Review challenge: Make a maker's day

Published on

May 3rd, 2023

Author

Rules of the game 🎲

Over the course of two weeks, reviews that you leave will enter you into a drawing to receive a special Product Hunt swag gift. Ten winners will be chosen from eligible participants and announced on 5/19. Jump in and make a maker’s day.

How to play (it’s simple)

Verify your email
Add a profile picture
Leave 3 high-quality reviews on products you have used before 12:00 AM PST on May 17, 2023.

Details

Participants must have a registered account on Product Hunt.
Reviews must meet our definition of a high-quality review (read below).
Reviews must be on products you’ve tried.
Reviews need to be authentic and honest, whether positive or negative.
Reviews must adhere to Product Hunt's content guidelines.
Duplicate reviews or reviews that violate the guidelines will not be considered for entry.
Your reviews must be made between May 3, 2023, and May 17, 2023, before 12:00am PT.

Why reviews matter and how to write a good one

You’ve probably heard it said before: feedback is a gift. As part of the Product Hunt community, your knowledge and passion for products are highly valued. When you take the time to review a product, it helps both makers and future consumers of the product.

For makers, it’s obvious that a good review can highlight the value of their product in a really authentic way that doesn’t seem like a sales pitch. Constructive feedback doesn’t hurt, either. The ability to respond to a not-so-happy customer and share what they’re doing to improve demonstrates good customer service and allows them to iterate and move forward.

Reviews are also important to people who are researching a new product. Think about all the times you’ve gone down a rabbit hole of reviews before making a decision. Seeing what others have to say (for better or worse) is really helpful and can sway you towards or away from trying something new.

So we agree that reviews are powerful. That’s why it’s really disheartening to makers when they get low-quality reviews. Avoiding these common traps will make sure you’re leaving a helpful review.

Trap #1: No context reviews

Reviews without context, even with five stars, are just not helpful.

Trap #2: Inauthentic reviews

It’s also frustrating for makers to see a review that was clearly not written by a person. There’s nothing wrong with using AI to help you organize your thoughts. But the feedback should be authentic and not copy-pasted from AI.

Trap #3: A$$hole reviews

The ones that are just negative and contradictory without the intention of helping the maker improve. Suffice it to say purely negative feedback without context is not helpful to the maker or the greater community. Don’t be that person.

At the same time, writing a constructive review of a product you use doesn’t have to be daunting, either.

Here are a few tips to make your review as helpful as possible to the makers and the overall Product Hunt community:

Share your context: Who are you, what’s your role, along with anything unique about your specific needs as a user?

Explain your pain point: What were you hoping the product would be able to do or solve?

Share the good: What did you like or appreciate about your experience?

Share what you’d like to see next from the team (this is a good time to share a feature idea or what else you would need to see to use the product more regularly)

How to leave a review

To leave a review, you need to head to a product's hub. Look for a link in the producthunt.com/products/[product_name] format. Scroll down the page and go to the Reviews section, where you'll see a "Leave a review" button. Here's what you should look for:

Great examples

Good luck!

- The Product Hunt team 🧡

Comments (45)

Duarte Martins @duarteosrm

I've added my three reviews. I think programmes like these are great to incentivise the genuine user base of product hunt. It's a great community but you have to try and avoid having it be swarmed with bots or users who aren't actually first-adopters or interested in tech products.

May 3, 2023