After reading Stross's article in the NYTimes, I couldn't stop thinking about the Fairfax county Parktakes service. For those who are not familiar with it, it is a set of services that Fairfax County provides through its recreation centers, whether it be a list of summer camps or 4 week swimming classes, you name it, it is all there. The first time I checked the service was of course, when I had my first son who I wanted to register in a swimming class at 18 months.Well, the registration was easy and I created an account on the site, as a Fairfax County resident. What I noticed then is that instructor names or rankings were not pusblished. To make a long story short, I was not pleased with the class, neither did I think the class was appropriately sized. It ended up being a waste. That experience made me reluctant to register my kid in another swimming class with the county. I was even looking for private lessons, which tend to be expensive, depending on where you end up going.
On the other hand having too many reviews did not help me this last weekend either. I actually looked up a restaurant on Yelp before going there this Saturday. We were told by an Italian friend that it was one of the best Italian places to have pizza (I wont mention the restaurant name so I wont sound like I am writing a review). The restaurant was Ok, acceptable atmosphere and very family oriented. The tables were uncommonly high and shaky, but I was not impressed at all with the food. My point behind this is that in both situations of having no feedback or plenty of it, I did not matter.
I keep on asking myself, if there was a magic formula to know for a fact what's good and what's not. Maybe we will get to a point where we can determine whose review to take into account or not from a personal perspective. I know its true to please everybody, but I guess if all else fails, we go back to the old way of trusting our own instinct, RIGHT!!
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I think this raises a good point - how many reviews can you read, digest and take something away from? Using the reviews on Amazon, what I usually do is review the star summary (how many reviews gave how many stars) if the number of reviewers is substantial - more than 30 or 40. Then I read a few of the posted reviews, and try to separate the emotion from the quantitative things I about which I care. Right now, I'm looking for baby carriers. So if someone specifically mentioned they too have neck problems and that a particular carrier aggravated it, I'll probably read on, but keep an eye out for others mentioning similar problems. It's become a very intuitive thing, whether or not to pay attention to a specific review. Knowing me, of course, I always put less faith in a review with spelling and grammar problems - isn't that silly?
ReplyDeleteHi Samar -
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to restaurants, you might be onto something. Everyone's tastes are extremely different, and unless you know whether or not your tastes are in line with those of the recommendations that you're getting, it can be entirely hit-or-miss. If I'm guessing right, you went to a joint next door to Cactus Cantina? :)
But keep in mind that Yelp (and many other services out there on the internet) offer reviews of more than just the hospitality industry.
When it comes to spending large amounts of money on contracting work (say you need new carpeting, or a new water heater), health services (dentists, doctors), or personal services (a hair stylist, waxing, facials), do think think there's a correspondingly greater value to researching other customers' reviews?
Also, this brings up a corollary question of: Are there people out there that are aware of, but choose to ignore customer reviews in favor of personally experiencing a local business, and why?
Interesting thought exercise that I haven't really put a whole lot of consideration into before. Maybe there -are- people who are aware of Yelp and simply opt to be a consumer without consideration for others' feedback...
Cheers,
-Kevin L, Yelp DC CM