How To Avoid Information Overload When Reading Online Reviews

To make well-informed decisions regarding purchasing online, finding genuine and objective reviews is necessary. Therefore, going on review platforms may help in deciding which websites are worthwhile and which ones you should avoid. Even with that help, you must be able to compare and choose what works best for you, which may need some reading. In this article, we’ll look at the many ways you can do so without overloading yourself with information.

Prioritise

Prioritising the most important factors of the site you are looking for will help you narrow down the reviews you need to check through. Using online casinos as an example, players might be on the lookout for a site that is not on gamstop — a self-exclusion scheme for UK-licensed operators. This would remove all licensed UK operations, leaving the best offshore alternatives.

Alternatively, players might have a specific game they are looking for or want to find betting operators that offer the best signup bonuses or loyalty schemes.

Filter out Information

After prioritising what you want from a site, filtering will lay out the best options for you. If a review site doesn’t have a specific search bar, you can open a search bar by using the Ctrl+F function, and then you can narrow down your search results and sift through the page for certain words or terms.

Furthermore, you can also use the filter function that finds a specific location, whether you want a house or an apartment, and your budget, which is very helpful if you need to locate a place to stay while on vacation in a foreign city.

Understand Your Limits

Only you will know your limits when it comes to the length of time you can take in information. Some people can retain a lot more than others. Therefore, setting a specific goal can be helpful in some cases, with a set target of sites to read reviews from, such as when comparing universities or training programs, which often involve extensive reading.

Keeping track of the sites which you are interested in on a separate notepad will also minimise confusion if you want to go back. Setting a goal of how many sites you check through, or how many you want to compare against each other, should reduce the risk of becoming burnt out.

Take Time Away

As well as setting goals of how many sites you want to look at, setting a timer so you can regularly take breaks will help to keep you fresh. Using the 20-20-20 rule when reading reviews is a good idea when you want to compare insurance providers, like when you need to pay extra attention to different insurance policies. It is also a great way to reduce the risk of developing uncomfortable eyes from prolonged screen staring.

Furthermore, you should try pausing every 20 minutes to look at anything 20 feet away for at least 20 seconds, as per the 20-20-20 guideline. This is claimed to reduce eye strain and increase eye relaxation. Aside from these brief breaks, moving away from the screen will allow the information you're examining to properly register.

Staying hydrated and fed should also improve concentration and help with the retention of information.

Stay Informed on the Subject

Looking at review sites for a topic you aren’t sure about can end up being a waste of time. This is because some of the information won’t be clear to you, and you might not have a good idea of what to prioritise.

You may better understand newly introduced technologies and services, and spot products that are becoming outdated by researching and keeping up with certain sectors. A great approach to remain informed is to subscribe to newsletters from reliable sources.

Better knowledge of a subject will make it easier to identify fake reviews, which can happen. This can be done by unscrupulous operators to provide false confidence in a site, or to try and torpedo competitors. Review sites work hard to remove these, but some can slip past.

Conclusion

Review sites are designed to provide a service that helps consumers. The best sites will be completely impartial and provide a well-structured breakdown and trusted reviews from experts and consumers. This will include a section that highlights key areas, and having a uniform breakdown at the end of each review makes comparisons much easier to draw.