It’s been an amazing four months leading GBR! The community has made this transition so smooth. Your support and feedback have been invaluable, and I’m truly grateful.
I’m thrilled to announce some positive changes coming to our platform that will significantly enhance your book-reviewing experience! As our community grows, we want to ensure that everyone has the best possible chance to receive timely, relevant, and valuable reviews for their books.
New International Controls for You and Your Books
I’m excited to announce a major update designed to make your experience on GBR even more personalized and effective!
Introducing Amazon Version Selection (Phase 1)
Now, you have the power to choose which Amazon version (country) you use to leave reviews for other members. Additionally, for each of your books, you can specify which Amazon versions or countries you’ll accept reviews from.
Why This Matters
- Targeted Reviews: U.S. authors who primarily target the U.S. market can now ensure they only receive reviews relevant to their audience. The same is true for international authors who only want to receive reviews from their national version of Amazon.
- Embrace International Reach: Authors with a broader focus can welcome reviews from a global readership, expanding their book’s potential to foster sales from multiple versions of Amazon.
- Reviewer Flexibility: Reviewers can contribute to any Amazon version for which they have an account. For example, if an author in India also has an Amazon.com account, they can leave reviews on that version for US authors and then switch back to the Amazon.in version to give reviews to books in their country or books that accept international reviews from India.
How it Works
- Account Preferences Update: Visit your preference settings on your account page to select your primary Amazon version for reviewing.
- Book-Specific Settings: When listing or editing your book, you’ll find new options to define which Amazon versions you’ll accept reviews from.
I believe this enhancement will lead to more meaningful reviews and greater opportunities for authors and reviewers alike. As always, I value your feedback and are committed to continually improving your experience.
Over 50 Members Banned from GBR
Under my leadership, GBR has banned over 50 members for violating Site Rules or Terms of Service. My goal is for GBR to have the world’s best books and the highest-quality most relevant reviews. To achieve this, I’ll ban as many members as necessary. However, it’s better to prevent bad actors from joining in the first place. So, upcoming updates will include even more controls to mitigate damage from bad actors and stop bad actors from joining in the first place.
On the topic of bans: Some of our members (many who are now permanently banned) were using other review-capturing services (GBR competitors) and/or other methods to get high-volume reviews. Their blatant disregard for the systems we have set up has resulted in them getting a ban from Amazon, and now they can not leave reviews on Amazon. Also, all their past reviews given to other authors have been removed from their Amazon accounts. If you’re using such tactics, your Amazon account will likely be banned too. It’s just a matter of time.
Our membership provides a safe, steady stream of reviews that won’t flag your Amazon account for suspicious behavior. Using other tactics designed for getting quick reviews negates our safety measures and will likely result in your Amazon account being banned. Not only is it painful and frustrating to have your account banned on Amazon, it also negatively affects GBR members in good standing by taking away reviews from their books. Please, if you are using other review-capturing services in addition to GBR, we ask that you decide which platform you like best and then stick with just one. Of course, we hope you choose GBR as your safe and reliable review-capturing service, but in the big picture, it would be better for you and our community if you leave for another service, as the alternative will be you getting a ban on Amazon. In most cases, getting a ban on Amazon will also result in a permanent ban from our membership.
Recap of Features and Improvements Launched Recently
We have been busy over here at GBR!
- When I first took over GBR, there was only one part-time support person in addition to the previous owner. We have increased our support staff to four members and plan to hire two more support agents by the end of the year.
- We have implemented new behind-the-scenes features to catch bad actors that would try to steal from or harm the community with even more improvements to come this year.
- We added new features to support international authors.
- We added the ability to get Verified Purchase reviews for paper books and added the option to upload an EPUB version of your book.
Upcoming Features
Working directly with our members through support tickets over the past few months has been invaluable. Your feedback has given me a deep understanding of the Amazon review process and inspired many upcoming improvements to our membership. We’re excited to share what’s coming by the end of the year, with even more features planned for early 2025!
- Better email communication on important updates and new features.
- A mandatory book information review to ensure all books are adjusted to the new token tiers and to ensure book pricing is up to date.
- A feature request and feature roadmap portal will be used to gather the most popular feature requests so we can work on those as a priority.
- A new-member onboarding process with step-by-step instructions on how to get started which will help us convert more new members to our network while ensuring they understand how to leave a proper review.
- A large marketing campaign to bring in more authors to review your books.
- Token spend and receive ledger so that you can see when and how many tokens you have spent or received in the past.
- Auto-publish your book to the Review Library to automatically request the next review.
- Request information about why a review was canceled so we can identify “problem books” and/or bad actors.
- We just launched phase 1 of our international review acceptance feature which allows you to restrict reviews from other versions/countries of Amazon on a book by book basis. Phase 2 will allow you to accept Verified Reviews only (rejecting non-verified reviews) from select countries. Additionally you will be able to set your preferred language for how you would like you reviews to be written.
Introducing a Balancing Fee for a Fairer and Smoother Running System
To achieve a more balanced and efficient reviewing ecosystem, I’m implementing a small 150-token balancing fee every time an author lists their book in our review library. While I understand that fees can sometimes be frustrating, I believe this adjustment will have a tremendously positive impact on the overall review process.
Why This Change is Beneficial
- More Reviews, Faster: By introducing this fee, we can incentivize more members to actively participate in reviewing, ensuring that your books get the attention they deserve more quickly.
- Reduced Wait Times: A balanced ratio of reviewers to books means shorter wait times and a smoother experience for everyone. When I took over GBR, the most serious issue was that we had too many review requests compared to the number of reviewers. This was mainly due to the “Daily Double Credit” system, which we had to remove because it was creating an unsustainable backlog. Since then, things have improved a lot! This new balancing fee is the final step to ensure we have a perfect balance between the number of books needing reviews and the number of reviewers available.
- A Thriving Marketplace: We’ll be able to reinvest these fees back into the platform, offering more promotional opportunities (like a free DD credit on your membership anniversary) and incentives (like gifting enough tokens to list your first book) to attract new members. The more members we have, the more potential reviewers there are for your books.
- Quality Over Quantity: A more balanced library encourages thoughtful reviews and helps surface the best books for our readers (not just the ones with the biggest bonuses).
A Small Fee for a Big Impact
I understand that nobody enjoys fees, but I promise this fee will well worth the cost. I truly believe that the benefits of a balanced and thriving review system far outweigh the cost of this small investment.
Thank you for your understanding and continued support. We’re excited to continue on this journey with you to create an even better community for our authors to thrive!
Sincerely,
Benjamin – GBR Owner
