Almost ten years ago I created the first running shoe review website, Running Shoes Guru. Little did I know that a few years later, this passion project would become my main source of income.

In this article, I will tell you how review websites make their money, why that is a conflict of interest and how to spot the difference between the sites you can trust and the ones you shouldn’t.

Commissions, or how review websites make money

The internet has been able to do something that wasn’t possible before: monetising word of mouth.

Let me introduce you to the concept of Affiliate Marketing.

Affiliate Marketing is one of the main ways of driving sales on the internet. The concept is simple: through special links, online publishers send their visitors to the websites of brands or retailers. If that visitor ends up making a purchase, the retailer will pay a commission for that sale to the publisher that originally sent the visitor.

It is, in theory a win-win-win.

a) It is a win for the online retailer, because they make a sale that they might not have done otherwise, and they only pay a commission for a successful sale, so no risk for them;

b) It is a win for the online publisher, because they can get paid for their content;

c) It is a win for the end consumer, because they found relevant information about the item they wanted to purchase.

Where it all goes wrong

Within these three players, not all interests are aligned.

The publisher and the retailer have all the interest in the reader buying the product.

The retailer can increase the commission they offer, with the goal of getting publishers to write more “convincing” reviews of their products.

The publisher can write overly friendly reviews that entice the reader to buy, rather than honestly informing them about the qualities of the product or services.

It is a very prolific industry

The affiliate marketing industry is worth $6.8 billion, according to a recent study.

Not only there are millions of websites whose only purpose is to get readers to buy stuff (and therefore collecting a commission check), but there are millions of sites that teach wannabe-affiliate-marketers how to trick their readers better.

Just google “how to write affiliate product reviews” and you’ll find lots and lots of people who mastered this craft and are willing to teach it to others. For a fee, obviously.

Are all product reviews bad, fake or misleading?

Luckily, no.

But you need to know how to spot fake or misleading reviews from the honest ones.

The absolute worst: sites that don’t even touch the products they review.

You’ll recognise these sites by their clean and perfect layouts, who will all look the same because they all copy each other in the never ending quest for the best conversion (ie, sending as many people as possible through to the retailers).

One clear giveaway are their product pictures: they are taken directly from amazon or from the websites of the manufacturer. On a running shoe site, they will look like this:

Shoe image on a review site — this image clearly comes from the manufacturer.

On the opposite spectrum, sites that actually obtain and test the products, will have pictures that show the item in “real life” scenarios, and not in a photo studio.

The same shoe, in other colors — shot by a real reviewer.

You can see the difference in these two pictures. They both showcase Nike’s Wildhorse 4, but one was taken from the manufacturer, the other was shot live by a person who run in them. You can still see the mud on the sole and the side of the shoe.

These are the reviews you want. You want people who actually used the product.

But that’s not all you need to look for.

How the product is sourced is almost as important

So, you want a reviewer that actually is an expert in the field and that actually has tested that and many other products.

But how they got the product in the first place makes a ton of difference.

You see, I run a review website. We purchase all the shoes we review. It’s more than 100 shoes a year, for an average price of more than $100. It’s expensive.

We used to receive shoes from the companies. It’s free advertising for them!

But we stopped.

Some companies would write you an email after a review was published, asking (politely) to modify some wording, or not to be so harsh on certain judgement.

Some companies would stop sending you shoes, after their last couple of reviews were anything less than total praise.

Thank you for your review

Honest, but biased

Some reviewers will be honest and tell you they did receive the product from the manufacturer, and some will even tell you they either donate or return the product after they are done with the testing.

This is good, but not good enough.

You see, buying products for reviews cost money. Personally for me, it is by far the largest expense in running my website.

It doesn’t matter if you return the products afterwards — just the fact of having received the product to test for free in the first place saves you a lot of money, which is the same as earning money.

If one particular manufacturer sends me thousands of dollars worth of merchandise every year, it is thousands of dollars that I have in profit instead of expenses. And you don’t want to upset such a generous contributor, therefore your reviews will always try and please that manufacturer.

Can you trust anyone ?

Yes you can. You should. But not everyone.

When you look for a review site, try and look around before you start trusting them. Do you know who the writers are? Are they expert in the field? Do their review actually talk about first-hand use experience with the product? Do the pictures look like they actually used it? Are all the reviews positive, with some very minor “cons” that don’t really detract from the enthusiastic judgement?

Also, is the website sponsored (banners, articles, images…) by one of the companies they are supposed to be neutral about? Can you be honest and independent, when you receive thousands of dollars in advertising from one brand?

Passion and expertise are what matters

Like anywhere else in life, you should take any advice with a grain of salt. You can trust friends and/or experts.

You should trust people who know what they are talking about, possibly people who have a true passion for what they review.

When purchasing something, many people try and find as many review as possible. You should instead try and find a voice you trust and listen to them.

I almost never shop without reading expert reviews — but I try and make sure I am reading an expert, not a marketer.