In recent years, social media users have been watching review content to decide whether to buy that product or not, whereas promotion via advertisement is losing popularity. While I admit a negative aspect, which is bias, I believe this is an overall positive development due to reliance on other customers rather than the producer.
There are several negatives of consumers depending on product reviews on digital media. One of them is that those influencers might be biased. In other words, everybody has their own opinion, thus one’s opinion may often seem biased to others. In this case, if a reviewer posts a video about flaws of a product, others may decide not to purchase that based on what they have watched in the media, even though the product actually has high quality. Eventually, those people would be victims of a biased and stereotypical perspective of just one consumer. For example, I once bought myself headphones online without checking any reviews, and a week later, a viral video had appeared on social media about how bad that exact product was; nevertheless, I had no issues with my headphones.
Even though biased opinion is a negative side, I think this is still a positive development for a single reason. Consumers are usually more honest than the producer. That is to say, the media customer reviewers’ goal is to show whether it is worth it or not. Meanwhile, the companies try to promote their product through advertising, and may sometimes exaggerate or lie about the actual quality and features. Therefore, people trust bloggers who open and check the product on a video, which is, indeed, the proof of honesty, rather than the ads that overvalue their products and try to sell them at any cost. For instance, a worldwide popular car brand, Volkswagen, tried to promote its new diesel models as clean and eco-friendly; however, after a period, consumers started complaining and stating that the ads were exaggerated and misleading.
In conclusion, I admit that some customer reviews might be based on biased opinions. Nevertheless, I believe this is a positive development since most of those reviewers are more reliable than promotional advertisements.