Your Name Out There
May 31 '01
The Bottom Line How does the newbie get established in Epinions? Be an active member!
Epinions is a fun site, but for the newcomer, it can be overwhelming. It's fun to write reviews. It is even more gratifying to see the first string of ratings come on. But at the same time, it can be discouraging to have people rate your ideas as only being Helpful as opposed to being Very Helpful. Or worse yet, you may get a Somewhat Helpful or the dreaded Not Helpful. While it is nice to see those few pennies roll in for your review, that tends to stop pretty quickly.
Having been there not so long ago, I remember the feeling well. While I cannot say that I am doing great, I feel that I have managed to get both feet in the door. What I hope to do with this essay is pass on some of the advice and pearls I have picked up during my time at Epinions.
Exposure
More than anything else, you want exposure. But not only do you want people to know that you exist, you want them to see you as a respected member, not as an abuser.
When you post a new product review, it appears in the New Opinions page. Given the sheer volume of new opinions that come in, your review can be expected to stay on the first page for less than five minutes, ten minutes if you are lucky. Essays tend to stay longer since fewer people write them.
For the newcomer, that means your review gets exposed to the public for less than an hour. In that short time, you want members to read and rate your review well. After all, nothing discourages a new reader than seeing that his peers saw your writing to only be worth a SH rating or worse.
First piece of advice: if you are doing this purely for the money, don't expect to reach that $10 minimum anytime soon! With each member hit returning 1 cent, you need 1000 member hits before you can redeem any money from Epinions. OK, you don't need quite that many with Income Share, but you still need to get quite a large number of people to look at your reviews. If you paint yourself to be an abuser, it can be a looong time before you earn $10 in royalties.
Tip #1: WRITE GOOD REVIEWS!
This is by far the most important tip! You will be judged on the quality of your reviews as determined by other members. People can look at how your reviews are rated without reading any of them by clicking on your profile. A string of poorly rated reviews can lead members to avoid your reviews or just block you altogether. Epinions also rates you based on the ratings you receive. Epinions is a site for helping consumers make decisions. If your review is determined to be not helpful or somewhat helpful, then it will get buried by better reviews, limiting the chance that anybody will read it.
Your review is an argument defending your opinion about a product/topic. You can say that Product X is the greatest thing since sliced bread, but if you don't back up your statement, you can expect to get a lot of SH's or even some NH's. Give details from your own personal experience with the product. Describe the product, how it works, what worked well, and what didn't work so well. If possible, try comparing the product you are reviewing to its competition. That can really drive home your recommendation, and it shows that you know something about the field.
And before you publish your review, check it, make sure that it is something you can be proud of. It doesn't have to be on par with Pulitzer Prize winning material, but the reviews worth reading show a considerable amount of pride and thoughtfulness.
I will discuss in more detail how to write good reviews here. There are numerous sources for you to look at. Just read some of the VH reviews out there and you will get an idea of what constitutes a good review.
Tip #2: Quality Over Quantity
Good reviews take a good deal of time and thought to put together. Most members know this from personal experience. So when they page through the New Opinions pages and see your name stuck on 20 or so reviews, they begin to question your quality immediately. You already have a strike against you, and nobody has even read your review yet!
So spend that extra time on one review. Even if you have a bunch of stellar reviews ready, space them out. Give people a chance to notice them. Instead of rushing to prepare your next stellar review, take a breather and follow Tip #3.
Tip #3: Read and Rate Other People's Reviews
Look at your fellow members' contributions to the site. And don't just click on the review and move on; take the time to read and rate it. This is a great way to get some much needed exposure even after your review has been ousted from the New Opinions page. Many of the writers keep tabs on who is reading their work. If they see a new face rating their reviews, they tend to take a closer look at that person. And if you followed Tip #1, the curious member will be greeted with a profile page that shows some promising reviews. Who knows, in addition to reading and rating some of your reviews, they may put an e-mail alert for your reviews or, better yet, add you to their WOT.
Tip #4: Leave Comments
There are some reviews that have been rated by over 50 members. When Epinions lists the member ratings, it arranges them like a totem pole. Those with the most clout (Advisors and those with large WOTs) are placed on top. Newbies and the like rest on the bottom. So how is anybody going to know that you actually read the review?
Leave a comment. Tell the writer what you liked about the review. Share some of your feelings and experiences. Not only does leaving a comment tell somebody you were there, it shows them that you actually read the review. That leaves a very big impression on writers and gives them reason to take notice of you.
Tip #5: Follow Up on Your Reviews
If somebody is kind enough to leave behind a thoughtful comment, return the favor and read that message. Take the time to respond back via e-mail or another comment. Update your reviews if necessary. This leaves a favorable impression since it shows that you care about your writing.
Tip #6: Don't Be Discouraged
Getting established in Epinions does not happen overnight. Getting a foothold in Epinions is tough, especially since there are a lot of well established reviewers with large webs of trust (WOT). Reviews from newbies tend to disappear into the dark recesses of the Epinions server, overshadowed by the many Advisors and other prominent Epinions members. It can take more than a couple of good reviews before people start to really take notice of you.
If members rate your reviews SH or NH, please don't go and revenge rate them; you can only cause more trouble for yourself. If you thought you wrote a solid review, send those members a message asking about what they didn't like and what you can do to make it better. After all, if they read your review, they should have reasons for giving you the SH or NH rating.
There are other tips to give such as how to choose topics to write about and so on, but the point of this essay was to cover the basics. You could write thousands of pages to cover everything about Epinions!
In Summary
How does the newbie get established in Epinions? Be an active member! If you care about the site and your work, people will start to care about you. Contribute good, informative reviews to the site. Read, rate, and comment on your peers' writings. Follow up your own work. By doing this, you will be building a solid foundation in Epinions.
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Epinions.com ID:
gorocco
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 - Top 1000 |
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Location: Stony Brook, NY
Reviews written: 91
Trusted by: 59 members
About Me:
Closing in on review 100
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