Customer reviews reduce search cost and uncertainty about a product’s quality. Hence, the quantity and quality of reviews has positive impacts on purchase intentions, sales, and customer satisfaction. In order to increase review quality, retailers and online platforms employ different monetary incentives. We experimentally compare two different incentive schemes: an incentive scheme in which reviewers receive a flat salary, which is independent of review quality, and a tournament incentive scheme in which the reviewer who wrote the most helpful review receives a bonus payment. Helpfulness ratings are assigned by the other reviewers. In our experiment, adverse consequences arise under the tournament incentive scheme. Strategic considerations give rise to strategic downvoting, so that reviewers assign low helpfulness ratings to others’ reviews in order to maximize their expected payoffs. Review writing behavior remains unaffected: the tournament incentive scheme does not affect review quality. However, it does destroy the signaling power of helpfulness ratings.

客户评论降低了搜索成本和产品质量的不确定性。因此，评论的数量和质量对购买意向、销售和客户满意度具有积极影响。为了提高评论质量，零售商和在线平台采用不同的货币激励措施。我们通过实验比较了两种不同的激励方案：一种是审稿人获得固定工资的激励方案，与审稿质量无关；另一种是锦标赛激励方案，其中撰写最有帮助的审稿的审稿人会获得奖金。有用性评级由其他审阅者指定。在我们的实验中，锦标赛激励计划会产生不利后果。战略考虑会导致战略性的否决，因此审阅者会对​​其他人的审阅给予较低的有用性评级，以最大限度地提高他们的预期回报。评论撰写行为不受影响：锦标赛激励计划不会影响评论质量。然而，它确实破坏了有用性评级的信号传递能力。