Andrea Polk - How To Write Helpful Reviews: Advice from a Top Amazon Reviewer

This book is written to inform and entertain. It is not an ultimate guide for how to become a Top Amazon Reviewer. Anyone who chooses to take the authors advice regarding the writing of helpful Amazon reviews is bound by Amazons review writing policies with no guarantee of having their reviews voted helpful by other Amazon shoppers.

The author is not an employee of Amazon, nor is she an Amazon representative, and it is the readers responsibility to abide by Amazons community standards and policies when writing their own reviews.

All information regarding products, services, and Amazon policies regarding review writing or the Amazon Vine program is current at the time this book is written but subject to change. It is each review writers responsibility to educate themselves as to the current Amazon review writing guidelines and policies before submitting their Amazon reviews.

The author is not responsible for anyones success or failure related to Amazon review writing, and there is no direct or implied promise that review writers following the information and tips shared in this book will attain Top Amazon Reviewer status at any time.

All information shared by the author regarding how to write helpful Amazon reviews is based upon her personal experience in writing over 2,700 reviews posted to Amazon in the past 23 years, and having those reviews voted as helpful over 31,000 times on the Amazon US website.

The author has never been paid to write Amazon reviews, nor has she ever participated in social media groups, accepted vouchers to purchase items for purposes of review, or belonged to any group that provides reviews in exchange for goods, services or monetary compensation, all of which are against Amazons Terms of Service and Community Guidelines.

Text Copyright 2019, 2022

Andrea Polk

All Rights Reserved

This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author / publisher.

To all of the Amazon shoppers who have been kind enough to read my reviews, trust my assessments of the products Ive reviewed, and vote them as helpful.

July 5, 1994, Jeff Bezos founded Amazon, and the face of online shopping was changed forever. The company that started as an online bookseller quickly expanded to include sales of electronics, clothing, furniture and much, much more.

Little did I know that Amazon would also change my life. The way I shop. The way I interact with people online. The products I use on a daily. And what I do as a profession.

On all the Amazon websites worldwide, the plethora of products, books, and digital offerings are reviewed by Amazon customers. Some of the reviews are thoughtful and helpful, and others, well, not so much. But all of the reviews shared on Amazon have the potential to help that items sales skyrocket to the top of the best seller lists or plummet into obscurity amid the millions of competing products.

Amazon reviewers are millions of unknown, yet powerful worldwide influencers, daily impacting not only other Amazon shoppers purchasing decisions but also the fate of all products sold on Amazon. Collectively, a potent group of international strangers who work together to share information.

I am honored to be one of Amazons Top 300 Reviewers in the United States.

After over twenty years of shopping on Amazon and writing over 2,700 reviews with over 31,000 helpful votes, I am among an elite few who get recognized for customer reviews.

I want to thank all the Amazon shoppers who read my reviews, watched my goofy product videos, and have voted my reviews as helpful. You have helped me to get the opportunity to review more significant and better products, and humbled me by seeking my advice and considering my honest opinion.

I hope when you read this book, youll be inspired to write quality reviews to help others too.

I wrote my very first Amazon review in 2000. The review was only a couple of sentences about a product I purchased for my baby daughter. I dont know what possessed me to write that first Amazon product review. Other than I really liked the product, and I wanted to let other shoppers know it was good. That, and I was bored.

Having gone from being a police officer to a stay-at-home mom was difficult for me. I loved spending time with my daughter but craved mental stimulation. I tackled household DIY projects, taught myself how to build a computer, and discovered the joys of online deal shopping.

My deal shopping turned into buying closeout items online at reselling them on eBay. I became an eBay Powerseller by focusing on reselling specific brands (Tumi, Oakley, The North Face) internationally. I researched each item, reading reviews for these items, and incorporating reviews into my eBay product listings.

I did the eBay seller thing for two years, and got out when their policies changed, and I decided it just wouldnt be financially beneficial to keep doing what I was doing. I started a deal website called Savvy Sleuth.

For two years, Savvy Sleuth was a passion project while I worked on paid freelance writing jobs. Unfortunately for me, the website was up against too many established deal sites that had the resources for researching deals and the web traffic that my little site didnt. It wasnt profitable to keep going, so I shut it down.

Putting together Savvy Sleuth from the ground up had taught me a lot of skills I didnt have before I jumped into publishing it. I had gotten the opportunity to share some of my own product reviews on the site. I had also gotten to see the advertising and monetization size of being an Amazon affiliate, which gave me a greater understanding of the company that was changing my life.

I dont remember making a conscious decision to start writing more and more Amazon reviews. However, I did start buying a lot more products on a monthly basis on Amazon because it was convenient for me. And the more I wrote reviews for those products which other Amazon shoppers found helpful, the higher my Amazon reviewer ranking.

It wasnt until Id written about 300 reviews that I realized Id found a new audience for my writing in millions of Amazon shoppers.

A mazon wants you to write reviews to keep products relevant and visible in their search engine. Positive customer reviews add implied value to products and in turn, sellers profit from them. Conversely, negative reviews can tank a products sales, but not always. Let me explain.

If you have two nearly identical products that both have a dozen reviews, youd think the product with the most positive reviews would have a better chance at selling more often than the one with more negative comments. I think that holds true for most retailers, but not necessarily on Amazon. The reason? Amazon customer reviews are a way to build an audience for even more products, capturing an audience who wants to buy what its selling.