Rating averages have dropped on Amazon

[alhawke]

Amazon ratings have dropped for everyone this year. I'm expecting objections, but I'm seeing it across the board on Amazon. There are many, many books now bestselling in the high 3 average range. This wasn't the case two years ago. Is it for Indies only? I don't think so. I think it's the impact of counting Goodreads reviews, which, at least with my books, are typically 0.5 stars lower than Amazon. Well, we can't do much about it. Ratings are out of our control. But many promotion companies still gauge a good sell off of books only in the >4 star range. Some of my books have fallen below 4 ranging around 3.8. Does it disqualify me? It does by their guidelines.

Does it mean less sales? I don't think it has for me. But I'm curious to see what you all think. And I'm curious as to why Amazon did this (I'd also love to understand how Amazon determines that final total ranking #. It's not just an average).

4 ain't what it used to be. I'm seeing more and more books advertised on AMS in the 3.5 range. And many bestsellers--take a gander yourself at a random category--in the 3.5-3.9 range.

[Bill Hiatt]

I know Goodreads review totals are displayed, but their average seems to be separate, not incorporated in the Amazon total.

Of course, it's hard to tell. For a long time, the Amazon average has been affected by a lot of variables (how new is the review, is it a verified purchase, that sort of thing). The result is that the average is never just a mathematical average. But to make it more difficult to compute what the mathematical average is, Amazon distorts the percentages (how many 5s, 4s, etc.) to match its contrived average.

For instance, I have a relatively new book with four ratings, three fives and one four. By straight math, that should be 4.75, but Amazon lists it as 4.7. I could live with that, but Amazon also makes the percentages 70% 5s and 30% 4s. Of course, it should be 75-25. There's no mathematical way to get those percentages out of just four ratings.

But here's the other thing. Only one of those is a review, and only the reviews have other data (date, verified purchase tag). I can still figure out what happened on this book because of the small number of ratings. But with a large number of ratings, there's no way to tell what the real breakdown is, what Amazon is adjusting for, etc.

That being the case, I'm not sure how you'd ever figure out whether or not Goodreads reviews have been included in the Amazon average just by looking. The two systems are different, anyway, so they shouldn't be combined. And since Goodreads displays a separate average, lumping the two together would essentially be counting the Goodreads numbers twice.

Is it possible that what you're seeing is the inclusion of ratings in the average rather than the inclusion of Goodreads ratings and reviews in the average? For the most part, the ratings tend to run lower than reviews, though I have a couple books where this isn't true. But that would account for the general drop in rating averages. And yes, I've seen it on trad books also.

[alhawke]

For my books, Goodreads ratings were incorporated about a year and a half ago. It increased the number of ratings but dropped most of my low 4 ratings to high 3s. Other writers on other forums saw the same thing happen. Suddenly ten to fifteen ratings were added per book. The impact for me with just 10 or so new ratings was pretty significant.

Which ratings were transferred? And how does Amazon count them?

Amazon does their calculations vary weirdly. I had a similar situation where the average didn't pan out on a book. A book had a rating of 4.6 that dropped to 4.2 after one negative review out of eleven.

Well... many of my books are from ARC reviewers who review thousands of books. One of my thoughts is that a negative review outside of their usual ARC reviews is weighted heavier? I don't know.

This news is not all bad, btw. It means a 3 star review can be marketed more than it used to. It also means that we don't have a glut of 5 star reviews that make the number system meaningless. Trouble is, many Goodreads reviewers will tell you that they rate a book based on 4 as best and, sometimes, 1 as never read. Never 5. That now impacts our Amazon reviews.

[Bill Hiatt]

I guess my question remains the same, though. How does anyone know that what changed was the addition of Goodreads ratings? Amazon started adding ratings from its own system in the time frame that you're discussing. Readers on mobile devices, for example, are offered the opportunity to rate a book when they finish. It used to be that those ratings went nowhere. Then Amazon dumped them in with all the ratings that came in with reviews.

When I look at my first book, it has 259 Amazon ratings and 200 Goodreads ratings. When I look at the customer reviews section, it shows the same average as the Amazon-only figure on the product page and says explicitly that it's based on 259 global ratings. To me, that indicates that the average there is Amazon-only, not Amazon plus Goodreads. Do you see any contrary evidence on your books?
 

[TimothyEllis]

Unfortunately, the habit of some Goodreads readers to one star as a place marker, impacts our Amazon rating now.

I had one of those on my last book. The one star appeared a couple of days after release, and vanished about 2 weeks later. When it appeared, it did a horrible think to the rating, but not for long as a whole mess of 5's came in a couple of days later.

[alhawke]

To me, that indicates that the average there is Amazon-only, not Amazon plus Goodreads. Do you see any contrary evidence on your books?

I don't think there's really any way to know which ratings are transferred. I can only go by the sheer number when my # of ratings exponentially shot up a year and a half ago. It happened on multiple books all at the same time, more so than even during one of my large promotions. In like a week, a some of my books were suddenly lowered in the 3 range. Their rating 'averages' and ranking choices is troubling. As we always say, it's their store, but I'm seeing the trend in Indie's going solo by selling direct and most large promo companies accommodating marketing for direct sales. It's not only Amazon that acts wonky from time to time. All said, I don't know if my sales have suffered by the change. And it takes the bite out of lower rankings a little.

[TimothyEllis]

Perhaps the difference is occurring when Goodreads has more ratings than Amazon does?

Most of mine on Goodreads appear to be copies of what is on Amazon, so presumably Amazon doesn't count the duplicates.

So for me, there's not much in the way of extras, since Goodreads for me is normally less than half what is on Amazon.

But for someone with a good presence on Goodreads, it might be making a difference.

[writeway]

First off, haven't noticed this but honestly haven't been paying attention. When I go on Amazon it's to check something on my own books or to download books to read. I'm not looking at other authors' books or AMS ads, etc. I'm not sure how the ratings falling is Amazon's fault. If your book is popular that means more people are reading them which means you can end up having lower ratings. This has always been the case. Some of my books have hundreds of reviews and the more reviews they got, the worse the rating got. And bad reviews have always seemed to hold more weight than good ones, anyway. I have numerous books in the 3 ratings due good reviews not being the same weight as bad ones but what can you do? Hasn't hurt me any bit. Authors read way too much into reviews and ratings than readers ever will. Most readers are going to read what they want to read regardless. One of my must-buy authors is a bestseller and her average ratings aren't that great for every book but she sells.

If you are concerned because of promo sites, yes, some will mention ratings but a lot don't. Many don't care about the overall rating. I use promo sites all the time and if a book I wanna promote doesn't fit the guidelines, I just skip it and go to another site. Thing is, whatever is going on with Amazon, whether is natural or not is nothing we can control. Me, I don't think anything has changed. Amazon has always put more weight to verified purchases which screw KU authors but if you are in KU, that can be a reason for lower ratings. Most our reviews don't count. Same as with ARC reviews.

My advice, is to not let this bother you. It's really not worth worrying about. Authors get more up in arms about this stuff than readers do. Just write the best books you can and that's all you can do. If you can't promote on a certain site due to your ratings falling, then use another site or other way to promote. Worrying about it will only make things harder for you. We can't control what goes on on Amazon, Goodreads, etc. And we never will.

Also, honest reviews make your books look more authentic, anyway. It's better to have a variety of reviews (even lower ones) than just glowing five stars because most people don't put stock in books with only good reviews. It's not fair but it's true. A lot of readers have said this. They find it suspicious if an author only has good reviews or a great rating on every book because no matter how good you write, that isn't gonna be a realistic outcome.

[Rod Little]

The internet is more negative every year; that's going to translate to reviews too. Amzn should switch to the thumbs up / thumbs down system like Netflix and other sites have done. There is a stigma that a 2.7 rated book is bad, but... think about it. That means 55% of  the readers liked it. If readers only look for 4 and 5 star books, that means it has to be like by 80% to 99% of the people. That's a hard ask these days, especially with promo junkies 1-starring every 99 c or free gift they get.  I don't worry about reviews. One of my books has been hammered to death (seems 45% hate it) but... it still sells well. So, I guess readers care less and less about this stuff.  Maybe some take the negative nature of the Net into account?