Perceived helpfulness of online consumer reviews: The role of message content and style

TLDR

Online consumer reviews enable study of how content and style affect perceived helpfulness. The study had consumers evaluate real online reviews for their usefulness in simulated shopping tasks. Moderate review length, positive product evaluations, non‑evaluative product details, reviewer information, and entertaining style (e.g., slang, humor) enhance perceived helpfulness, while spelling and grammatical errors reduce it, indicating that factors beyond product information influence review usefulness. © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Abstract

ABSTRACT The rise of online reviews written by consumers makes possible an examination of how the content and style of these word‐of‐mouth messages contribute to their helpfulness. In this study, consumers are asked to judge the value of real online consumer reviews to their simulated shopping activities. The results suggest the benefits of moderate review length and of positive, but not negative, product evaluative statements. Non‐evaluative product information and information about the reviewer were also found to be associated with review helpfulness. Stylistic elements that may impair clarity (such as spelling and grammatical errors) were associated with less valuable reviews, and elements that may make a review more entertaining (such as expressive slang and humor) were associated with more valuable reviews. These findings point to factors beyond product information that may affect the perceived helpfulness of an online consumer review. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.