Testing improvements to the rating & review system

[dereck_s]

2 minutes ago, donnovan86 said:

That's the reason why they are changing things. They are making it a bit harder for people to obtain 5 star reviews. That will potentially make it easier for buyers, so there is a focus here on streamlining the buyer experience. However a lot of sellers are disappointed that it's all at their expense and in some cases they might have an unfair number of stars, even if the buyer really liked how they worked.

I tend to agree with their criticism although I'm a seller so of course there's at least some bias here. I've always felt like the 2 biggest downfalls with Fiverr was their lack of transparency and how harsh any negative review or metric can effect you.

[donnovan86]

1 hour ago, dereck_s said:

how harsh any negative review or metric can effect you.

Well those won't go away, these public review changes will be on top of the existing stuff. 

[iamsulok]

Hi @Kesha

The order of review system should be like:
Very Poor > Poor > Average >  Good > Very Good
⭐️  = 1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5
 

what is missing is: ( Good ) . 
and Exceptional need to be excluded , because when a buyer consider delivered product is exceptional, he/she writes comments happily . 
people consider anything exceptional is very rare. 
and if exceptional is with weight=5, it will be unfair to sellers,
because even after providing accurate service what is asked for wont be considered as exceptional, buyer only thinks very good is the highest compliment.

i would request fiverr team to re consider this before it is too late! 

thanks !

[mandyzines]

15 hours ago, donnovan86 said:

I would recommend to have all the necessary info in the gig description. By the time they get to the gig requirements, that means they already placed the order

I've noticed that some buyers don't even read the descriptions, which is why I asked:

16 hours ago, mandyzines said:

does anyone have something in their order requirements asking whether or not buyers have read and understand the gig description and FAQ's....

On one hand, It would be nice to have a higher character allotment in the descriptions but on the other, hand some buyers don't even read the descriptions.

Edited December 17, 2023 by mandyzines

[donnovan86]

19 minutes ago, mandyzines said:

On one hand, It would be nice to have a higher character allotment in the descriptions but on the other, hand some buyers don't even read the descriptions.

Most people don't, unfortunately. The worst situation is when you have a lower price. As you raise your prices, people become more focused on reading and performing their due dilligence, which means they read your description, check packages, etc. 

As I said earlier, once a buyer sees the order requirements, the order is already being placed.. we should have a pop up where people agree they read the gig description and agree to the terms stated by the seller. Other than that honestly, there's nothing we can do other than stuff our gig description or gig packages with info, and as you said, that's limited by a certain word count. 

[mandyzines]

On 12/12/2023 at 4:40 AM, Kesha said:

@greg_vo2020, you bring a valuable perspective to this new system and we appreciate you voicing your thoughts! We will keep them in consideration for future updates!  

I agree with @greg_vo2020, at least in terms of voice over. For example, I have a client from Turkey who, during our last exchange, told me that she would be able to bring me more work if I lowered my rates. What I was delivering that day was a 65-word voice over with commercial rights for $20. Her view was that I should adjust my prices to Turkey rates because it's such a poor country--and (get this) because I'm a nice person.

This was our 13th order, and I always wondered why she showered me with compliments beyond my services and came to me right about the time I had raised my prices for a lengthy exchange about the terrible political, social, and economic conditions in her country.

Anyway, so, I tried to offer her a little perspective. There are two sites that the industry as a whole uses to determine rates. I couldn't find Turkey in the drop down list, so I used Egypt as an example for a 30-second internet ad here: https://rates.gravyforthebrain.com/ .

$125 without usage rights factored in is exponentially higher than the $20 I'm charging here.

Of course, she went back to the me-being-a-nice-person-who-ought-to-consider-otherwise thing.

Say she's not at all a manipulative person with opaque intentions. She will always consider anything beyond $10 for a 30-second spot to not be a value for her money, and if she answers truthfully for every review then (at least closer) to the bowels of Fiverr I go.

However, I've always suspected that she's drop servicing what I create for her. It's a known phenomena on Fiverr. Boy, that opens up a can of worms in relation to reviews. 

Will the sellers with rates that are more profitable for drop servicers get better reviews?

That's just one worm wiggling out of the can.

 

Edited December 17, 2023 by mandyzines

[levinewman]

In a fun, very ironic twist, one of my long-time customers left me a "4-Star" review. I was curious but didn't say anything at all and just kept going on about my day. Later that same day they sent me, "Hey, Levi, I'm sorry about the 4-star review. I didn't leave that. I left you full 5-stars and the system changed it to 4-stars. I reached out to customer service to have it changed to 5 stars, since it was the system and not me."

So, even the customers are baffled when the reviews they actually leave aren't the reviews the system is giving people. 

It's fine. It's my last few months here anywhere before I do something else. Fiverr has become too stressful for sellers, even for people who have done exceptionally well here. (Speaking from my own perspective)

[donnovan86]

2 hours ago, levinewman said:

I didn't leave that. I left you full 5-stars and the system changed it to 4-stars. I reached out to customer service to have it changed to 5 stars, since it was the system and not me."

What's interesting is that people can see the number of stars before they press Publish. So most likely what happened is your client placed stars by mistake and didn't realize it, as it does happen sometimes. But as far as I saw, they show you the final rating before you publish it (as a buyer).

2 hours ago, levinewman said:

It's fine. It's my last few months here anywhere before I do something else. Fiverr has become too stressful for sellers, even for people who have done exceptionally well here. (Speaking from my own perspective)

That's sad to hear.. but I can understand. There are lots of new metrics, things like reviews for canceled orders, etc. All of that is very stressful to deal with, and I didn't even talk about private reviews where we have no idea what buyers say, nor do we receive any feedback, we just see orders and messages slowing down..

[rawque_gulia]

Lmao, isn't this just fabulous? Got my life's first-ever 4-star review today. And guess what's interesting?

- The buyer generously sprinkled a $28 tip
- The buyer was extremely pleased with the results (was clear in chats).
- And he was a returning client, too! 🙂🙂

[ajpirela27]

First review of the new normal. What do we know about the 4.2 threshold to maintain level? They will lower that? Or should I prepare myself to have no badge in 3 months? 😂

[ahunyady]

The new system looks like Fiverr is encouraging buyers to leave 3.0 or 4.0 for acceptable jobs but keeping the threshold for demotion ABOVE this. The system has always encouraged people to leave a 5.0 unless the other party does something wrong. The thresholds need to keep up with changes to the rating system.

These changes may make sellers hesitant to accept jobs from buyers who are new to the platform as they don’t know they should leave 5 for a good job.

Edited December 18, 2023 by ahunyady

[ajpirela27]

16 minutes ago, ahunyady said:

The new system looks like Fiverr is encouraging buyers to leave 3.0 or 4.0 for acceptable jobs but keeping the threshold for demotion ABOVE this. The system has always encouraged people to leave a 5.0 unless the other party does something wrong. The thresholds need to keep up with changes to the rating system.

Maybe the plan is to wipe off the level system without dismantling it and boost some sellers with good overall metrics within their niche but without badges, just Pro and the rest. But one thing is for sure, it is practically impossible to keep badges with the current system, and I think they will not change that.

[visualstudios]

2 hours ago, ahunyady said:

These changes may make sellers hesitant to accept jobs from buyers who are new to the platform as they don’t know they should leave 5 for a good job.

It doesn't even matter if they're used to the old system. Under this new one it can be hard to leave a 5 star review even if you want to, apparently (judging by what some people have commented). 

[zerlina84]

Aaand my first new review is in! Apparently he loved all of it but the "value for money" was 4 stars. Are you telling me I should lower my prices, Fiverr? Shouldn't you want to make MORE money, Fiverr?

What a stupid choice of criteria. Get rid of the "value for money" and I'm on board with the emoji nonsense. Otherwise, this is just stupid. Rant over.

[vibronx]

14 minutes ago, zerlina84 said:

Aaand my first new review is in! Apparently he loved all of it but the "value for money" was 4 stars. Are you telling me I should lower my prices, Fiverr? Shouldn't you want to make MORE money, Fiverr?

Wow... I would be so livid if it were me. I thought they wanted to focus more on business buyers... the Fiverr Pros. And they have also just recently increased the number of Fiverr Pro sellers. This does not seem logical.

I'm suddenly very worried about the order I have in queue from a new buyer.

Edited December 19, 2023 by vibronx

[sripra9007]

@Kesha - Hi, I hope you (and the relevant team(s)  are checking the messages on this thread and giving some appropriate thoughts on the feedback shared above.

Since the thread subject says "testing", would like to ask you whether this testing is going to end & the changes rolled back anytime soon? (so we sellers can feel relieved)

Or whether it's going to stay as it is for ever?

If you could please share some updates on this, it would be much appreciated.

 

Edited December 19, 2023 by sripra9007
adding clarity

[donnovan86]

26 minutes ago, sripra9007 said:

Since the thread subject says "testing", would like to ask you whether this testing is going to end anytime soon? (so we sellers can feel relieved)

Or whether it's going to stay as it is for ever?

Well once the testing is over, most likely the new system becomes the norm, with a few changes that they noticed they should do after seeing any testing results. So.. I wouldn't rush. It's the end of the year now so.. most likely the new system will be used starting with January. I don't see developers rushing to finish stuff during the holidays when most people are free anyway.

 

[priyank_mod]

On 12/15/2023 at 10:07 PM, sripra9007 said:

After 3.5 years of working here on Fiverr, after getting 1000+ ALL 5* reviews (except just one which was done by a customer by mistake), today I received my 1st 4* review on an order, credit goes to this Testing. As you can see from my profile, I have ALL 1000+ 5* reviews on all orders , if I receive a 4* due to some ongoing testing, it's not something desirable. 

Unhealthy obsession with earning 5-star ratings is pretty much the thing Fiverr is trying to do away with.🥲 It was a nice thing to score 100/100 in a school exam but this is real life. 

For a buyer, there is NO way to differentiate between sellers with 1000/200 or even 25 5-star ratings. Alot of us have gamed this system over a period of time and it is a good thing that there will be some demarcation between good<better<best sellers. 

 

PS This is similar to 10th board grades - way too many mediocre people scoring above 75/80 or 90 percentage and no way to differentiate between them. 

[sripra9007]

4 minutes ago, priyank_mod said:

Unhealthy obsession with earning 5-star ratings is pretty much the thing Fiverr is trying to do away with.🥲 It was a nice thing to score 100/100 in a school exam but this is real life. 

For a buyer, there is NO way to differentiate between sellers with 1000/200 or even 25 5-star ratings. Alot of us have gamed this system over a period of time and it is a good thing that there will be some demarcation between good<better<best sellers. 

 

PS This is similar to 10th board grades - way too many mediocre people scoring above 75/80 or 90 percentage and no way to differentiate between them. 

Lol so are you saying that if you start receiving 4 stars on all your orders (means Very Good), you will be happy?

"Unhealthy obsession" - nah not at all, it's something that was designed/built by Fiverr, not sellers like us. If a person has less than 5 (on public / private reviews) they get almost out of work. Moreover, if you remember till few months back, the cutoff rating for levels etc was 4.7. So unless a person gets a 5, they were out of competition.

Honestly speaking, if I get a subpar rating because I didn't perform well, I would happily accept it. But if I get a lesser rating when I delivered super work and the client acknowledges that as well, however, due to system mechanism the rating becomes 4, THAT'S A PROBLEM.

Imagine the situation of a newer sellers - if they start getting "Very Good" / 4* on all their orders.

All of a sudden overnight they try to change an age-old system - obviously it will cause problems. If some changes have to be done at such a mass scale, it has to be well thought of, properly planned and executed, and not implemented like a TESTING, and not like a scale of "Average" and then straight to "Very Good".

 

[miiila]

On 12/7/2023 at 8:16 AM, emmaki said:

Also, what is value for money doing as a review metric on a platform which wants to go upmarket? 

[...]

 couldn't tell you how I arrived at the numbers. I clicked the happy faces! Why isn't the review happy?

That. Hard to find something that's more subjective, vague, and non-descriptive of a Gig's quality, really.

12 hours ago, visualstudios said:

Under this new one it can be hard to leave a 5 star review even if you want to, apparently (judging by what some people have commented). 

(Reminds me of the "Are you sure you want to press this button (leave x stars)? If you press this button, the thing you wanted to do by pressing this button will actually happen." Depending on my client, when translating such button texts, I try to infuse some humour there instead of letting it sound as if the person about to press the button might be out of their mind. As from my experience, yes, I wanted to press that button in 99.99% of cases. However, for Fiverr, I can't quite decide if this would be a bad thing, making people think, hm, if they ask me if I really want to leave 5 stars, maybe I shouldn't, after all?" just so, or a good thing, so that people who thought 1 star was the best rating, or pressed 4 accidentally on their tiny phone screen, get a moment to reconsider or correct their choice.)

1 hour ago, vibronx said:

I thought they wanted to focus more on business buyers... the Fiverr Pros. And they have also just recently increased the number of Fiverr Pro sellers. This does not seem logical.

And that.

If pro, then pro, please.

 

Glad to read that the also rather un-pro "would recommend to a friend" is gone, though! Without a doubt, there have been lots of people over the years who clicked low stars for that, because none of their friends would ever need such a service, or they didn't have any friends anyway. 

I wonder if a completely different system, more buyerside-focused, might be more useful for buyers. Just one example, when a seller has buyers who keep buying, since years, but don't leave feedback at all, that might be more useful to know for them than seeing a dozen different buyers left a 5-star feedback for another seller but never returned and then went to a different seller for the same service (this specific thing only works for services that people typically don't just need only once in their life, obviously; generally, maybe it might also be worth a few thoughts if different niches or verticals might also call for different evaluation points.

I also think that if Fiverr ask buyers for their important criteria, it might rather be things like quality of the delivery, reliability, professionalism in dealing with revision requests, flexibility, taking initiative, etc., than "value for money". I might be mistaken, though, maybe Fiverr asked buyers, and "value for money" came out top. Anything is possible, especially in the current economy.

Edited December 19, 2023 by miiila
small clarification

[priyank_mod]

16 minutes ago, sripra9007 said:

 

Honestly speaking, if I get a subpar rating because I didn't perform well, I would happily accept it. But if I get a lesser rating when I delivered super work and the client acknowledges that as well, however, due to system mechanism the rating becomes 4, THAT'S A PROBLEM.

 

That's what I was trying to say but you articulated it better than me. 

Rating is just a number and it is not a reflection of an individual's capabilities, quality of work or performance. If someone's work is genuinely world-class which I'm sure yours is too with 1000+ ratings - then a change in the rating system won't make a great deal of difference in the long run. 

Eventually new normal with an average 3 to 4 star will become the norm but it will even out the playing field where a buyer will know that a 4.4 rated seller is definitely better than a 4.1 rated one. (while both these sellers were 5 star performers in the previous system).  

[edc_lab]

I'm a new user on Fiverr, joined about 20 days ago, and I'm yet to have my first client. Even though I don't have hands-on experience on the platform yet, I'd like to share my perspective regarding the recent change in the rating system, an issue I've noticed numerous negative comments about on the forum.

I've observed several top sellers expressing dissatisfaction with this change. As a UI/UX Designer, I wonder whether top users and the most active sellers were involved in the research phase for this modification.

Personally, I believe that involving key users, especially those with extensive experience on Fiverr, is crucial. Their input can offer valuable perspectives for a more user-centric design.

The importance of feedback collection is crucial, both in the preliminary phase and after the rollout of the new system. Understanding what works and what doesn't is essential to effectively adapt the system.

Testing prototypes with a representative group of users could reveal aspects not initially considered, allowing for significant improvements. Clarity and transparency in the rating criteria are equally important, as is recognizing the quality of the work done.

The shift from average to negative ratings doesn't seem consistent. It's crucial that the system accurately reflects the quality of service offered, highlighting the gap between those providing low-quality services and those delivering exceptional performance.

The current rating system could be significantly enhanced by specifically highlighting the higher rating value for those high-level sellers who consistently deliver truly exceptional service.

As a new user, I look forward to offering my services, committing to delivering a high-quality experience. I hope my observations contribute to an enhancement of the Fiverr ecosystem.

Have a nice day and see you soon! 

[maddyfx]

Confused. Fiverr know that what they are doing. And I am confident about them. Lets see...

[emmaki]

25 minutes ago, edc_lab said:

I'm a new user on Fiverr, joined about 20 days ago, and I'm yet to have my first client. Even though I don't have hands-on experience on the platform yet, I'd like to share my perspective regarding the recent change in the rating system, an issue I've noticed numerous negative comments about on the forum.

I've observed several top sellers expressing dissatisfaction with this change. As a UI/UX Designer, I wonder whether top users and the most active sellers were involved in the research phase for this modification.

Personally, I believe that involving key users, especially those with extensive experience on Fiverr, is crucial. Their input can offer valuable perspectives for a more user-centric design.

The importance of feedback collection is crucial, both in the preliminary phase and after the rollout of the new system. Understanding what works and what doesn't is essential to effectively adapt the system.

Testing prototypes with a representative group of users could reveal aspects not initially considered, allowing for significant improvements. Clarity and transparency in the rating criteria are equally important, as is recognizing the quality of the work done.

The shift from average to negative ratings doesn't seem consistent. It's crucial that the system accurately reflects the quality of service offered, highlighting the gap between those providing low-quality services and those delivering exceptional performance.

The current rating system could be significantly enhanced by specifically highlighting the higher rating value for those high-level sellers who consistently deliver truly exceptional service.

As a new user, I look forward to offering my services, committing to delivering a high-quality experience. I hope my observations contribute to an enhancement of the Fiverr ecosystem.

Have a nice day and see you soon! 

Oh, you sweet summer child...

Also, it's really obvious that this isn't your perspective, but what ChatGPT thinks. Fiverr's not particularly listening to humans sharing their opinions. What makes you believe Fiverr will take ChatGPT's vague ideas into consideration? Especially when it has its own AI systems with more insight than man or machine to inform their data analysts of the good, the bad, and the ugly of this test? Analysts who likely have different questions to answer than those shown by sellers on this thread. 

I noticed a lot of the recent amazing templates/emails etc. for sellers from Fiverr were equally poorly created with AI, so you're in company. I'm always surprised at how poorly AI is being "adopted" by most people when there's much better use cases for it. Have you seen Google search results lately? Most of it is badly-done AI keyword spam. Even the news media is in on it with BERT. And of course, there's the AI infestation on forums where users think they might gain in some way - usually financially - by using AI answers (Quora is particularly bad for this).

The point being, if you're going to introduce something as your perspective, then it should be yours, especially if you're going to tie your perspective into your service offerings on Fiverr. 

My opinion has been simple for years: if Fiverr sellers want to see change and actually get listened to - including those who actually get flown into TLV for chats with the CEO and now, 6 months later, are packing up their bags to leave due to the stress of Fiverr's increasingly draconian metrics - they should all simply go out of office for a few months. Fiverr is pretty hopeless without sellers (or buyers). That'll pan out in two ways: 1) Fiverr actually listens, or 2) AI workers are deployed (cheaper to run, less tiresome, no commissions etc). 

Won't happen though. You know why? Because no matter who leaves, there are always new sellers coming in, with varying levels of competency. Hence the increasingly draconian metrics.

One might ask a simple question: why would Fiverr need its metrics to get ever-tougher, more opaque, and more reliant on AI at the same time it goes upmarket? 

The second question that follows is naturally: where is the balance in a system that treats all sellers exactly the same and still uses systems that were put in place when the site was a lot smaller?

The third question: why has Fiverr never really responded well to sellers saying "wow, that's bad" to them about these systems? Back in 2017, I told the CEO in TLV that the Levels system was a horrible idea. He disagreed, of course.

I know they listen - but I also know they rarely implement. Anyone can listen to people talking. It ultimately means nothing. It might make the person being listened to feel special and validated, at least until later, when they realize that they were not heard. 

This whole post is a monument to Fiverr's ability to listen, with a few comments here and there being "passed on" to the team. 

They do listen quickly when you tell them that one of their glossary items is outdated though. They removed that glossary item. But not the other obvious outdated ones... imagine if a Fiverr seller were to do such slap-dash work for their client 🙂 Take a look at the Early Payout page in the Help Center. The description of how it now works is badly-written to the point of nonsensical and contradicts the Forum post on the update, which promised the team would "update" (presumably here) on Monday. It's now Tuesday evening. That's corporate listening and action for you. Of course, the only people interested in that topic are the people who like Early Payout, who are full of profuse thanks to give the corporation even more of their money to get their money. Which I find amusing. 

tl:dr: it's must more interesting when you share your actual perspective, just like I did, all with the laborious use of my fingers and brian. ChatGPT is not interesting. It is an increasingly-nerfed tool, not your mouthpiece. Please don't confuse the two. One is powerful. The other is not. YMMV on whether any of this wall of text was interesting though, and that's fine. 

[visualstudios]

3 hours ago, priyank_mod said:

Unhealthy obsession with earning 5-star ratings is pretty much the thing Fiverr is trying to do away with.🥲 It was a nice thing to score 100/100 in a school exam but this is real life. 

For a buyer, there is NO way to differentiate between sellers with 1000/200 or even 25 5-star ratings. Alot of us have gamed this system over a period of time and it is a good thing that there will be some demarcation between good<better<best sellers. 

You're missing the obvious point. Someone who already has 10k 5 star reviews, under the new system, will have an insurmountable advantage over someone starting on this new system with 10, 20, 100 reviews. The 10k review seller will be able to maintain the 5 star average for years, therefore getting an unfair advantage over everybody else. Doesn't matter if they're not better, and if the reviews they're getting now aren't better. Their profile and gigs will show 5*, where everybody else's will not.

If they got rid of the old scores, and everybody started from 0, then the new score average would make sense - everybody would be lower. But that's not the case.

Like, if the system had always been like that, since the beginning, nobody would be complaining. There are plenty of platforms where a 4.0 star average is good. What you can't do is condition people for years that it's 5 star or "bad", and then switch it. That doesn't work.

Edited December 19, 2023 by visualstudios