Write your review as a decision aid for others
Bear in mind that other users will be making product choices based
on your review. Therefore, try and cover all aspects that will be
relevant to their decision without repeating the product specificiations
found in the product comparison tables. Make it clear whether, and
for whom, you would recommend the product.
Describe your OWN experience
Readers want to hear about products and services from the consumer's
perspective. By structuring your review around your own experiences,
you will better enable them to judge what the product is like to
use and whether it would be appropriate to their own needs.
Tell readers both what you like and what you
dislike about the product
Try and make your review as balanced and objective as possible by
describing both sides of the story. This will make sure that your
review is still helpful, even if your reader's requirements are
entirely different to your own. For example, if you are reviewing
a television set which had poor sound quality and was thus the wrong
choice for you, please don't omit to mention that the picture quality
was excellent, because this may be your reader's main requirement.
Write in a factual, clear and well-structured
way
A well-reasoned argument, built on the evidence of your own experiences,
will make your evaluation of the product or service easier to read
and understand. Make sure that you always explain both what you
think of the product, and WHY you think it.
Use accurate grammar, spelling, capitalization
and punctuation
This will make your reviews easier to read and more accessible.
Writing reviews of consistently high quality will increase your
readership, so why not prepare the text in a word processing programme
with a spell checker?
Post your review in the right place
Placing your review in the right section will ensure its relevance
to the page content and increase your chances of scoring a high
rating. Should you have inadvertantly posted your review in the
wrong section, or should you believe that an additional section
needs to be created, please
contact us.
Do not use headings and bold / italics excessively!
To guarantee that a review is clear and easy to read you should not make excessive use of headings
or formatting in bold and italics. Please also read the hints in the chapter Top of Page
What you must avoid when writing a review
Do not plagiarise any part
of your review
Plagiarising other users' reviews will lead to your membership being
revoked and your Ciao account balance lost.
Do not post content that violates
our site rules
All offensive, obscene, sexist, rascist or other dishonest or illegal
content is prohibited. Writing reviews that contain such content,
or that violate our site rules in any other way, will lead to the
revocation of your membership.
Do not use your review to advertise
your own or third party services
Reviews must not be used as free advertising: please limit your
comments to an evaluation of the product or service in question.
Though you may acknowledge information sources, you may not use
your review to promote them.
Do not use your review to
discuss other reviews or members
Comments concerning other reviews should be written as "Comments"
- your own review should exclusively concern the product or service
you are evaluating. Comments directed at other members, as far as
these are not personal or offensive, should be left in members'
individual guestbooks.
Do not publish the same review
more than once
Re-publishing the same review is useless to other users as it provides
no new content. Re-submitting a review to increase reads is not
acceptable and may lead to site penalties.
