When I was getting my start as a writer, there was a mildly infamous Amazon troll who left one-star reviews on every book in the indie lit scene. (“Indie” then meant published on small literary presses not self-published on Amazon.) Seemingly a failed writer, he took his frustrations out on authors he’d never met or even read. His “reviews” didn’t even pretend to review the books. Most were poorly written poetry akin to “night sky / smeared with poo poo / mosquito my pee hole? / words r dumb.”
But the fact this troll hadn’t even pretended to read the books didn’t matter, because what mattered was the ratings.
Few people read reviews whether it is Amazon, Yelp, or anywhere else. But shoppers look at ratings. Even worse, Amazon factors ratings into its algorithm meaning bad ratings could directly impact your sales. Back then, everyone tried to rig the rating. Authors would beg friends or family members to leave five-star reviews while haters would one-star their nemeses or authors who annoyed them on Twitter. It was all very stupid in the typical way of social media, but it mattered since Amazon was—and still is—a huge percentage of the book market.
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