46% Indians have low or zero trust in Google reviews, ratings: Survey

46% have low/zero trust in Google ratings: Report  

To quantify the consumer pulse on Google ratings and reviews, LocalCircles conducted a national survey, which received over 56,000 responses from citizens from 357 districts of India. A total of 47% respondents were from tier-1, 33% from tier-2 and 20% from tier-3 and tier-4 and rural districts. 

When you go on Google to find details of a business, how often do you refer to their ratings and reviews?

(Sample size: 21,000 respondents)

• 12% admit that it influences decision 100% or always
• 22% say it was a major factor 75-100% or most times
• 25% indicate 50-75% times or quite a few times
• 19% point to 25-50% of the time or sometimes

How much do you trust Google ratings and reviews

• 49% say medium levels of trust
• 39% low levels of trust
• 7% had zero trust
• 3% said high level of trust

Biggest issue with reviews on Google

• 37% find reviews positively biased
• 45% say reviews are inaccurate
• 3% find them accurate

Source: LocalCircles 

"The reviews feature available on certain Google products is intended to share helpful information based on real experiences and information. We have policies covering such features that prohibit fake and fraudulent contributed content and all deliberately inauthentic or incorrect content," Google said.  

The tech giant added, "In addition to flags from users, our automated systems and trained operators work around the clock to monitor for suspicious behavior. Upon being notified, we take prompt and effective steps to disable reviews, in accordance with applicable local laws and policies. We continue to invest in technology across our products to help people find reliable local information on Google.”