Buyers can rate sellers on Marketplace to provide feedback on their experience purchasing from that seller. This allows future buyers to see ratings and reviews for a seller when considering making a purchase. Ratings and reviews are an important part of Marketplace as they help establish seller reputation and provide transparency.
Why Review and Rate Sellers
There are a few key reasons why buyers should take the time to review and rate sellers on Marketplace:
- Helps future buyers make informed decisions – Reviews and ratings allow future buyers to get a sense of the seller’s customer service, product quality, shipping times, and overall reputation.
- Recognizes good sellers – Positive reviews and high ratings help showcase sellers who provide good experiences and stand behind their products.
- Improves marketplace standards – Ratings encourage sellers to provide good products and service in order to maintain a high rating.
- Provides feedback to sellers – Sellers can use reviews and ratings to understand areas where they are doing well and areas needing improvement.
When buyers rate sellers, it contributes to an open and honest marketplace environment.
How Buyers Can Rate Sellers
Buyers can rate sellers in a few simple steps:
- Make a purchase from the seller and receive the order.
- Go to your Order History and select the completed order.
- Select “Leave Seller Feedback”.
- Choose a star rating from 1 to 5 stars.
- Leave a buyer review detailing your experience.
- Click submit to post your seller rating and review.
Buyers have 100 days from the estimated delivery date to leave a rating and review. The steps may slightly vary across Marketplace platforms, but the overall process remains the same.
What Rating Options Are Available
When leaving a seller rating, buyers can select from 1 to 5 stars. Here is what each star rating generally indicates:
- 5 stars – Excellent – You were extremely satisfied with the seller.
- 4 stars – Good – You were satisfied overall with the seller.
- 3 stars – Average – The experience was average or mixed with the seller.
- 2 stars – Poor – You were dissatisfied and disappointed with the seller.
- 1 star – Extremely poor – You were extremely unhappy with the seller.
The number of stars selected represents your overall feeling toward the seller and experience. Most platforms will also allow you to leave a more detailed seller review explaining your rating.
What Happens When a Seller Receives Ratings and Reviews?
After a buyer rates and reviews a seller, here is what happens:
- The rating and review are published on the seller’s profile page for all to see.
- The rating and review factor into the seller’s overall feedback score and percentage.
- The seller is notified and can respond publicly to the review if desired.
- Other buyers can upvote or downvote the review if they find it useful or not.
- Marketplaces monitor seller ratings and can take action against consistently low-rated sellers.
A seller’s volume of ratings and overall score impacts their reputation on Marketplace. Continued positive ratings reward good sellers. But consistent low ratings can indicate a problematic seller that needs improvement or removal.
Seller Rating Criteria to Consider
When leaving a fair and honest seller rating, buyers can consider aspects like:
- Product quality – Did the product match its description and your expectations?
- Product as described – Was the product accurately portrayed in the listing?
- Communication – How responsive was the seller before, during, and after the transaction?
- Shipping time – How long did it take the seller to ship out the order?
- Packaging – Was the product shipped safely and with proper packaging?
- Customer service – Did the seller quickly address any issues or concerns?
- Overall experience – Was it a smooth and satisfactory purchase and delivery?
Basing ratings on these criteria results in more useful feedback for both the seller and future buyers.
Pros of Leaving Accurate Seller Ratings
Here are some of the biggest pros of buyers taking the time to leave factual and honest seller ratings:
- Informs buying decisions – Your rating provides helpful insight that aids other buyers.
- Identifies exceptional sellers – High ratings help great sellers stand out.
- Motivates seller improvement – Constructive feedback encourages enhancing business practices.
- Determines marketplace access – Consistently low ratings can lead to removal of sellers.
- Upholds rating integrity – Accurate ratings maintain the system’s reliability and usefulness.
The system only works when buyers commit to leaving fair and truthful ratings after each transaction.
Cons of Rating Sellers Unfairly
While there are many pros, here are some cons that come with rating sellers unfairly:
- Hurts seller reputation – Unjust low ratings negatively impact good sellers.
- Misleads other buyers – Skewed ratings result in poor judgement.
- Diminishes rating usefulness – Extreme or false ratings make the system less helpful.
- Undermines marketplace trust – Buyers and sellers become skeptical of unfair ratings.
- Potential abuse – Some buyers may strategically rate sellers unfairly to harm them.
Left unchecked, biased or false ratings can degrade the rating system’s reliability for all marketplace participants.
Best Practices for Buyers Rating Sellers
Follow these best practices as a buyer when rating sellers for the most benefit:
- Leave a rating after every purchase – This helps establish an accurate seller reputation.
- Be fair when selecting a 1-5 star rating – Choose the rating that best reflects your honest experience.
- Provide details in your written review – Expand on your transaction experience to inform others.
- Keep comments objective – Focus on facts vs. emotional venting so others find it useful.
- Rate only verified transactions – Refrain from rating sellers you haven’t actually bought from.
- Follow marketplace rules – Abide by policies around leaving ratings and reviews.
Adhering to these practices preserves rating integrity and makes the system more valuable for everyone.
Sellers with No Ratings
Some seller profiles may not yet have any ratings. This could occur for several reasons:
- New seller – They recently joined and haven’t made any sales yet.
- Low sales volume – They haven’t had enough sales to accumulate multiple ratings.
- Buyers not leaving ratings – Their buyers aren’t taking the time to leave feedback.
- Reset account – They may have created a new seller account that lacks rating history.
Lack of ratings does not necessarily indicate an untrustworthy seller. But proceed with caution until initial ratings start coming in.
Average Seller Rating on Marketplace
The average seller rating can vary across different Marketplace platforms. Here are examples of average seller ratings on some top marketplaces:
| Marketplace | Average Seller Rating |
|---|---|
| eBay | 98% positive rating |
| Etsy | 4.9 out of 5 stars |
| Amazon | 95% positive rating |
| Walmart | 95% positive rating |
Top marketplaces tend to maintain high average seller ratings of 4+ stars. This reflects well on the marketplaces’ ability to attract good sellers and remove poor ones.
Impacts of Low Seller Ratings
Consistently low seller ratings can carry serious impacts like:
- Loss of buyers – Bad ratings repel buyers from making purchases.
- Marketplace restrictions – Privileges like advertising may be limited.
- Fee increases – Marketplaces may raise fees on low-rated sellers.
- Demotion in search – Listings have lower visibility in buyer searches.
- Account suspension – Accounts can be suspended temporarily or permanently.
Low ratings are a warning signal to sellers that they need to improve or risk losing marketplace access.
Seller Rating Forgiveness
Some marketplaces have rating forgiveness programs:
- One-time forgiveness – Etsy allows sellers to request removal of one low rating.
- 5-star promotion – eBay elevates sellers back to 5 stars if they go 30 days without another low rating.
- Periodic automatic reset – Amazon resets ratings about once per year.
These programs allow established sellers the opportunity to recover from an occasional unfair rating. But sellers can’t rely on forgiveness to offset consistently poor service.
Seller Rating Removal Requests
Sellers may request rating removal if:
- The rating violates a marketplace policy, such as containing prohibited content.
- There was no actual transaction with the buyer who left the rating.
- The order was canceled so no product/service was provided.
- The rating is determined to be fraudulent or intentionally malicious.
Marketplaces investigate removal requests on a case-by-case basis. But they rarely delete authentic ratings describing a real buyer’s experience.
Legal Action Against Seller Ratings
Sellers rarely pursue legal action against buyers for leaving negative ratings or reviews. Two key reasons:
- Marketplace terms and conditions protect buyers’ rights to leave honest feedback based on their transaction experience.
- The high legal costs and burden of proving real damages make lawsuits impractical for most sellers over ratings.
However, sellers could potentially take legal action in cases of libel, extreme profanity, or false claims unrelated to the actual transaction.
Accurate Seller Ratings Benefit Everyone
When buyers leave truthful seller ratings after Marketplace purchases, it benefits the entire community. Seller reputations are established. Other buyers make informed decisions. Marketplaces can promote good sellers and discipline problematic ones. And sellers themselves gain valuable feedback to improve. Maintaining rating accuracy and integrity should be the priority for all involved.
Conclusion
Rating systems empower buyers on peer-to-peer marketplaces like eBay, Etsy, Amazon, and more. By reviewing and rating seller performance after each transaction, buyers guide future purchasing decisions and motivate sellers to provide quality products and service. While rating fairness and honesty is essential, following best practices as a buyer ensures the system remains useful for everyone. Ratings bring transparency that builds marketplace trust and loyalty. When buyers take a few moments to rate sellers accurately, it creates better experiences for the entire community.