That poll about 80% of people trusting online reviews got me thinking

I stopped at a diner outside Tulsa last month and got talking to the waitress about her Yelp reviews. She said she had 47 five-star ratings but one bad one from a guy who was mad the pie was too sweet. That one review dropped her average to 4.8 and she was stressing over it. I asked if she checked how many people actually read the bad review versus the good ones. She hadn't thought about it that way. Made me wonder, how many of us let one bad number ruin the whole picture? Has anyone else ever looked at the split between positive and negative reviews in a poll?

3 comments

3 Comments

leewood1d ago

Wait, she was stressing over a 4.8 average? That's insane, you'd think a five star average would be the dream, not something to lose sleep over.

nina_taylor1d ago

My buddy runs a coffee shop in Austin and he got a one star review from someone who was mad the parking lot was too crowded on a Saturday. That single bad review haunted him for weeks even though he had 200 positive reviews saying his cold brew was the best in town. He finally put the number of complaints next to the number of compliments on a whiteboard and realized he was letting a tiny fraction of people run his mood.

wesleyflores1d ago

Bruh that waitress story hits different. I once got a 3 star review on my band's demo and spent a whole month obsessing over that one dude who said our bassist was "out of tune" when really it was just the recording quality. Meanwhile 50 other people were like "this slaps" and I didn't even care. That pie thing is proof people freak over bad reviews way too hard. Honestly polls with just an average number feel like a trap, you gotta look at the actual spread to see if it's even real.