The Five-Star Feedback Scam

How Relationship Marketing Belittles Us All

After checking out of a hotel recently, the mega-hospitality holding company app requested that I rate my visit. Having had a satisfactory but unremarkable stay, I complied with what I believed to be a fair assessment.

However, upon receiving my 3-star (out of 5) evaluation, the corporate travel monolith followed up with a most earnest note, inquiring as to the nature of my mediocre review. “Why,” they beseeched, “did our services not merit the highest assessment?”

My first reaction was disgust at seeing a multi-deca-billion-dollar conglomerate grovel for my approval, but I was more taken aback by their transparent lack of self-awareness.

“Why didn’t I give you five stars? Because you’re the Hampton Inn in Dayton, Ohio! Three stars is your five-star rating! The Four Seasons in Maui is eligible for five stars, but you are not. My room was clean. The people were nice. But you don’t have a beach, and your gym is a rusty treadmill in a supply closet, so no cinco estrellas.

Know thyself, Hampton Inn!”

I’m so over businesses asking for my feedback. Not just because it’s disruptive and time-consuming but because the whole process is nothing more than an obligatory charade where a business pretends to care about our opinions, and we pretend to offer a sincere evaluation. If you dare rate an experience less than five stars, the inevitable follow-up just sucks up more of our day and finite brain power.

It’s grade inflation of the worst kind. It’s corporate participation trophies. (“oh, you’re just the best little hotel, aren’t you, Hampton Inn?”) Worst of all, it completely ignores the fact that some products are designed to be just okay. And there’s nothing wrong with that.

Speaking of insincere surveys from mediocre service providers...

When I stay at a Hampton Inn—the chain whose pricing most accurately fits my comedy income level—my expectations are modest: keep the rain off my head and bed bugs out of my clothes. What else should I expect for $108/night?

It’s the same thing for my haircut experience when I go to Great Clips. For $17, I’m not expecting them to reverse my baldness. Just clean up what little hair I have left and shave my scraggly neck. That’s it.

But from their post-coif inquiry, it’s clear they believe their product should lead to some kind of transcendent experience. Then they get all pissy if I tell them they simply provided a decent product at a fair price.

Well I’m sorry, Great Clips—you didn’t give me a raging boner followed by an earth-shattering orgasm. But that’s not what I wanted anyway. What I wanted was a haircut. And it was fine.

It was FINE

Uber is probably the most annoying to me because it’s the service I use most frequently, and they insist that you rate every single ride. “Why didn’t you rate Joseph 5-stars? Did he get lost, drive too fast, or otherwise make you feel unsafe?”

No, but he did pick me up in a noisy 2010 Camry that was covered in cat hair, then made me listen to Christian rock for 8.2 miles. None of these is terrible, but they don’t merit a ne plus ultra ranking.

Speaking of which, why 5 stars? As if an Uber ride is so nuanced we need to dissect its evaluation into quintiles. Uber should have only two ratings: “Fine” and “Other.” The former would cover 97% of rides, while Other would include anything extraordinary or terrible, like the driver saving your puppy’s life on the one hand or him prattling on about how our flat Earth is populated by lizard people on the other.

What went wrong? Nothing. It was fine. (Photo: Uber)

The short ratings are annoying, but the longer surveys are beyond pointless. When I buy a pack of Dentyne at Walgreens, I don’t need to fill out a binder-length psychological assessment of my Gum Discovery Journey. Here’s what you need to know, Walgreens: my breath stank and your store was the closest place to buy gum. That’s my journey.

It's mostly good that technology enables businesses to listen to their customers. But it has gotten absurd. Stacey and I recently had a service come out to clean out the lint from our dryer vents. On the invoice, the service provider implored us to “Be sure to sign up for our newsletter!” Oh yeah, I’ve always wanted to stay on top of the current events in the laundry exhaust industry. I can’t wait to hear the latest gossip from the luminaries in the duct-cleaning ecosystem that are—probably for reasons of political bias—ignored by the mainstream media.

It's all just gone too far and it's time for a reset. So, dear service providers and purveyors of consumer goods, let’s restore some moderation and self-awareness to your relationship marketing efforts. Every time you ask for my opinion, you’re asking for my time, which—as we all know—equals my money. So, either pay me or leave me the hell alone.

And as for you dear reader, please subscribe to this Substack. Yes, I see the irony, hypocrisy, and shallow desperation here, but that won't stop me from participating in this unstoppable societal sham.

Also, please rate and review my podcast. It’s way better than fine!

(5 stars only, please.)

THE END…but keep reading

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