Are Online Restaurant Reviews Trustworthy?

You have all been to restaurants to find that it is nothing like the reviews online. This is because anything that someone rates online is inherently biased, and shouldn’t be completely trusted. A customer’s expectations play a huge role in how they rate the restaurant. If you’re trying to find a cheap place to get a sandwich, then your expectations will be lower, and you’re more likely to give a positive review, than if you went to a higher end mezza grill for the ambiance and fine cuisine.

It becomes hard to decipher bad reviews with legitimate concerns and quality reviews with fair commentary. To find the best online reviews, you must sift through the comments, follow critics who give honest feedback and understand that one person’s three-star rating is another person’s five.

Restaurant

The best thing to do is to read through the commentary and ignore the heavily slanted reviews. Restaurants often host promotions that offer a free item for positive online reviews. This is great for the restaurant, but it makes it hard for you to know if it’s worth checking out. On the opposite end of the spectrum, unhappy customers leave reviews that are much worse than the reality of the situation.

If you are reading through comments and find a one star rating when the average is four stars, then that customer most likely had a negative experience and is using this as a platform to publicly state their frustration. These reviews should only deter you if there are several people with similar experiences. Everyone has bad days that can both affect how the restaurant treats customers, and how customers treat the restaurant.

Social media has become so engrained in our society that we can now follow people on restaurant review websites. Yelp is one of the most popular restaurant review websites that allows you to find people and read their past reviews. This is great for the foodies because they will be able to connect with other foodies who leave honest feedback for restaurants. Critics aren’t the only people to leave thoughtful reviews for companies.

There are many weekend warriors out there with a trained palate and the ability to write about food so well it will make your mouth water. Connect with others, and find the best restaurant for your taste buds!
When you’re reading through reviews it’s important to understand that someone can hate your favorite restaurant, and that’s okay. Each person has unique taste buds and their three-star review is another person’s five. In fact, the five-star rating system has become obsolete as many major companies are moving away from a scale of five, to a scale of 10, or 100. This allows the customers to more accurately rate an item, and not arbitrarily rating the item in increments of 20 percent.

Article Submitted By Community Writer

Today's Top Articles:

Scroll to Top