Can you remove negative reviews on Amazon? Yes. Is it easy? No.
There are a lot of black hat ways to manipulate reviews on Amazon. There are brands hijacking reviews. There are shady review brokers that Amazon continues to fight.
In other words: manipulating reviews on Amazon is illegal and will get you kicked off the platform.
However, there is also a white hat and legal way to remove negative reviews on Amazon.
In my experience as an Amazon Seller for 10 years. Even if you have a review that should be removed, getting Amazon to do it is quite challenging and I’ve often given up.
Is this worth it?
Moving your product from 4 stars to 4.5 stars is a big deal in your conversion rates.
That means your advertising dollars go further. This is worth the long-term investment if you get it right.
How to remove them inside Amazon's terms of service
It's very simple. You persuade Amazon to remove the review. You don't actually do it. You just point to the offending review, and let them finish.
But... it's not actually that easy. I have personally created cases to remove reviews that should definitely be removed but were transferred around to seller support hell. Where fun goes to die.
I have several just like this:
So that's why I can recommend a SmartScout partner, Tracefuse.
If you're rolling your eyes, because I'm recommending someone. I get it. Listen to the conversation linked below on the podcast and we go into the variety of ways to remove negative reviews. The thing is, knowing what needs to be removed is not enough. Actually, removing them is a persistent process that you need to persuade Amazon to do what they should.
Using AI interpretation combined with experience in detecting patterns that are not logical, they can help Amazon find ways to help themselves by actually removing the negative review that is not compliant once and for all.
Understanding Negative Reviews on Amazon
The prevalence of counterfeit reviews on the Amazon marketplace is rising, posing a severe threat to sellers. It is vital for sellers to understand the concept of falsified reviews, recognize their characteristics, and adopt strategies to protect their brands from the implications of such fraudulent activities.
Fraudulent product reviews are posted on Amazon by users who haven't actually purchased the item they're reviewing. These reviews are typically crafted with the goal of distorting potential buyers' perceptions of a product or brand. The issue with these fabricated reviews is that they can be challenging to spot, as they often mimic genuine reviews and utilize standard phrases.
However, they can be identified by some indicators, such as excessively high ratings for every product, overtly promotional language, and vague comments lacking specifics.
Sellers can flag a suspected counterfeit review to Amazon using the “Report Abuse” button adjacent to each customer review. However, a seller's mere disagreement with a negative review does not make it a candidate for removal.
Only reviews in clear violation of Amazon's policies may be taken down after an investigation.
Types of Amazon Product Reviews That Can Be Removed
Amazon has a number of policies in place to maintain the integrity of its review system. A product review might be removed by Amazon for several reasons, including:
1. Violation of Community Guidelines: If a review violates Amazon's Community Guidelines, it is likely to be removed. These guidelines prohibit reviews that are profane, defamatory, or contain hate speech, among other things.
2. Promotional Content: If a review contains promotional content, it may be removed. This includes reviews that include URLs, email addresses, or any attempt to direct customers to another website or promote a product or service.
3. Irrelevant Content: Reviews must be related to the product itself. Amazon may remove reviews that are not product-specific, such as those that comment on a seller or shipping experience.
4. Inappropriate Content: Reviews that include inappropriate content such as obscenity, discriminatory language, or explicit content are typically removed.
5. Manipulative or Fake Content: Amazon may remove reviews that it suspects are fake or intended to manipulate a product's rating. This includes both positive reviews posted by someone associated with the product (like the manufacturer or seller), and negative reviews posted by a competitor.
6. Incentivized Reviews: Incentivized reviews, where the reviewer has been offered compensation (such as a free or discounted product) in exchange for writing a review, are not allowed unless they are part of Amazon's Vine program. Reviews that Amazon identifies as incentivized and not part of the Vine program may be removed.
7. Personal Information: If a review includes personal information about another user, it is likely to be removed for privacy concerns. This includes full names, phone numbers, addresses, and other sensitive information.
8. Conflict of Interest: Reviews written by individuals with a vested interest in the product, such as the product's manufacturer, creators, or family members, are not allowed and will be removed.
It's important to note that Amazon has sophisticated algorithms and human moderators that monitor and enforce these guidelines. Sellers who believe a review violates these rules can report it for investigation. If Amazon finds that the review does indeed violate its guidelines, it may remove the review.
Working with the service provider TraceFuse, you can get results of negative reviews removed that violate Amazon’s terms of service. They have trained their algorithms to spot duplicates and violating reviews. They know Amazon’s system and how to get them to improve their marketplace for the better.
You can try and figure this out yourself. I tried and gave up. I have submitted several reviews that should be taken down, and it didn't work.
TraceFuse will get more reviews removed than you can. That I believe completely.
I recently hosted them on my podcast and put together this partnership to be a win-win for brands that need this service.
