Reviews Frequently Asked Questions

FAQs for Review Verification and Publication

Who determines which reviews should be published?

All reviews are manually examined by our team of experts in an effort to ensure published reviews are from verified sources and provide helpful content. All reviews are treated equally during the verification process, regardless of rating or vendor. During this process, the team verifies the reviewer’s identity, checks for conflicts of interest, and evaluates the review against our site guidelines. For a more in-depth overview, please see our Quality Assurance guidelines.

Does your site publish negative reviews?

Simply put, yes. We treat one-star reviews no differently from five-star reviews. Like all online reviews platforms, our sites are intended to provide a forum for honest discussion between vendors and software users. By remaining neutral, they can host a wide array of opinions that help software shoppers make informed decisions. For this reason, and also to ensure compliance with applicable laws, we do not modify content or remove an opinion or statement from a valid review. For a detailed overview of our Quality Assurance process, click here.

Why was a previously published review disabled after being published?

The reviews program is continuously evolving. As we improve our methods, we periodically audit previously published reviews as they are flagged by our system. If a past review does not meet our current standards or our current guidelines, it may be removed by our team.

What happens if a fraudulent review is found?

If a review is found to be fraudulent by our team, it will be removed from our site. In addition, the reviewer may be subject to removal from any outreach campaigns, and/or banned from leaving future reviews from our site. If a vendor is found to have participated in fraudulent activity, their account may be subject to future penalties such as a publicly visible warning about suspicious activity.

What is considered fraud?

Software Advice is committed to providing our visitors an unbiased reviews catalog with content from other community members. Though every reviewer is entitled to–and encouraged to share–their own opinion, Software Advice is vigilant against attempts to deceive others through their review’s content. Any reviews found to be fraudulent will be removed, and the submitter of the review will be subject to penalties.

Fraudulent activity may include, but is not limited to, the following:

• Attempts by a vendor to influence the reputation of themselves, or another vendor, by:

• Paying for the services of a third party, such as a marketing agency, to post reviews.

• Submitting reviews of their own product, or of any software (such as a competitor’s product) in which they have a financial interest.

• Submitting reviews on behalf of an actual user, with or without their consent.

• Encouraging reviews to be posted based on false pretenses.

• Discouraging users from posting negative feedback.

• Harassing or bullying a reviewer over a review in an attempt to force it’s removal.

Vendors should also refrain from reviewing a competitor’s product or paying for reviews to be submitted to a competitor’s account.

Fraudulent activity may also include attempts by a reviewer to damage the reputation of a vendor, or obtain incentives, through false pretenses such as:

• Writing a review of a software product without actual experience using the product.

• Writing a review of a software product after being solicited by a competitor.

• Copying content from another source, including our own site.

• Allowing a third party to post a review on your behalf.

A reviewer should not review a product for which they have a conflict of interest or a financial stake in its success.

What is considered a “Bad” review?

We believe it is important not to focus on the star rating alone. Our research has shown that people actually find reviews of products more believable if they have a variety of star ratings. In addition, a detailed review, even if a “lower” score, provides a much clearer picture of an experience than a five-star review with few details.

We encourage our vendors to respond to all customer reviews, regardless of rating given. We believe (and research shows) that a vendor’s willingness to address critical reviews builds credibility, shows responsiveness, and generally creates a more favorable opinion of the vendor and product.

Can a review be submitted by a competitor?

No. When our QA team verifies each reviewer’s identity, we take steps to ensure that they are a real person, not a scammer, and (among other items) do not have any conflict of interest (financial or competitive) with the vendor they are reviewing. Please see an overview of our Quality Assurance process for more details.

Are old reviews removed if a product’s features have been updated?

If a review was submitted for a version of the product which was active and being supported at the time the review was submitted, the review will remain published. It is an accurate reflection of what the user’s experience was at that point in time.

As a product evolves, it is typical to see a shift in the nature of the reviews listed, and we believe this helps increase the value to software shoppers visiting our site. Older reviews can help a software shopper see how things have changed over the long term, and help them gain confidence that issues are being addressed and updates being made over time.

How can I flag a suspicious review?

We take several steps to safeguard against fraudulent reviews. We have technology in place, as well as a team dedicated to moderating reviews. But no system is perfect, and occasionally an inappropriate review may slip through the cracks. In these rare instances, you may flag a review by emailing us at reviews@softwareadvice.com, providing as much information as possible about the review, and the reasons you believe it should be investigated.

For more details about our process, please refer to our Reviews Investigation guidelines.

What evidence do you consider while evaluating a review flagged for fraud?

While our internal investigative processes are confidential and all decisions are subject to our discretion, we have outlined some key factors that we consider during our reviews investigation process. Click here for an overview of our investigation process.

Do you require proof of use when evaluating a review?

We’ll request proof of use from users when investigating reviews, but it‘s not required. Our experience has shown that “proof of use” is a valuable piece of the puzzle, but not a reliable source of proof on its own. It’s just one aspect among an array of considerations we use when evaluating a review. Faking proof of use through doctored screenshots or images taken from web searches is a method favored by those looking to scam our system. Moreover, with tens of thousands of products listed in our catalog, it is simply not feasible for our QA team to become experts in verifying proof of use across all products. In our ongoing efforts to treat all vendors equally, we consider “proof of use” as one aspect among the many that make up our investigation.

How is it possible for fraudulent reviews to pass inspection?

We have technology in place, as well as a team dedicated to moderating reviews, to safeguard against fraudulent reviews. Every review is manually verified with care and consideration to ensure a high quality of content is published across our site. No system is perfect, however, and with tens of thousands of reviews submitted monthly, occasionally an inappropriate review may slip through the cracks. In these cases we rely on our vendors and our reviewer community to alert us of potential fraud by “flagging” a review for further review.

Why are some reviews accompanied by a notation stating they were incentivized?

We have implemented an “i” icon on our site, which will indicate the reviewer was offered an incentive to leave their review. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Endorsement Guidelines require online companies to provide clear notice when a review has been submitted in exchange for a nominal incentive (whether invited by the website or by the software vendor). See https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/business-center/guidance/ftcs-endorsement-guides-what-people-are-asking. Our policies require that any such incentive must be made available to all reviewers who submit honest reviews, regardless of the rating they ultimately give the product they are reviewing.

Does Software Advice fact-check reviews for accuracy?

Our team has analyzed hundreds of thousands of reviews across the tens of thousands of products listed in our catalog. It would not be feasible for our QA team to become experts equally across all products or to spend an equal amount of time verifying the details of each review. In our effort to treat all vendors equally, we must not fact check the opinions submitted by our reviewers. Instead, our Quality Assurance team focuses on verifying the identity of the reviewers and ensuring that reviews posted meet our site guidelines. Please find more details about our QA process, and our Reviews Guidelines.

May a foreign language review be published on your site?

At this time, we do not accept reviews submitted in languages other than English. Any review submitted in another language would need to be translated into English and re-submitted to our site by the reviewer. We will only accept a translation from the reviewer themselves, as we need to ensure the review is authentic.

How valid are videos or articles promoting false reviews submissions?

Our teams are aware of the existence of videos or articles promoting our site as a way to earn extra income, or even offering suggestions on how to game our system and submit reviews under false pretenses.; Unfortunately, being targeted in this fashion is not uncommon for any site that offers a rewards program. Our teams actively monitor all such content, and use it to strengthen our existing methods of detecting fraudulent activity. We condemn the submission of reviews under false pretenses, and have built a robust Quality Assurance program to safeguard against reviews fraud. Any review that does not adhere to – or is found to violate – our strict guidelines will not be published, and any reviewer who is found to have submitted a false review will have their accounts banned.

Does your site edit the content of the reviews published?

As per our reviewer policies, we will never make an edit that would change the original intent of a review. However, we may make simple edits to correct typos or remove non-standard characters. Edits may also be made to hide sensitive data (as further described elsewhere), such as personally identifying information, or private contract terms that are not intended for public disclosure. The reviewer will not be notified about these edits, which are made at the discretion of our site.

Does a reviewer need to be a customer to leave a review?

No. A reviewer does not need to be a customer in order to leave a review- so long as they are a direct user of the software, they may submit a review. For example, if a reviewer uses a software while working a company licensing the software, their review would be valid even though they may not be listed on any contracts, or have their own user account.

When is a reviewer’s software experience not acceptable?

It is not acceptable for a review to be based on a user experience influenced by a third party. For example, a review of an ecommerce platform based off of a shopping experience on a 3rd party’s ecommerce store would not be allowed, as the ecommerce store itself would dictate the user experience.

It is also not acceptable for a review to be based on an indirect experience with the software. Reviews must be submitted by the actual user of the software, and not on behalf of the software user by a 3rd party. For example, if a software is used by coworkers of the reviewer, but the reviewer has no direct experience using the software themselves, they may not submit a review on behalf of the experience of their coworkers.

What languages are supported for reviews?

At this time, our site supports reviews submitted in English, French, German, Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese, Italian and Japanese. Reviews submitted in a supported language will be manually evaluated by our Quality Assurance team to ensure compliance with our Community Guidelines. Any review submitted in a language not supported by our site, or a mix of languages, will not be processed through our system, and will not be eligible for current or future publication.

Will reviews submitted in a previously unsupported language become eligible for publication?

A review submitted in a language not supported by our sites at the time of submission will remain ineligible for publication even if the language becomes supported at a later date.

Can a review be written in more than one language?

Reviews must be written in one language and cannot contain a mix of languages.

How are reviews submitted in a foreign (non-English) language displayed on the site?

Published reviews that are submitted in a non-English Language supported by our sites will display in the language in which they were originally submitted. In addition, reviews submitted in a language other than English may be displayed higher on a local version of our site where the language is natively spoken.

Is the QA process the same for reviews submitted in a language other than English?

All reviews submitted through our sites, regardless of their location and language in which they are submitted, undergo the same quality assurance process, and are held to the same set of Community Guidelines. Please note that only reviews submitted in a supported language are eligible for consideration.

May reviews include partial or incomplete titles?

While a review will not be disabled solely on the basis of an incomplete or partial review title, all review titles must meet the criteria outlined in our Community Guidelines. Any review that does not meet the Community Guidelines requirements for publication will not be eligible for publication.

Can an emoji be used in a review?

Our sites do not fully support the display of emojis in review content. In addition, our Guidelines prohibit masking any submitted content if such masking would change the intent of a review. As emojis are often used to convey meaning, removing an emoji could potentially change the intent of a review. Therefore, because we cannot remove emojis without potentially altering the content of the review, we cannot publish any review in which emojis convey a substantive message, or when emojis are used to convey a message that violates one of our published Guidelines, at our discretion. An example of prohibited use would be a review that utilizes emojis in place of actual text content, in which the content of the review would not read correctly were the emoji not displayed. We also cannot publish a review that uses emojis to meet minimum character counts, or where excessive emoji use could cause a review not to display properly on our site, or where the implied intent of an emoji could be deemed profane or harassing in nature. We may, at our discretion, remove or replace emojis which could cause grammatical confusion- such as when they are used in place of a recognized punctuation mark.

Are competitors to Gartner or Gartner Digital Markets sites allowed to review software?

To avoid potential conflicts of interest, we do not publish reviews from reviewers found associated with Gartner Digital Markets competitors. Our site reserves the right to determine competitor status.

What is considered a Conflict of Interest?

A reviewer may be determined to have a conflict of interest with a software if it can be reasonably believed, based on objective evidence that can be independently verified, a risk exists where their opinion may be unduly influenced by other, secondary interests.

Because under such circumstances the decision-making process can be disrupted or compromised in a manner that affects the integrity or the reliability of a review, we do not publish reviews where such a conflict is believed to exist.

Examples of conflicts of interest include, but are not limited to:

• Current and recent employees of the vendor, the vendor’s parent company, or other companies directly affiliated with the vendor.

• Immediate family members of the vendor’s employees.

• Employees of a competing software vendor.

• Anyone with a significant financial interest in the vendor, such as: a reseller for the vendor, a social media advocate or affiliate marketer receiving a significant incentive for partnering with the vendor, or the partners or employees of a private equity group invested in the vendor or a direct competitor.

Examples of what would not be considered a conflict of interest include, but are not limited to:

• Software users who share an affiliate link that is promoted to all users of the software, but who do not receive significant or excessive compensation for promoting the vendor.

• An ex-employee who worked for the vendor many years ago, who no longer has a direct financial interest in the vendor’s success.

• A friend of an employee of the vendor, who does not have a direct financial interest in the vendor’s success.

We reserve the right to determine if a Conflict of Interest exists.

How much time can transpire between a review submission and the last time a software was used?

One of our site’s “best practices” suggests a review should be left within one year of last using a software.  We believe a fresh review based on long past experience is not as helpful to software shoppers, as it can be based on an experience that is no longer relevant.   This is different from older reviews based on submission date, as past reviews retain value by helping software shoppers understand how a product has evolved over time.

Because of this, we may remove a review if it can be proven, to the best of our ability, that the review was submitted more than one year after the reviewer last used the software.  For example, a reviewer may expressly state in their review they last used the software “five years ago”. We reserve the right to determine time since last use, based on objective evidence our teams can independently validate.

FAQs for Vendors

Are vendors allowed to solicit reviews from their own user base?

Yes, vendors are allowed to solicit reviews from their own user base.  However, any reviews received in relation to an incentive offer must be disclosed as such so that our site can apply the proper attribution.  Failure to disclose an incentive campaign misleads software shoppers in regards to the source of the review, and as such is a violation of both the FTC Endorsement Guidelines and these Community Guidelines. As per our Guidelines, if it is determined that a review was submitted in response to an undisclosed incentive offer, our site will, at our discretion, i) retroactively apply the correct attribution on our site, or ii) disable the review(s) entirely. Any vendor found in violation of our guidelines as a result of their failure to disclose an incentive-driven reviews campaign may also, at our discretion, be subject to penalties applied to their account.

How can vendors properly disclose their own reviews campaigns?

Our site provides links for all vendors within the Vendor Portal, under the “Reviews” section.  Two different links are provided: 1) a link to be used for soliciting reviews without an incentive offer, and 2) a link to be used when offering an incentive reward in response to a review.  Using the links provided is the easiest, and most preferred method of disclosing incentive offers.  However, if the link cannot be found, or is otherwise unavailable, the vendor must contact the Compliance team at reviews@[site.com], with details that can help our team identify reviews submitted on behalf of the campaign.

Can a vendor retroactively disclose a reviews incentive offer?

Yes, we encourage all vendors to reach out to our team at reviews@softwareadvice.com and alert us about any undisclosed reviews submitted in response to an incentive offer.  Disclosure of an incentive campaign will not result in the disablement of the review, and allows our team to apply proper attribution to the reviews and remain in compliance with FTC guidelines. 

NOTE: We encourage vendors to disclose to us – BEFORE their campaign is run – those reviews that were submitted in return for an incentive.  Otherwise we will have no choice but to either disable or list as paid those reviews we later learn have been incentivized without proper notice, as per our published guidelines.

How may a vendor respond to a review?

We allow, and encourage, all vendors to respond in a constructive and respectful manner to reviews left on their profile pages. As per our Guidelines, vendor responses to a review must be respectful and constructive- and may not contain abusive, hateful, threatening, or harassing content. Responses that violate these Guidelines, or contain other information disallowed by our site, such as links to external sites or resources and personally identifying information about the reviewer, may be removed or have their content masked with the following text [SENSITIVE CONTENT HIDDEN].

We view the vendor response option as a key aspect of our Reviews Program in that it allows the vendor and reviewer to engage in a constructive and respectful dialogue intended to open up lines of communication and provide additional context and clarification. For guidance on forming well-crafted responses, vendors may access their Vendor Portal to find suggestions on leaving a response via our platform.

What should we do if we receive a negative review?

We understand a negative review can be upsetting. As a reviews platform, we provide an opportunity for vendors to address misunderstandings or issues. A vendor’s response to a negative user review has the potential to result in a positive experience for both vendor and reviewer, as well as demonstrate to other software shoppers a great customer service experience. Please see our guide to addressing negative reviews, as well as this blog post about the positive outcomes of negative reviews.

Will my responses to reviews be sent to the reviewer?

When submitting a response to a review through your vendor portal (Capterra and GetApp), there will be an option to select to “Send response to reviewer.” You may send the response to the reviewer regardless of whether the reviewer decided to publicly display their information.

For Software Advice reviews, you may request our team send your initial response to the reviewer at the time you submit your response to our team. See “How may a vendor respond to a review.” Please know that we do not facilitate back-and-forth communications, and are unable to send more than the initial notification of a reply.

Will we be notified of a new review submission for my product?

No, vendors are sent a notice only after a review has been published by our team. To avoid confusion from spam or reviews that do not pass our QA process, no notifications are sent upon a review submission.

We didn’t ask for this review to be published to our profile – why was it published on your site?

Visitors to our sites are free to submit reviews to our QA process on whichever software they choose. As an unbiased, user-driven reviews platform, we do not ask for consent from the vendor before a review is published. All vendors are treated equally in this respect and cannot opt out of receiving reviews. In this way, our reviewers generate valuable content that help our other community of software shoppers make informed decisions.

May a vendor request its profile or product listing be removed from your site?

Like all online reviews platforms, we endeavor to provide our users with software product directories that are as comprehensive as possible. As such, our policy is not to remove product listings from our sites unless: (i) the product listing does not fit within one of the existing software categories (or “directories”); (ii) the vendor can provide evidence that product is no longer actively being marketed and/or sold to the public; or (iii) the listing or profile fails to comply with our guidelines.

Why is a review submitted in the past just now being published?

In our ongoing efforts to improve our service, we periodically audit our reviews database. And, as our ability to vet these reviews improves, we may find past reviews that still contain entirely valid content that we can now publish. These reviews will display in the order of their submission date. Because there is currently no time stamp on verified reviews, we treat these past reviews the same as all other verified reviews submissions. We publish them exactly as they were originally submitted.

We flagged a review for investigation, but it was not removed. Can you tell us why?

If a review was not removed following your investigation request, this means that during the course of our investigation our team found the flagged review to be in compliance with our site guidelines. While we cannot provide further details about the investigatory process, we can confirm that the reviews team devotes significant time and effort to investigating every escalated review and evaluating the review against our site guidelines.

The reviews on our profile mention features we no longer offer – can we remove those reviews?

A review cannot be removed simply because it is referencing features that are no longer actively supported. If the review was valid at the time of submission, it is reflective of the user’s experience with that software at that point in time. While recent reviews are more likely to reflect a product’s most current set of capabilities and most relevant experiences, it is important for our shoppers to consider how reviews about a vendor have progressed over time as the software as developed.

Does your site share the contact information of a reviewer with a vendor?

Our site does not share the personal contact information provided by the reviewer along with a submission to any vendor, though certain non-private information such as name and company may be publicly displayed alongside a review to provide important context to our site users (except in cases where reviewers have opted to submit an “anonymous” review).

As a vendor, would any evidence we provide along with a review be considered in its evaluation?

Yes, we consider all information when investigating a flagged review. However, we are unable to act as an intermediary between vendors and reviewers. As an unbiased reviews platform, we cannot make decisions based on interactions that took place between a vendor and a reviewer outside of our site. Because we are not able to validate private communications, such as email exchanges or phone conversations that happen outside of our site, these can be unreliable. Therefore, we consider outside communications as one aspect among the many that make up our investigation. More details about our investigation process can be found here.

We do not know this reviewer. We do not believe they are a user of our software. How could they leave a review?

While we understand that many vendors pride themselves on knowing their user base, there are many valid cases where a vendor might not know a legitimate reviewer, based on the information provided along with a review. These cases include but are not limited to the following:

• Software buyers who evaluate multiple tools before purchasing software. We believe these evaluative experiences (in a proof of concept or with trial versions) are valid experiences in their own right and thus worthy of sharing with our user community.

• Software accounts that are be shared by multiple users or business units at a single company. The reviewer may not be the account owner and thus may be unknown to the vendor.

• Vendor contracts that are signed under a company name, not by an individual.

• Reviewers who change jobs and have used the software at their previous company.

• Users who submit under a name other than the name used on their contract with the vendor. For example, “Bob” rather than “Robert”, or the use of a maiden name.

• Users who enter an alternative name for their current company, such as initials or a shortened name, or a parent or sister company, rather than the name used on their vendor contract.

• Users who opt to use an abbreviated or screen name to maintain their anonymity.

• Reviewers who log in with LinkedIn but choose to remain anonymous. These users have been validated by our Reviews team, but their reviews will not display any identifying information. Learn more about anonymous reviews.

As a neutral content platform, we rely on our reviewers to provide accurate and honest descriptions of their software experiences In keeping with our efforts to provide the broadest possible picture of the software industry, we try not to limit the types of software experiences that are shared on our site. Because any software user has a valid experience to share, a reviewer is not required to be the account owner or to have been in direct contact with the vendor.

While a reviewer may post under an identity unknown to the vendor, be assured our verification process validates the actual identity of the reviewer before approving the posted entry.  If our teams cannot confidently validate a reviewer, or finds any signs of fraud, their review would not be published.

We received multiple reviews for our product from reviewers working at the same company. Is this allowed?

Yes, there are no restrictions as to how many reviewers from the same company may review a given product. As co-workers often use the same product in different ways, we feel that providing these multiple viewpoints is a valuable service to our community. However, any one reviewer is prohibited from writing more than one review of a product within a short time period.

Are vendors allowed to ask for a review in exchange for an incentive?

Vendors are permitted to ask their customers for reviews and offer nominal incentives for doing so. Software Advice also sends out periodic email campaigns asking for a software review in exchange for an incentive amount.

• These incentives must be offered to all reviewers, regardless of whether they leave a positive or negative review.

• Vendors found using incentives to influence the content of a review will result in the review’s removal.

• Vendors are required to notify SoftwareAdvice if they source reviews in exchange for an incentive.

Please refer to our guidelines section About Incentivized Reviews.

Why were some of our users emailed by your site about reviews?

Most of our reviews come from users posting reviews directly on our site or in response to our in-house reviews campaigns (which are targeted to our own database of site members). Users are added to our database voluntarily as they leave reviews on our site, sign up for our mailing lists, or phone our in-house sales teams. While visiting our site or when responding to our reviews campaigns, users are free to review any software they wish. We may then email these users about reviews from time to time based on their past interaction with one of our sites.

May a vendor contact a reviewer to request that they remove their review from the vendor’s profile?

We encourage interchanges between vendors and reviewers via our review response mechanism. Vendors should not contact a reviewer, either directly or indirectly, with the goal of getting a review removed or edited. Software Advice does NOT condone, and has a zero tolerance policy for, any threats or bullying of our reviewers. If we receive a report that a vendor has reached out to a reviewer to request a review to be removed/edited, or harasses that reviewer in any manner, we encourage the reviewer to contact our site immediately by emailing reviews@softwareadvice.com. Based on the results of our investigation, the offending vendor may be subject to site penalties as well as legal redress.

Why are vendors prohibited from submitting reviews on behalf of their customers?

Though no fraud may have been intended, when a third party submits a review on a reviewer’s behalf, we have no way to determine whether the content was submitted with the reviewer’s consent or if the original content has been modified in any manner. When we identify a customer review submitted by a vendor, we will disable the review. The original reviewer is encouraged, following such disablement, to submit a review in their own right directly to our site.

Do you treat reviews for products by paying vendors differently than reviews for products by non-paying vendors?

All reviews for all vendors across all directories are subject to the same Quality Assurance process, regardless of whether or not they are a paying client. We make every effort to ensure that our reviews team is completely unbiased and unmotivated by revenue. This is one of the primary reasons the reviews team is separate from the sales and marketing teams.

Why are vendors found to have participated in fraudulent reviews activity not banned from your site?

We believe that providing a full catalog of software across a variety of categories is more important to our users than removing a listing altogether. Instead, we look to penalize vendors for fraudulent activity in other ways, such as flagging their profile for fraud as a warning to software buyers. In this way, we provide valuable information to software shoppers that would not be evident were we to simply remove the profile from our catalog.

Our software has been penalized, what can we do?

In the event that your software page displays a penalty and you’re unsure why, reach out to the reviews team through your vendor portal for a brief synopsis of the activity that led to the penalties, along with additional details about the penalty.

What should we do if someone is blackmailing us by threatening a negative review?

We do not facilitate arbitration. We are not mediators and cannot intervene in disputes between our reviewers and vendors. If you feel you are being harassed or threatened, we suggest you contact applicable law enforcement.

If a negative review does not meet our guidelines, please flag the review for investigation through the vendor portal. Our team will investigate accordingly as per our standard investigation procedures.

What is the “Reviews as a Service” program?

The free Reviews as a Service (RaaS) program helps vendors recruit reviews for their product listing by allowing Capterra to email their customers asking for a software review in exchange for a nominal incentive. Reviews collected are displayed across the Gartner Digital Markets network: Capterra, GetApp, and Software Advice. You may learn more about the RaaS program by speaking with an account representative or clicking here. We reserve the right to determine which vendors meet our criteria for acceptance into the Reviews as a Service Program. Vendors who fail to comply with our Vendor Policies or Community Guidelines, or who have recently taken part in a RaaS or Self Service program, may not be eligible. 

How are reviews sorted on product pages?

Reviews are by default sorted by Most Helpful to software buyers, driven by our proprietary algorithm reflecting the depth and quality of the review, recency of experience, and other factors. As a neutral reviews platform, the star rating of the review is not considered in the “Most Helpful” ranking, and there is currently no voting mechanism that would allow site visitors to influence the ranking. This default sorting algorithm has been applied across every product profile for every vendor at the site level. Users of the site may choose to change the sort to other options, such as Most Recent or Highest Rating.

Why is there a delay shown between the date submitted and the notice of publication?

When a review is submitted, it goes through our QA process, conducted by a team dedicated to ensuring published reviews meet our guidelines (link to QA section in guidelines). We aim to publish reviews within a few business days of being submitted, though during busy times, the delay may be longer. Vendors are then notified when reviews are published.

May a vendor opt out of participating in the reviews program?

As a neutral reviews platform, we endeavor to provide our users with reviews directories that are as comprehensive as possible. As such, our policy does not allow vendors to opt out of our reviews program. Whether or not vendors choose to participate in collecting reviews, we will publish reviews we receive about any product listed in our catalogs, as long as it passes our QA process (link to QA section in guidelines) and meets our guidelines (link to reviews guidelines section in guidelines).

Are resellers listed on your site and can resellers respond to reviews?

Lead Gen: We allow authorized resellers to participate in our lead generation programs. However, if the parent company expresses interest in lead generation for their product, the parent company will take precedence and the reseller will be disabled.

Product Listings: Because Product Listings are reserved for the companies that own the products, we do not list resellers, integrators, consultants and other partners in product listings.

Reviews: A reseller or partner that has signed up for a profile is able to respond to reviews provided that they disclose in their response that they are a reseller or partner for the company that owns the product.

Can a review mention a competitor to our product?

Yes, a review may mention a competitor to the product being reviewed so long as the reference is intended to add value to the review and not to solely promote or disparage the competitor. Reviews may contain mention of alternative products considered or used before or after using the product being reviewed. This additional information can help put a review into the proper context, and provide valuable information to software shoppers.

Why were previously published reviews removed from our profile?

Our teams have built an extremely robust QA process, but we understand that with tens of thousands of reviews submitted each month there will be reviews that violate our guidelines, which occasionally slip by. In our ongoing efforts to improve our service, our teams periodically audit our reviews database. These audits help find reviews that do not meet our guidelines, which we may not have initially identified. When reviews are found to violate our guidelines for any reason they must be disabled, even if the review was originally published by us. If Reviewers are found to have submitted deceptive reviews, we will ban their accounts and remove their historical reviews across all products. As such, an audit may occasionally impact the published review count for a number of unrelated products. Please know that we do not share information about decisions related to a review removal, or our investigatory process.

We are expecting a review but it has not been published, can we know the status?

It is not our policy to provide status updates regarding content submitted to our site. If an expected review has not been published (for example, one submitted through our Reviews as a Service program), there are three likely reasons: i) the review has not yet been processed by our QA team, or ii) the review failed to meet one or more of our Community Guidelines and was disabled, or iii) our team was unable to validate the reviewer. Regardless of the reason, or time for our QA process to complete, please know that every review submitted to our site is examined by our Quality Assurance team according to a strict set of universally applied guidelines and submission criteria. As a neutral reviews platform, we must apply our methods equally and without bias across all vendors, and may not engage in debate regarding the decisions made about a review.

Are notifications sent if a review has been disabled?

If a review was not published because our teams were unable to validate a reviewer’s identity (a cornerstone of our QA process), we will send the reviewer an email asking for additional information that can help validate who they are. A user who responds to this request with accurate information makes it more likely that our team will be able to verify their identity during our QA process. However, in cases where a review is disabled because it violated our Community Guidelines, we do not send notice to the reviewer or vendor as we have found that doing so encourages repeat attempts by those seeking to violate our guidelines. While we realize there are cases where the reviewer was not intending to violate our guidelines, we must treat intended and unintended violations equally.

Can a negative review be removed if our team has resolved the reviewer’s issues?

No. When submitting a review, a reviewer attests that their statement is an honest reflection of their experience. If the review was based on a bad experience, a retired product feature, or even a miscommunication or misunderstanding on the reviewer’s part, it is reflective of the user’s experience with that software, even if later action may have resolved the problem. As a product evolves, it is typical to see a shift in the nature of the reviews listed. We believe the inclusion of this history serves to increase the value to software shoppers visiting our site, as they can better understand how a product has evolved over time.

Can we have a negative review removed if we have a non-disparagement clause in our contract?

No. A review cannot be removed simply due to the existence of a non-disparagement clause in a contract. Not only would this allow vendors to unduly influence the overall rating of their product, Federal law prohibits the use of non-disparagement clauses in customer contracts. It is important that our shoppers receive an unbiased view of a product, and any vendor found to be enforcing such a contract may have penalties applied to their account.

How many reviews for a product are allowed per reviewer?

To prevent a single reviewer from overly influencing the reviews of a product, only a single review is allowed by a reviewer for the same product at a given time.

Can we independently solicit reviews from our users?

Yes, vendors can solicit reviews from their user base outside of our programs, so long as our Community Guidelines are observed. When soliciting reviews, vendors are encouraged to make use of the “Share Your Review Form” links provided within the Reviews section of the Capterra Vendor Portal. Using the supplied links ensures our system applies proper source attribution.

All vendors that independently solicit reviews in exchange for an incentive are required to use the Incentivized Review Form link found within their Capterra Vendor Portal. The FTC requires that all reviews submitted in response to an incentive offer disclose that such an offer was made. Using the provided Incentivized Review Form link ensures that our system applies the appropriate disclosures to any published review. Please know that any review which is found to have been received in response to an undisclosed incentive offer must be disabled on our site in violation of our Community Guidelines and the FTC.

A review mentions pricing details – can we remove the review?

We do not endorse pricing that is posted by a reviewer, and rely on reviewers to submit accurate, publicly available information. However, as per our Reviews Guidelines, reviews must not violate any legal agreements, and a review disclosing confidential pricing details should be flagged to our attention. If a review is challenged on pricing concerns, our teams will investigate to see if the pricing is from a publically available, validated source. Pricing information not found to be public can be removed in violation of our Community guidelines as it would be considered private information. At our discretion, we may i) mask the sensitive information from public display, or ii) disable the review entirely.

Why does this review show [SENSITIVE CONTENT]?

If a review, or a vendor response to a review, contains sensitive information, we will hide this information from public display. Sensitive information may include, but is not limited to:

• Personally Identifying Information. Information, such as email addresses, physical addresses, phone numbers, names, or any other details that could help identify an individual.

• Private Contract Terms. Contracts between two parties often contain sensitive information that may not be disclosed publicly such as pricing information, account service details, or other terms.

• Information that could in our discretion harm a reviewer, vendor or another individual. This includes, but is not limited to, links to a website or any external URL, reference to unsubstantiated legal matters, or profane language.

In such cases the following text [SENSITIVE CONTENT] will be displayed in place of the original text. Please note that we cannot share the content we have masked as such sharing could violate our site’s Privacy Policies.

NOTE: We will never edit a review, or vendor response to a review, in any way that would change the original meaning and intent. If a review is worded such that masking sensitive information would change the intent of the review, the review or response would be determined not meet our Community Guidelines, and would be disabled. In all cases, these edits will be made at the discretion of our site without notification to the reviewer or responder.

What are Buyer Alerts?

A Buyer Alert is a banner placed at the top of a vendor’s product profile page, informing software shoppers that suspicious behavior has been found to be associated with this vendor, which behavior (i) may be causing doubt as to the veracity of the reviews submitted about the vendor’s services, or (ii) may be manifesting in other deceitful activity across our site.

After a vendor’s violation of our policies has been identified and confirmed, we will issue a visible Buyer Alert on the offending vendor’s associated product profile page(s), and then monitor the vendor’s account for a 90 day period. After this period, our teams will review the vendor’s profile(s) and determine whether the Buyer Alert will remain active on the vendor’s product profile page(s), or be removed. Egregious and ongoing violations may warrant additional action, including without limitation, removal of access to the offending vendor’s product profile pages, extension(s) of the Buyer Alert period, referral to appropriate regulatory authorities, or legal action.

How are Buyer Alerts issued and enforced?

When a violation of our site or vendor policies, or manipulation of our reviews system, has been identified and confirmed we will remove any reviews found associated with this activity, and send an email warning to the vendor requesting that all such violations cease as quickly as is practical, or within a period of five (5) business days, whichever comes first. If the offending activity persists, or the vendor is unable to provide evidence which we, at our discretion, believe removes the activity from suspicion, we will disable any additional reviews found associated with this activity, and send a final notice requesting cessation of this activity. If violations still continue, we will place a visible “Buyer Alert” on the vendor’s product profile page(s). A vendor with a “Buyer Alert” in place will also be removed from consideration for any reviews-based awards and/or badges.

A “Buyer Alert” serves as notice to software shoppers that the vendor has engaged in fraudulent activity on our sites, and will remain in place until we determine that the vendor has satisfactorily addressed its non-compliance. Egregious and ongoing violations may warrant additional action, including without limitation, removal of access to the offending vendor’s product profile pages, extension(s) of the Buyer Alert period, referral to appropriate regulatory authorities, or legal action.

May a vendor protest a “Buyer Alert”?

Yes. At any time following the initial warning, but prior to the Buyer Alert being issued, a vendor may submit evidence to argue against an Alert being applied. Because we are not able to validate private communications, including email exchanges and phone conversations taking place between a vendor and a reviewer outside of our site, evidence submitted for consideration should be objective in nature, and capable of independent validation. Any evidence provided by a vendor will be considered as one factor among many in our investigation.

After a Buyer Alert has been applied to a vendor’s account, all communications challenging the Buyer Alert must be handled through the Ombudsman. A vendor may only make a direct appeal to the Ombudsman, and must provide arguments and supporting evidence not already submitted for previous consideration.

Are reviews-related products impacted by a Buyer Alert?

Yes. Issuance of a Buyer Alert will result in the removal of a vendor from any Gartner product which showcases reviews. Once an alert has been lifted, a vendor would regain eligibility for future consideration based on the merit of the reviews associated with their product profile.

How long does it take to process a review?

Reviews sourced through our vendor programs, such as Reviews as a Service, or submitted through the approved links supplied within the vendor portal, are generally processed within five (5) business days. It can take up to two (2) weeks to process reviews sourced elsewhere, or that require additional investigation time. If it has been at least two (2) weeks since the expected submission date, it is fair to assume that the review was either not submitted to our program or did not meet our criteria for publication.

This review is too vague, or too generic, can it be removed?

A review being too vague or generic is a subjective determination of content quality that we are not in a position to make, since we do not evaluate the content of the review itself. However, while we will not disable a review solely on the basis of its content, we will ensure that all reviews meet the criteria outlined in our Community Guidelines. Reviews that, in our discretion, do not meet these Community Guidelines, will not be eligible for publication.

Who owns the reviews on our profile pages?

Reviews are submitted by site visitors (reviewers) who retain ownership as the original author. As part of the review submission process, reviewers grant a broad-based license to us to allow us to use the reviews in the ordinary course of our business in accordance with our established Community Guidelines.

What details about reviews can you share with vendors?

Because we take all measures to protect the privacy of our reviewers, we do not as a rule share details about individual reviews. Details our teams may share regarding individual reviews are limited to those that can be obtained publicly, or through the Vendor Portal. We may also provide high-level details regarding the overall status of an account, such as confirmation that a product’s profile has no technical issues, or that reviews are being processed in accordance with established procedures. We do not share nonpublic information, such as details about unpublished reviews, confirmation of a review submission, or any information about an individual reviewer beyond what is shared publicly. In addition, we do not provide summarized metrics related to the reviews submitted to a product, excluding those offered through a vendor offering or program.

Can a vendor know why a review is not displaying?

No, we do not provide updates as to the status of any one review, nor do we provide details related to decisions to publish, or not publish, content on our site. We operate as a neutral platform provider, and evaluate all content against an objective set of criteria. Because of this we cannot engage in subjective debate as to how these policies are applied. In addition, reviews are submitted by site visitors (reviewers) who retain ownership as the original author. Because we take all measures to protect the privacy of our reviewers, we will not confirm submission of a review, share any communications that may have taken place between the author of a review and our team, or disclose the reasoning behind a decision made about a review.

Are vendors notified when published reviews are disabled?

No, we do not send a notice to reviewers or vendors when a published review is disabled. As part of our ongoing Quality Assurance process, if we learn of a previously published review that does not comply with our published Community Guidelines, the review will be disabled. We operate as a neutral platform provider, and evaluate all content against an objective set of criteria. Because of this we cannot engage in subjective debate as to how these policies are applied, and do not send notifications of disablement.

Can a vendor help in publishing a review?

While we cannot disclose details about individual reviews, and do not engage in public discussion regarding the application of our Community Guidelines, vendors who are searching for reviews they do not see published are welcome to submit questions to reviews@softwareadvice.com, along with any information about the expected reviewers that might be used by our teams to conduct an investigation. Our team will use this information to investigate a vendor’s account, and, if the reviews at issue have been submitted to our site, ensure that they have been, or will be, processed as outlined in our Community Guidelines.

May we publish reviews posted to our software profile on our website and/or marketing materials?

Vendors may make use of reviews content so long as such use is in compliance with our Content Compliance Policy . Violations of this policy may result in penalties, such as a Buyer Alert being displayed on a profile page, or legal action taken by Gartner.

We collected customer reviews at a conference or event. Are they eligible to be published?

Events and conferences are a great opportunity to generate reviews and these reviews are eligible to be published, as long as they are submitted by the reviewer and conform to our published Community Guidelines. Vendors must alert our teams prior to any event where reviews will be solicited so that our teams may provide ‘best practices’ information for collection, and supply proper links for attribution and evaluation. We recommend that you contact your Reviews Representative for more information about Gartner’s Events Review Collection service, which can assist with this process.

May vendors make use of freelance sites, or similar services, to drive reviews for our product?

Vendors may not make use of sites or services that facilitate the completion of tasks in return for a reward (financial or otherwise), or any method used to drive a high volume of unverified leads to a specific software. An “unverified lead” is defined as traffic that lacks substantial evidence of having the qualifications necessary to submit an honest opinion on the use of a specific software product. While we acknowledge the possibility of a qualified reviewer being invited through such a service, experience has shown that the vast majority of leads sent through these services are not qualified. Because of the poor quality of traffic sent through these sites or services, any review found to be sent through these methods – directly or indirectly – will be removed by our team.

May vendors screen reviewers prior to sending them to our reviews form?

To be eligible to participate in our Reviews Program, vendors should solicit feedback from their entire user/customer base (defined as all active users of their software), and must not selectively screen potential reviewers based on a desired attribute or previous opinion shared. In doing so, a vendor would be actively manipulating their reviews to achieve a desired profile, which is a direct violation of the Endorsement Guidelines issued by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). For example, when soliciting reviews from their user base, a vendor may not exclude users who have expressed a negative opinion about their software, or who do not meet a certain personal or professional profile.

A vendor may apply an objective set of qualifying criteria to a reviews collection campaign, provided that such criteria does not impact the intent or substance of the review, and provided that all active users meeting these qualifications receive equal opportunity to submit a review. For example, a vendor may wait to request reviews from its users until a certain period of time has elapsed since they began using the software. However, all users who meet this qualification must be provided with the opportunity to leave a review, whether positive or negative, and regardless of any opinions they may have previously expressed, or their personal or professional background.

Any review found to be in contravention of the above guidance is in violation of our Vendor Guidelines, and would be subject to removal by our team.

May a vendor make use of video reviews from individuals about our software on our website and/or marketing channels?

Yes, a vendor may use a video review about their own company or its products on their website or through marketing materials. At this time, we recommend embedding the video directly from YouTube.  Vendors may share/quote/display a GDM-sourced video review, so long as the use complies with all aspects of our Content Compliance policy.

Is there a disclaimer vendors must add to reviews solicitations?

Yes, vendors must append legal disclaimers to all requests for reviews on our site.

The following must be included on any email or blog post:

* To be eligible to participate, your review must comply with these Community Guidelines.

If a request for a review includes a nominal reward as an incentive, vendors must also append the following paragraph:

PLEASE NOTE: In our support of Gartner’s ongoing efforts to ensure a just and legally compliant Reviews Program, we will not provide an incentive to: i) Reviewers who are employees of -or affiliated with- the company being reviewed, or a direct competitor; ii) Reviewers who are employees, officers, directors, agents of Gartner, Inc., its subsidiaries and affiliated companies and their immediate families; iii) Reviewers who are government and public sector employees; iv) Reviewers whose company policies prohibit the acceptance of gifts in the context of business transactions; and v) Reviewers who are (or who are acting on behalf of) individuals subject to, residing in countries or employed by organizations identified in the US Department of Treasury Office of Foreign Assets Control Sanctions list. ** Even if you fall under one of the categories listed above, you are welcome to submit a non-incentivized review directly on the site by visiting our profile page on https://www.softwareadvice.com/.

The following must be included on any social media or other landing page request:

* To be eligible to participate, your review must comply with these Community Guidelines.

If a request for a review includes a nominal reward as an incentive, vendors must also append the following paragraph:

PLEASE NOTE: In our support of Gartner’s ongoing efforts to ensure a just and legally compliant Reviews Program, we will not provide an incentive to certain categories of restricted individuals. Please check your eligibility status before submitting a review. ** Even if you fall under one of the categories listed above, you are welcome to submit a non-incentivized review directly on the site by visiting our profile page on https://www.softwareadvice.com/.

What is the selection process for video reviews?

Reviewers are selected from a pool of reviewers who meet an objective set of criteria, such as experience with certain software, and who have been previously validated through our Quality Assurance process with a history of submitting high-quality published reviews content. Video reviewers are recruited by our site only, Vendors cannot solicit video reviews for their own products.

How may we respond to a video review?

As with written reviews, vendors may submit a written response to display under a video review.  To add a response to a video review, please email reviews@[site].com with a link to the spotlight page the review is displaying on, a description of the review (if more than one are displaying), and a text response of 1,000 characters or less. 

Why should a vendor respond to a review?

Vendors are encouraged to respond constructively to reviewers on our site, regardless of the rating of a review. While responding to a critical review may be difficult, a vendor’s willingness to address critical reviews builds credibility, shows responsiveness, and generally creates a more favorable opinion of the vendor and product. A thoughtful response also presents another side of the situation, providing potential software shoppers with additional view points to consider as well as showcasing strong customer support.  Positive reviews also benefit from a response, as this shows appreciation and consideration for a vendor’s user base.

In all cases, a vendor may elect to send their response directly to the reviewer, alerting the reviewer that a response was posted. While we strongly discourage vendors reaching out to request a change to a review, sharing a response with a reviewer lets them know their voice has been heard, and creates an additional touch point that may facilitate further engagement outside of our site.

What is a Review Snippet?

Review snippets are direct quotes compiled from user-submitted reviews that have been published to a product’s profile (see How are Review Snippets Selected). Snippets provide software shoppers with an easily digestible snapshot of “Pros” and “Cons” extracted from the user-submitted reviews for quick reference, and may be displayed where a summarized view of reviews highlights is required, such as a product’s reviews profile page, or product comparison pages.   

Snippets have been deployed equally across all products which meet the minimum requirements for snippet generation.  As a neutral reviews platform, our site does not edit, or create, any content selected for snippet display. The opinions expressed in selected review snippets are those of the reviewers and not of Capterra, and we do not endorse any of the opinions expressed through a snippet.

How are Reviews Snippets selected?

Snippet selection is driven by our proprietary algorithm which analyzes a product’s published reviews to identify relevant and impactful content “snippets”.  Snippets are then classified as appropriate for “Pros” or “Cons” classification based on sentiment analysis. 

The snippet algorithm is applied equally to all products on our site that qualify for the display of reviews snippets. 

What qualifies a product for the display of Reviews Snippets?

Review snippets are generated from published reviews content. To ensure a high level of accuracy, our system requires a robust set of reviews content from which to choose snippets .  Snippets are only released to a product profile once our system determines that there is enough reviews-sourced content available to generate a balanced set of both positive and negative snippets.    

New reviews added to a product profile will work towards fulfilling snippet requirements, but as not all reviews contain content suitable to generate a snippet, snippet eligibility is not based on reviews count alone.  If snippets are not currently displaying on your product profile, additional reviews content is needed, and we can only suggest recruiting fresh reviews in order to increase the diversity of content available for our snippet service to select from. 

How many Reviews Snippets will display on our profile ?

All products that meet the requirements for snippet selection will display up to four (4) “Pros” and four (4) “Cons”.  Our system seeks to display a balanced number of snippets of each sentiment.  However,  on occasion a profile may display fewer snippets of either sentiment depending on the availability of relevant snippet content.

Can we prevent Snippets from displaying on our profile?

Because reviews snippets display is a feature universally applied across our site, vendors cannot opt out of this feature simply to prevent the display of snippets on its product profile pages. However, vendors are welcome to challenge individual snippets they believe do not meet our criteria for display. 

Can we remove or replace a snippet with a different snippet?

As with the reviews they are sourced from, snippets cannot be removed based on subjective challenges regarding their content.  Snippets may be considered for replacement with another snippet only in the following situations: (i)  where content has been incorrectly identified as a “pro” or a “con”, (ii) where they mention an unsupported product feature, (iii) where they mention a lack of a product feature that currently exists, or (iv) where they otherwise violate our Community Guidelines.

Any vendor or site visitor may flag a review snippet for investigation by sending an email to reviews@softwareadvice.com. If it is determined that the snippet does not meet our criteria for display, the flagged snippet will be replaced by our system during the next scheduled system refresh.  

Why did we decide to display review snippets on our site?

Reviews provide a great source of honest feedback for software shoppers.  Review snippets facilitate that feedback by providing software buyers with easily digestible content regarding a product’s reviews, which can be quickly referenced as they progress in their product search 

Can vendors repurpose Reviews Snippets for display on their own site?

Yes, vendors may share/quote/display or otherwise repurpose a GDM-sourced snippet from their own product listing, so long as the use complies with all aspects of our Content Compliance policy.  

How are products sorted on category pages?

Within product categories, products are by default sorted by “Sponsored”.  Vendors may choose to bid for placement within our category listing pages. The “Sponsored” option sorts the directory by those bids, placing the vendors bidding highest above those bidding lowest. Vendors who bid for placement can be identified by the orange “Visit Website” button on their listing. Vendors with a blue “View Profile” button have not opted for a paid listing within the selected category.

Products may also be sorted by “Highest Rated”, “Most Reviews”, and “Alphabetical”.  “Most Reviews” and “Alphabetical” are self-explanatory, with “Highest Rated” being a proprietary function of a product’s overall star rating, normalized for recency and volume of reviews, from highest to lowest.  As such, “Highest Rated” sorting takes into account not only the number of reviews and their ratings, but how recent those reviews are. “Highest Rated” does not consider a vendor’s status as a client. 

Therefore, it is possible for a product to have a higher average rating and more reviews, but rank lower than another product with more recent reviews but a slightly lower average rating and fewer reviews. It would also be possible for a product with more reviews and a higher average rating to rank higher than a product with more recent reviews and a much lower average rating. The time each review was submitted, their individual ratings, and other proprietary factors all contribute to creating a normalized score for each product which will determine where the product will rank for “Highest Rated” within a given category.

FAQs for Reviewers

Why am I receiving emails from Software Advice after submitting a review?

Users who submit a review on our site agree to opt-in to future communications from us as outlined in our site terms. Any user who does not wish to receive these notices may choose to opt-out of our email program by clicking on the “unsubscribe” link provided in these emails. Please review our site terms for further details.

I left a review but didn’t receive a gift card! Why not?

For those reviewers who submitted a review as part of an incentive program, please keep a few key points in mind:

• Only published reviews are eligible for an incentive. If a review did not meet our Guidelines and was not published, the reviewer will not be eligible for an incentive for that review. We do, however, encourage that reviewer to submit reviews in future incentivized review campaigns they remain eligible for.

• Gift cards are automatically fulfilled by our system at set times. In order to minimize error, our system automatically fulfills gift cards at periodic intervals.

• Ensure that the email link to which you responded contained an incentive offer. Only reviews that are submitted after clicking on an incentive link in an email are eligible for an incentive. These links contain tracking information that allows us to match the incentive to the submitted review. If you did not click on a link in the campaign email, our system has no way to know that you left the review.

• We could not verify your identity. If we required additional information from you, we may have reached out to you for additional information, during which time both your review publication and incentive were paused. Responding to our request may allow us to publish the review and provide you with your gift card.

• The gift card confirmation link was not clicked on. To ensure our gift cards are going only to valid emails, we send a confirmation email containing a link that must be clicked on before the actual gift card is sent.

• The review was submitted after the incentive expired or after payout limits were reached. Some of our programs offer a limited number of gift cards only, or have an offer that expires after a set period of time. Reviews submitted after the thresholds have been met would not qualify for a gift card.

In all cases, please double check your Spam and Trash accounts for our gift card offers before reaching out to our support team.

A note on fraud. Gift card codes are unique, and may only be used only by those who have access to the email the cards were originally sent to. Please know that we are able to track gift card balance and identify whether a gift card has been redeemed and used. Illegitimate requests for an incentive, as well as any fraudulent activity related to leaving reviews in exchange for an incentive, may result in removal from our reviews incentive program.

Why wasn’t my review published?

Your submitted review may not be displaying because i) it is waiting to be reviewed by our team, ii) the review failed to meet one or more of our Reviews Guidelines, or iii) the review was not otherwise eligible for publication (for example, if the review was submitted in an unsupported language).

NOTE: To protect the integrity of our reviews program, reviews are disabled if we do not feel confident we have verified the identity of the reviewer. In these cases we will reach out to reviewers requesting additional information. Though no guarantee, responding to these emails with helpful information can aid our investigation and lead to publication of your review.

There were some edits to my review. Can you tell me why?

As per our reviewer policies, we will never make an edit that would change the original intent of a review. However, we may make simple edits to correct typos or remove non-standard characters, or remove the same content entered into different fields within a review. Edits may also be made to hide sensitive data (as further described here), such as personally identifying information, or private contract terms that are not intended for public disclosure. The reviewer will not be notified about these edits, which are made at the discretion of Software Advice.

I submitted a review, but was told the review did not meet site guidelines and will not be published. What now?

If a review does not pass our QA process or is identified by our team as not meeting our Community Guidelines, the review will not be published. Reviews that are not published do not qualify for an incentive, even when submitted in response to an incentive offer. Users may submit another review that meets our guidelines.

Are reviewers liable for any penalties for leaving fraudulent reviews?

In short, possibly. When submitting a review, you are agreeing to our site guidelines, and that all content submitted meets our guidelines. Our site has the right to seek legal action against any reviewer who submits a review containing fraudulent, or misleading, information. In addition, many jurisdictions in and outside of the United States take reviews content very seriously, and have prosecuted reviewers over posting fraudulent content. In 2009, a case was settled by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo in which a company posting fake reviews agreed to pay a $300,000 penalty. Countries outside of the US, such as the UK, France, Italy, and Germany, also have strict laws posted about reviews fraud, as dictated by the EU Unfair Commercial Practices Directive.

May I leave a review for a product based off of a demo I viewed?

We believe software reviews should be based off of actual experience in using a product. Watching a product demo is not the same as hands-on experience in using a product, and as such a review found to be based off of a viewed product demo would be disabled by our team. However, a viewed demo is not treated the same as evaluating a product during a free trial period. Participating in a free trial does include hands-on experience. If you used a software during a free trial period, you may review the software, but should indicate that you used a free trial on the review form.

Why was my review flagged for investigation?

Reviews may be flagged as potentially fraudulent by the vendor, other reviewers, or during our internal audits of our reviews database. At these times, we may ask for more information, such as proof of use, in order to better understand if the review in question does meet our guidelines. If a review is found to be in violation of our guidelines, it will be removed. Please reference our investigation process overview for more detail (link to investigation section in guidelines).

May I leave a review for a product based off of a free trial?

Software buyers may evaluate multiple tools before purchasing software. We believe these evaluative experiences in a proof of concept or with trial versions are valid experiences to share with our user community. If you used free trial version of a software, you may review the software, but should indicate that you used a free trial by selecting “Free Trial” on the review submission form.

Why did I receive a note that my reviews account was suspended?

We are dedicated to connecting software shoppers and vendors by being the largest, and most trustworthy, source of software reviews. To achieve this end, all reviews are manually reviewed by a dedicated Quality Assurance team. Any signs of reviews fraud result in the review being disabled. Users who are found to have committed fraud may have their accounts banned, with associated reviews removed across all products, and would not be allowed to submit future reviews. If your reviews have been marked as fraudulent, you may receive a note indicating such. We understand that you may not agree with our decision, but please know much consideration is given before flagging and closing any user’s account. We encourage you to reference our guidelines to help understand factors involved in our decisions.

Why was my published review removed?

Our teams have built an extremely robust QA process, but we understand that with tens of thousands of reviews submitted each month that there will be reviews which violate our guidelines that occasionally slip by. In our ongoing efforts to improve our service, our teams periodically audit our reviews database. These audits help find reviews that fail to meet our guidelines, which we may not have identified initially. When reviews are found to violate our guidelines for any reason they must be disabled, even if the review was originally published by us. Audits are conducted across our entire reviews database, and impact all reviewers equally.

Can I protest a review removal?

Our site strives to maintain a neutral stance on reviews, disabling only those that fail to meet our Community Guidelines. If you believe your review met our Community Guidelines, and was incorrectly disabled, you are welcome to submit an inquiry to our Compliance team at reviews@softwareadvice.com. The Compliance team is tasked with upholding our guidelines, and will investigate the review status to ensure that the appropriate decision was reached. Please know that we do not share information about our decisions underlying a review removal because there are many data points that our systems collect, which are considered proprietary.

Are notifications sent if a review has been disabled?

If a review was not published because our teams were unable to validate a reviewer’s identity (a cornerstone of our QA process), we will send the reviewer an email asking for additional information that can help validate who they are. A user who responds to this request with accurate information makes it more likely that our team will be able to verify their identity during our QA process. However, in cases where a review is disabled because it violated our Community Guidelines, we do not send notice to the reviewer or vendor. While we realize there are cases where the reviewer was not intending to violate our guidelines, we must treat intended and unintended violations equally.

How can I edit my own review?

Our team may make simple edits, such as typos or spelling corrections, or removing the same content entered into different fields within the same review, upon receipt of a request from the original reviewer to reviews@softwareadvice.com. The request must be sent from the email address used to submit the original review, as only the actual reviewer is entitled to direct us to edit their review.

We cannot otherwise edit the content of a previously published review. Instead, reviewers may replace existing reviews at any time by submitting a new review for a product they have previously reviewed. The updated review will then be re-evaluated by our QA team. Only a single review is allowed by a reviewer for the same product at a given time, and if published the new review will replace the original.

If it has been less than six (6) months since the review was originally submitted, please notify our team of the submission at reviews@softwareadvice.com to ensure our team treats the review appropriately. Failure to contact our team will result in the new submission being disabled. Please note that reviews submitted within a six (6) month window for the same product are regarded as edits, and are not eligible for any incentive offer the reviewer may have received.

How can I remove my own review?

To request a review to be removed, any reviewer may send us an email to reviews@softwareadvice.com, explaining which review they want to remove and the rationale for such removal (for our records). The request must be sent from the email address used to submit the original review, as only the actual reviewer is entitled to direct us to remove their review.

Once we disable an existing review, a reviewer always has the option to submit a new review for the product for evaluation by our QA team. If it has been less than six (6) months since the review was originally submitted, please notify our team of the new submission at reviews@softwareadvice.com to ensure our team treats the review appropriately. Failure to contact our team will result in the new submission being disabled. Please note that reviews submitted within a six (6) month window for the same product are regarded as edits, and are not eligible for any incentive offer the reviewer may have received.

How often can I update or edit my review?

You may request a minor edit to an existing review, or submit a new review to replace an existing review, at any time (see How can I edit or remove my own review?). Please note that reviews submitted within a six (6) month window for the same product are regarded as edits, and are not eligible for any incentive offer the reviewer may have received.

How many reviews for a product are allowed per reviewer?

To prevent a single reviewer from overly influencing the reviews of a product, only a single review is allowed by a reviewer for the same product at a given time.

Can I submit more than one review for the same product?

We understand that experiences with a software can change over time, and we believe an updated review allows a new opinion to be expressed. However, we only allow a single review from an individual reviewer to be published at any time for any one product, and require at least six months to pass before a new review for the same product may be accepted.

If you are looking to edit an existing review, please read more here.

Why was my review edited to show [SENSITIVE CONTENT]?

If a review contains sensitive information, we will hide this information from public display. Sensitive information may include, but is not limited to:

• Personally Identifying Information. Information, such as email addresses, physical addresses, phone numbers, names, or other details that could help identify an individual.

• Confidential Contract Terms. Contracts between two parties often contain sensitive information that may not be intended for public disclosure such as pricing information, account service details, or other terms.

• Potentially Harmful Information. Any other information that we in our reasonable discretion determine could be detrimental to the interests of a reviewer, vendor or another individual.

In such cases the text [SENSITIVE CONTENT] will be displayed in place of the original text.

What are Buyer Alerts?

A Buyer Alert is a banner placed at the top of a vendor’s product profile page, informing software shoppers that suspicious behavior has been found to be associated with this vendor, which behavior (i) may be causing doubt as to the veracity of the reviews submitted about the vendor’s services, or (ii) may be manifesting in other deceitful activity across our site.

After a vendor’s violation of our policies has been identified and confirmed, we will issue a visible Buyer Alert on the offending vendor’s associated product profile page(s), and then monitor the vendor’s account for a 90 day period. After this period, our teams will review the vendor’s profile(s) and determine whether the Buyer Alert will remain active on the vendor’s product profile page(s), or be removed. Egregious and ongoing violations may warrant additional action, including without limitation, removal of access to the offending vendor’s product profile pages, extension(s) of the Buyer Alert period, referral to appropriate regulatory authorities, or legal action.

Can we trust reviews from a vendor with an issued “Buyer Alert”?

Prior to issuing a “Buyer Alert,”, our Teams will take corrective action to remove any content that violates our Site guidelines. Any reviews remaining on a vendor’s product profile page after a “Buyer Alert” has been issued will have passed through intensive scrutiny by our expert Quality Assurance team. However, because the actions of the vendor has placed their account under suspicion, we encourage buyers to proceed with caution when relying on reviews of a flagged vendor to make an informed software purchasing decision.

Where can I find more information about review incentives?

If you submitted a review in response to an incentive offer from our site, you may find more information about eligibility and incentive distribution in our Incentive Program FAQ.

Where will the content of my review display to the public?

Published reviews may display publicly i) on the profile page of the software reviewed, ii) in summarized form throughout our site, such as the “snippets” and “product comparison” sections of software profile pages on applicable sites, and iii) through reviews-sharing applications hosted by our site used to display reviews content on third party sites. Please refer to our General User Terms for more information regarding content ownership and usage rights.

How long will it take for my review to be published?

Every review submitted to our site is manually evaluated by our Quality Assurance team to ensure published reviews meet our site guidelines. While the QA teams work diligently, it can take up to two (2) weeks to process reviews. If it has been more than two (2) weeks since your submission, you may assume that either our QA teams were either unable to validate your identity or your review did not meet our criteria for publication.

Are some reviewers ineligible to receive an incentive for their reviews?

Yes, there are certain reviewers to whom incentives cannot be provided in response to an offer because doing so violates the law and/or corporate policy prohibiting gifts in the context of a business transaction. Please review our eligibility restrictions carefully prior to leaving a review.