reviews

[Huff]

Couple quick questions guys:

My friend and I are trying to play each course in our state by the end of the year. I'm writing a review for each one, as well as taking pics, as we go.

I have 5 reviews so far, and only 10 helpful votes. In fact my last one for Maple Hill got a neg vote (does that count against my total?). I'm doing the pics n reviews to:

A)try and help the site by reviewing courses no one else had. (same with adding pics as needed)
2) hopefully get more people in our local area out onto the course and raise the demand for courses.

so 10 helpfuls and 1 not helpful out of 5 reviews doesnt seem very good to me. I dont want to go all year doing these if my reviews themselves arent going to be helpful to people, or else its just kind of silly to take the time to do them lol.

So would a few of you trusted reviewers take a look at my reviews and let me know if there is some piece I'm missing, or whatever it is they are lacking? We've still got alot of the state's courses to go on out 09 tour and if I need to re-evaluate my approach to these its better to do so now than at the end of the year.




And Tim, is there anyway if someone clicks 'not helpful' that some sort of comment could be left for the reviewer. Like they need to give a reason why its not helpful? Otherwise I dont see how people will become better reviewers if they dont know whats wrong. Just a thought.

 

[Camgolfer]

People sometimes just don't like your review. I doubt it has anything to do with what you posted. People like certain courses and they hate others. If you give a course you played a less than stellar review than someone else feels it deserves or you were not 100% clear on what you meant people can get upset over nothing.

Some people are just jerks. Keep playing and updating the reviews. I think this is a great idea.

 

[mmyersdisc]

wow...nexanimal all over again? apprently she had a point tim if shes not the only one about the "negative comments"

 

[Marty McFly]

Honestly people kind ways to complain about anything.

 

[Huff]

oh the fact that I got a 'negative comment' doesnt bother me. I didnt even look at it in that light.

I was thinking more along the lines of actual usefulness to the site. If we cant communicate why a review isnt helpful without having to PM someone, then whats the point of clicking 'no' on if the review was helpful or not. However if theres an easy way thats potential built in to saying 'no' on a review, then wont the reviews in general get better and be more of a resource? and lets face it, most people wont go out of their way to do something like that.


I'm just starting to travel any large distance specifically to play golf. So If I'm doing 4 or 5 hours or more of driving to get someplace I picked off the site, its in my best interest if the reviews on there are accurate and helpful. I dont wanna drive all that way to find out its actually a crappy course and locals just keep voting it up out of pride or something. I'm guessing that goes for other travelers too.

 

[Greg Layton]

You have to consider that not everyone who reads your review and gets something out of it is going to bother to hit the little helpful button. Hell, I'll bet more than half of the folks who read reviews at this site aren't members. You can't vote on reviews if you aren't logged in. Just think of writing reviews as a public service.

Someone might google a course name and read your review five years from now and get something out of it. And that's a good thing.

 

[A.Mutt]

I agree with you that not knowing why somebody finds your review unhelpful isn't very helpful in making better reviews. For what its worth I read your Maple Hill review and did find it helpful.

I've done two reviews and only 2 votes, 1 a piece and 1 of those are a not-helpful, which is discouraging because I put a lot of effort into both. For the 1 not helpful I went and played the course again for the first time this year. I put up photos of the full course as there were none and completely overhauled the review.

 

[swatso]

Helpful/Non-Helpful

Huff,

A 10-to-1 ratio of helpful to non-helpful is pretty good. Two votes per review is a bit better than what I average, so don't take that necessarily as a negative.

A suggestion for being "helpful" (not in the voting sense): For your local courses, are there good directions how to get to the course? Find the first tee? A map of the course? Distances listed? Listing of local amenities? Put some of this information in your reviews, or better yet, add them as separate files under the links/files tab, and you'll be doing a service to everyone who plays the course, visitors and locals alike.

Swatso

Couple quick questions guys:

I have 5 reviews so far, and only 10 helpful votes. In fact my last one for Maple Hill got a neg vote (does that count against my total?). I'm doing the pics n reviews to:

A)try and help the site by reviewing courses no one else had. (same with adding pics as needed)
2) hopefully get more people in our local area out onto the course and raise the demand for courses.

so 10 helpfuls and 1 not helpful out of 5 reviews doesnt seem very good to me. I dont want to go all year doing these if my reviews themselves arent going to be helpful to people, or else its just kind of silly to take the time to do them lol.

 

[srm_520]

Huff,

If I were you, I wouldn't worry about the negatives and wonder why. It'll just keep you up at night, and it's been talked to death on the site as well. http://www.dgcoursereview.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2134 if you'd like to read the thread.

Now onto the bigger issue - These are the things I try to keep in mind when I write a review
1: Tee Boxes - condition, type, size, marked, multiple boxes, quality of the box, and signage.
2: Pins - condition, type, any design flaws i.e. bad install
3: Fairways - How does the course play - doglegs, length, foliage density, what kind foliage density, creative layout, water features, elevation changes, obstacles, or unique features that make you remember the hole
4: Location - Park, public or private, park facilities, area the course is in, people, busy or not, look of the course (well-used in good or bad way)
Any finally - how does the course compare to the other courses in the area? I also tend to personalize my review a bit in the other thoughts section - since I think that adds to my feel of the course.

Okay - that's a lot, but I tend to spend a good 30+ minutes writing, reading, and revising my reviews before I post them. I also usually do it on Word and copy and paste since people tend to dislike grammatical errors.

Even then after all that, and I think I have a good review - I still just have to hope that someone agrees with me. I have been lucky in that people tend to mark my reviews well, but I think that also has to do with the time spent creating it.

You also have the tangible that more popular courses are going to get reviewed more and rated more. How many DG'ers are scoping out Maine courses? Not to say your service isn't valuable, but again - I'm lucky to write about courses in the Houston area - much bigger pool of players interested in the courses I'm reviewing.

With all of that - I wish you the best, and I too liked your Maple Hill review - but I wish I could have read more about Quarry Run. Take a look at some of my reviews http://www.dgcoursereview.com/profile.php?id=2596, ERicJ always writes some good stuff http://www.dgcoursereview.com/profile.php?id=519, and I'm a big fan of DGTourists writing style http://www.dgcoursereview.com/profile.php?id=473 (Beaver Meadows is a good example). Spend some time, go through some of these reviews for ideas.

I also suggest picking a popular course and selecting the most helpful option. Then you can read the popular reviews versus unpopular to get some idea of what people like. And it's also interesting to note the reviewers have had to get better as the site grows. Old reviews that were good and were marked well seem to look mediocre to the newer reviews, so just yet another thing to keep in mind.
Harry Myers is a good example of both of these things: http://www.dgcoursereview.com/reviews.php?id=1347&mode=rev&page=9&sort=helpful

Having said ALL of that - hang in there - you're are doing a great service to DG'ers everywhere, and be patient - hard work pays off eventually.

 

[Olorin]

A few quick comments...

-Don't worry about the Maple Hill negative vote. On a course like that has lots of local loyalty some people will give you a thumbs down if you give any rating less than 5 discs.

-I read several of your reviews and I'd suggest that you add more information. Here are some ideas:

• Tips for rating courses objectively
• Olorin's Review criteria (Yeah, it's a shameless plug for my own stuff.)

-In addition to those Trusted Reviewers already mentioned check out the reviews by:

• Donovan I believe that he has the highest number of Yes votes and the highest ratio of "Yes votes per course". He's very entertaining
• The Valkyrie Kid The first Gold Level TR. Very proflic.
• Jaymon1 I like his approach.
• There are also lots of other good TRs. Too many to mention them all, so I don't mean to leave anyone out. (You can find the Gold and Silver TRs by filtering the members for TRs, then sort the TRs by number of reviews.)

Keep it up! I'd love to visit Maine some day so your reviews will be a big help. I hope you're able to bag all the courses in your state!

 

[Texconsinite]

Also, keep this in mind with yes votes on reviews. Its exponential, not linear, because the more courses you have reviewed, the more likely someone is to read one of your reviews and thus give it a helpful vote.

Then, if they like your stuff, (which I suspect they will since you cared enough to ask everyone else how you can make your reviews better), they will probably look for what else you;ve reviewed in the area, which in your case should be everything. Thus every time someone looks at any courses in their area of maine, they will prob look through several courses, and if you've reviewed all of them, thats a helpful vote on 5 or 6 different courses right there.

Just know that initially, when you've only reviewed a few courses, this is less likely to happen, but it will start snowballing eventually

I found that it got easier for me to write reviews as I played more courses, because I had more benchmarks to compare each new course to, and thus I noticed more things.

Just keep playing new courses and writing good reviews, and ppl will eventually click on them. Also, if you play a course again or think of something else later that you forgot, dont be afraid to go back and add on to your review. I do it all the time

Good luck on your quest for the total domination of Maine DG courses!!

 

[pokamitch]

Don't sweat it, there are idiots in every community, and we ain't short on 'em in DG (You should see some of the bozos I've encountered over 20+ yrs). But, for every idiot, I have found 5 new friends from this sport.....(I disregard the bad apples before they ruin the barrel)

Just keep reviewing, I and the other non-idiots appreciate it. That is how I deal with gettting "No" votes when I spent 45 minutes writing, editing, improving, and rewriting reviews.

I have been emailed and texted by people out of town to tell me that they appreciated the review I did and it helped them choose to play a course. Just 1 of those will make-up for a hundred "No" votes

 

[TalbotTrojan]

Obviously I don't look at every review, but I am prone to vote not helpful for two reasons. 1) The review gives me little to no information about the course and your personal feelings about the main topics people have previously listed. 2) The rating that you give the course does not seem to match your description of the course. For instance on this one, if you give a course a full five stars, you had better not have any cons to say about the course. For a positive response to a review, I am generally looking for thoughtful. Don't worry about the thumbs down, you'll end up with more positives in the long run based on what you have said so far. Also, be a part of the community here as much as possible. There are certain people that I am bound to read a review by because I know them from the forums or groups.

 

[Huff]

Wow, lots of good info here (and plenty of link reading for me to kill to with today) and some things I certainly hadnt considered, like directions to the course, distances, maps etc.

Thanks for the replies, you guys gave me exactly what I was hoping to get to polish my future reviews

 

[craigg]

Yeah,
I wouldn't worry about a few negatives. As far as including the right kind of info - for me a course that gets a high rating (4 or above) and doesn't provide any backup for that rating other than you thought it was a great course, is not helpful. So I look for a listing of amenities/course qualities; signs, bathrooms, teepads, hole variety, terrain descriptions, owner information, parking information, all that sort of stuff. The more you can tell me about what makes it deserve a high rating - the more helpful it is.
One thing I do before rating a course - is to not read the other reviews. Don't worry about what anybody else has said - make your review your own. Be thoughtful, enthusiastic, and as complete as you can - and it should all be good.

 

[valkyriefb11]

Also, keep this in mind with yes votes on reviews. Its exponential, not linear, because the more courses you have reviewed, the more likely someone is to read one of your reviews and thus give it a helpful vote.

Then, if they like your stuff, (which I suspect they will since you cared enough to ask everyone else how you can make your reviews better), they will probably look for what else you;ve reviewed in the area, which in your case should be everything. Thus every time someone looks at any courses in their area of maine, they will prob look through several courses, and if you've reviewed all of them, thats a helpful vote on 5 or 6 different courses right there.

Just know that initially, when you've only reviewed a few courses, this is less likely to happen, but it will start snowballing eventually

I found that it got easier for me to write reviews as I played more courses, because I had more benchmarks to compare each new course to, and thus I noticed more things.

Just keep playing new courses and writing good reviews, and ppl will eventually click on them. Also, if you play a course again or think of something else later that you forgot, dont be afraid to go back and add on to your review. I do it all the time

Good luck on your quest for the total domination of Maine DG courses!!

This is very true, the more exposure you've got the more votes you'll get. This also goes for reveiwing more popular courses especially those on the top ten list. Your only negative came on Maple Hill ... if you lookk at the helpful-not-helpful ratio on some of those reviews are far worse than yours. The same thing happened to me when I reviewed Tyler State Park (a top ten course ) I had (I think) 16 ups and one down ... those isolated downs are going to come ... don't sweat it. Your reviewing style is good and as you gain experience you'll develop a unique reviewing style and it will improve.
One of the benefits of many reviews on here are the various perspectives and emphasis that they bring to the table. Keep reveiwing and more impotantly keep discin'

 

[ZMan44]

Yeah, keep up the good work. I think someone gave a negative on Maple Hill simply because you didn't give it a 5 and drool all over the keyboard. Olorin is right on...sometimes people just see your rating and will vote "not helpful" just because they disagree. I think this actually keeps some members from reviewing elite courses. I actually gave you a "helpful" on it for being truthful. You clearly said there was some damage due to winter storms, and when you review you can only say exactly what it was like the day you played. I thought it was a solid review. In short, don't sweat the negatives.

As for the quantity of "helpful" votes...the biggest problem is that you are in Maine. There are probably not many users of this site who play there, and some will only vote on courses they have played...it's not my philosophy, but some do abide by that rule of thumb. For example, see how much feedback you got on Maple Hill. It is because many have played it or want to look at it because it is a top 10 course. Currently, I am a silver level reviewer and closing in on gold. This doesn't necessarily make me an expert. I have just reviewed a few courses that are well-known. For instance I have 20 helpful votes on my review of Idlewild, simply because people look at the course page alot. It is probably different for the courses in Maine because they are not as well known nationally. However, I hear there are some sweet courses there. I plan to be up there sometime this fall to see family. So far I have only played BAP in Gorham and I thought it was really nice. Can't wait to hit up some more.

Keep the reviews coming because I will definitely be using them.

 

[ZMan44]

To answer your question about what to include in a review...

1) Basics - Tee pad type/condition - basket condition - fairway condition (grooming and mowing)

2) Design - is it too right-hand dominant or left-hand dominant? Use of elevation. Are there navigational issues? Long walks between holes. How difficult is the course? Are many skills tested?

3) Course/Park Amenities - bathrooms, water fountains, benches on courses, poles for holding your bag, tee signs, directional signs for next hole, ample parking

4) Location - is it too far away from everything? is it too close to busy roads? etc.

Always add in your own "flavor" but this is where I generally start.

 

[Huff]

However, I hear there are some sweet courses there. I plan to be up there sometime this fall to see family. So far I have only played BAP in Gorham and I thought it was really nice. Can't wait to hit up some more.

we have some great courses here. Part of the reason ploth and I are trying to review them all is to give more exposure on here to some of those great courses. You should hit us up when you come up this fall, Maybe we can get a round or 2 in together

 

[Dave242]

In my opinion, DG is all about "feeding the addiction". So, for reviews to be meaningful/helpful to me I want to know what about the course will draw me to it and why this course will draw me back again and again and again. Is it a course I should go out of my way to visit when passing through an area?