Hi there community 
I would like to find out if anyone can share a piece of advice or some ‘tricks’ if you will on how to ‘motivate’ customers to give a review, yes those shiny stars 
Can I ask a customer do rating in exchange for some small service like graphics customatisation, etc? Is it worth it and is it allowed according to GR rules? Thanks.
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Vox clamantis in deserto, awesome, thnx community
hi buddy , well as u could observe a lot of guys try to introduce it in their review images … as for me , i am mentioning about it in the help file but lets face it i think that this is hard to get to manage to really “push people” into rating indeed and that mostly people who are not really satisfied will cone easy to get to leave a message … this is how for me this system is pretty much not basically saying what an item or an author is all about … at tis stage all guys should basically have a better rating knowing just that , not to mention that lots of guys have the same problem as yours , that is to say that they do not receive ratings this often … a bit like i do for instance i have had not so far from 1500 sales and only 21 ratings …
one of the big issues that i had faced at least three or times was that some buyers contacted me for an issue and wanted to rate 5 stars and they should could not understand where to go to rate (the system is not intuitive if u ask me … and if people have to search they just do not want , they have other things to do …) and in the end did not do …
in any case , hard to tell if this is good to push people into rating and also if there is a really efficient way to do …
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Thanks for your time and experience, Nico. Btw I have as much as 10 ratings 
one of which is negative with 3 stars ;3
Thanks for the idea of ‘asking’ for a review in a help file, haven’t thought about it .)
One time one guy posted a screenshot-instruction ‘How To Rate’ (might be helpful):
Also I had a thought. When we update items our purchasers should receive notifications (if they don’t opt off). Since we can’t contact them directly we can contact them by this mean (of course in terms of common sense). Let’s say I decided to update my item. I can ask for review in a Help/Support file and on the item page.
And again, the question to savvy users and admins, can we, authors, offer some services like graphics, in my case logo, customatisation, or freebies in trade of positive reviews and ratings?
Would be grateful for your answers and any tips on the topic.
well if u ask me buddy this is whole “cannot contact the customer” thing is just a thing for envato to protect themselves as they are afraid that u do business without they get their share in the equation / their part of the cake … when let’s face it it would be a minority thing anyway … . But, once again, we have to abide by the rules and do what we are told to do , the only sad thing is that the author is always the poorest part in the equation , no matter what … .
This is just sad that the same does not happen with pirate things because for sure we could be really much better protected that we are to say the least if something like this happened to take place … but once again , authors individually are not a big deal, they re jut small money for big oiled machine, period … all they have to do is accept all and keep quiet …
otherwise thanks for the process capture this is far from being useless / unuseful to say the least , as i explained earlier on …
for me having to contact people and so on to update an item and in particular an item’s basic settings is also much of a big flaw in the system at a time when envato had a campaign to push guys into working more again to make sure that we and envato have a better SEO … (which will mainly benefit Envato by the way). Indeed, not being able to change the name of a file when we are asked to follow some instructions as regard to names of items is just out of this world in my view …
well the thing about assistance is much of an issue as we are supposed to do it all to help when on the other hand we cannot contact anyone … there is a real discrepancy … authors are all about working efforts and so on and are not the one who get the main fruit of their loom … but are imposed many responsibilities
i am not sure of what is the impact of positive rating anyway , maybe it plays a part but i have seen guys and items having very average ratings selling hugely and some guys like me have a very good rating and high satisfaction level and do not sell that much more for that matter , so hard to figure out what is the real impact … i assume this is better to have as high as possible but i think that rating things are not that much of a big deal … sone buyers do not even read what they buy sometimes and thus i am not sure that all of them are paying attention about ratings …
offering something in return of a good rating also sounds morally wrong in my view, it sounds kind of bit like bribery for me and if i am rather sure that people would like it in buyers side , i think that it would make this whole rating system even less reliable that it is now and what is the legitimacy of such a system is this is not a fair display of what the proficiency of the author is or of what the quality of his items are ?
if u ask me we are all underrated at this time, most of satisfied guys not rating and most of less satisfied ones not being reluctant coming to rate just means that u have the worst in priority and that all guys should ave a better rating for that matter, besides a guy offered to put 5 stars to any item not being rated , well this maybe fairer in an way but not sure that it would make the system more reliable for that matter … after all u can be satisfied and put 4 stars because u consider something an aspect of an item and consider that it could be better in a way …
in any event for me all is related to buyers when it comes to ratings if they are fair the system can be worth the drive if they are not this is completely useless and as all people are not the same well this is always something in between …
Well, Nico, I agree to most that you’ve written. Yeap asking about positive rating in trade of some goodies looks like bribery, but if you think about it like motivating ‘lazy’ or busy clients, then it’s Ok I think
And the thing about stars is only that a lot of customers still would buy items with higher ratings, I believe these are those buyers who don’t know what they are buying so they rely on experience of others. That’s the trick. Now imagine every single sale of yours had at least 4 stars rating! Would be huge I bet
About poor authors that have a small piece of pie I agree only 50/50. It’s webmarket buddy, it’s somebody else’s platform .) Build your own platform, create audience, have your own clients, pay bills for domain, hosting, google ads, invest in SEO, and so on and so forth, and get all the fruits
well in fact ideologically speaking i agree with u , i am just not sure about how true this is practically speaking, since, as i explained , i have seen a big deal of very hugely sold items getting sometimes very varying ratings and including some very bad however they were continuing to sell wickedly all the same , when some other with great ratings are having limited sales … i guess this is more about how useful people think your item actually is rather than stars … i things that positive rating are more here to convince undecided guys rather than any other thing in the end …
as for what u said about buyers not knowing what they are buying they are more responsible for both having flat or poor items selling and thus for them to make their way on the market than any other thing, i think stars just help to possibly convince someone who is reluctant into choosing one or another item …
no i am not craving for having lots of 4 stars ratings, i prefer just like what happens this far having some 5 stars ratings that too many lower ratings , i think this is better for the potential image of a seller … but a lot of guys bet on quantity rather than quality , whether this is for items and for other things, i guess that people like us having a true interest for quality should not indulge into doing just this …
well for poor authors, i think that what u said to me is not appropriate , as not only we give a good share (to say the least) of what we earn for what u mentioned but poor authors are not numerous , just a handful, and i am always amazed to see these guys have so many items approved when they are really low quality if u ask me , the thing is that they have a potential buying base, as some buyers have bad taste (they are everyday people and this is what happens in this case , sometimes …) and that they ;make the most of the fact that people buying do not know what a quality item is and in the end, they also get exposure from having a lot of items uploaded and approved …
i also do not like the idea that u spread throughout what u told me insofar as it basically means that we have to accept and it all and like it all about this marketplace and that we take it or leave , the problem is that if all do that then nothing will go forward here , being 100% in complete self satisfaction is not helping to give the bets of yourself and to come up with the best possible product …
Sorry, Nico, you use too much words and not in the clearest manner, at times it’s difficult to get the idea. And the post is going astray
Well to the point, higher ratings and the more the better are saying to a potential buyer that the item is popular, many other people bought it, it’s safe to buy it. In many cases positive ratings will increase (not guarantee but just increase) possibility of purchase.
Moreover customers’ reviews are interesting to me in terms of author - customer relations, that’s why my initial interest was how to motivate clients to rate.
What concerns poor authors I meant your idea that (if I understood it right) gr authors are poor because they get smaller part of the money that they generate. Well it’s platform rules. They put resources, time, skills, envato gives a huge deal of exposure to items and authors, and I’m not saying it’s perfect platform, even your own platform won’t be perfect, just more customizable
many people complain that i express or the way i do here … lol anyway … sometimes this is difficult to express all what we want at a time
higher ratings are sometimes fooling rather any other things. the thing is that many guys do not have 3 ratings on their items and thus no rating is being shown
lots of guys let themselves go into buying popular or supposedly good items but they end up buying sone things that are not always that good
sorry to say just that but popularity has much to do with marketing skills, not design quality in most cases. there are pretty good examples here to illustrate what i am saying …
for me ratings are no interesting, period. for me they are biased by some unfair ratings that many guys suffer from. if nothing like this was existing they would be good for buyer-seller relationship as u mentioned. problem is that these unfairness examples are from being unusual
there are no poor authors as for this we do not agree. there are sone guys who play the number thing … can we blame them for this in a volume based system, well no , they play with rules and flaws
and the idea about authors is not at all what i tried to explain, the general body of authors here is just very good, sometimes even impressive, this is more about strategy and also about being coherent as quality control is all about
this is marketplace’s responsibility to avoir flat / not good enough things and thus prevent the saturation of the market
envato is giving a huge exposure? really ? lol well try to put your item for sale, have it accepted , do not post anything for long and try to see what is going on … u will realize that no other uploaded item after 2 weeks, u just do not have any sale anymore (unless u self promote a LOT) , if this is what u call giving good exposure, well , we do not have the same idea of what good exposure is …
Nico, I didn’t say one doesn’t need to work and put a lot of effort. A rolling stone gathers no moss
And yes, this is market and a lot of things are about marketing, maybe even more than the quality of items as you’ve stated. But authors who care about quality would care both about items level and marketing part as well. Petit à petit, l’oiseau fait son nid. So if I can use this every small bit to add to my success, why not?
i know no positive thing that really hurts and this is better for anyone to enjoy good reviews indeed , at least psychologically speaking. However , when it comes to sales , this is the same as with other sale-related things , u have no warranty at all … for me the rating thing is just another way for Envato to make sure that guys bring up the best possible thing to the table when they upload something, period …
now is that necessary when u have a review of quality in the first place ? not sure at all, this is like u are unjudging professionals by sometimes following some amateurs feelings when the concerned people do not know anything about techniques. Let’s face it, this is sometimes what happens with some buyers … of course sometimes this is freelancers or authors who buy other guys stuffs for some projects but most of the time this is some people who come to buy for their own business and who do not belong to the design world and who may not completely be proficient enough to really determine the real quality of an item …
all guys have the right to feel how they like about this system, for me, as regard to what a lot of guys report this is not that efficient and this is very far from being perfect , not to mention that this is not sure that it brings anything to authors …