Red Flags from Online Businesses – How to Avoid a Scam!
-Clarissa Burrows
Online shopping is the way of the world these days and there are brand new online shops popping up daily, meaning more and more and more access to new and exciting things!
…It also means that the likelihood of dealing with a scammer has increased significantly. We’ve noticed all over the news and social media, people sharing their accounts of getting scammed by what looked like reputable businesses. How, you ask? For the most part, the trick is to get you (the customer) to send the scammer a deposit or pay for the product/ service up front, and then once you do pay up, you’re ghosted or blocked. Usually, they get you by offering a huge discount on an expensive item but create a sense of urgency by telling you there are other people interested in it too so you have to buy it immediately!
There are so (SO) many examples of scams with online stores or marketplaces that I won’t even try to list them all as it would take too long and become terribly boring. Instead, let’s look at all the similarities between the scammer’s online profiles so you can avoid getting scammed or buying from a fake store.
Big ‘Ol Red Flags To Avoid:
- Many likes and followers on a company page
These scammy pages on social media tend to have wildly high amounts of likes and/or followers. This could be because you can buy likes and followers. Many people are still of the opinion that many followers equal a trustworthy page, but no. That’s not actually true.
The way to differentiate between something real and popular and a scam is to see if the number of likes or followers seems accurate for the number of posts, comments, and reviews on the page. If there are three posts and 100k followers or likes, it’s probably a scam.
Real likes and followers take ages and ages to build up over multiple posts per day. It’s incredibly unlikely that a real page would have hundreds of thousands of likes or follows with only three posts.
- Post comments turned off
Pages with the post comments turned off are red flags! And we don’t mean one post of hundreds had the comments turned off, that’s likely due to ugly or hateful comments. No, we mean a page with a decent number of posts, all of which cannot be commented on, even when the post is a competition or giveaway. Also, if a page routinely turns its comments off. So, there was a post with comments being made and then the page suddenly turns its comments off.
This is usually done if people are trying to comment negatively about the brand or out them as scammers. Scammers know that potential customers will look at social media before buying and if the comments are negative, the scam no longer works.
A trustworthy brand will allow its followers to comment, and they will respond to that feedback or ask to get in touch.
- No reviews on Facebook
The same goes for a brand or store with no Facebook reviews. The thing with reviews on Facebook is that you cannot delete specific reviews. You can let them be, report them to Facebook and hope, or turn your reviews off completely. Those are your only options with Facebook reviews. This is why you’ll often see those reviews that are totally unrelated to the brand, about Dr. So-and-So’s magical pimple ointment or Mr. MoneyBucks’ investment opportunity and the like.
If a brand has exactly zero reviews but many followers and likes, it’s probably not going to be a trustworthy brand as the only reason to remove all reviews is to hide potentially bad reviews.
- Check the date the page was created
Scam pages will have just been created. As with the Froggie shoes scam, the scammers copied the Froggie website and Facebook branding but the page was made just days ago and the real one has been there for ages. Always check the date the page was created.
- Overly excited web copy
If you click through to the brand’s website and the web copy is too enthusiastic, it’s also possible the brand is a scam. Too many exclamation points, headlines that are too big and loud, etcetera. These are all things that should make your Scam-O-Meter go off.
Web copy tends to stay pretty close to professional, even if they’re trying to make you feel like they’re your friend. That’s just what is considered the correct way to write a website. Online stores will obviously try to sell you their products or services, but they probably won’t use three exclamation points in a row.
- Weird URLs
Scammy sites will often have odd URLs as more normal URLs are already taken so they have to settle with using questionable URLs. Don’t just trust that if there’s a website, that it isn’t a scam. Check the URL to ensure that is related to the business you’re dealing with.
So, what do you do to make sure you avoid a scam?
Good scams can sometimes be unavoidable. But we can try. Besides looking for all of the above, you can also try a few other things to make sure you aren’t giving your money to a scammer.
-Check the address on Google Maps
If there’s an address listed, pop it into Google Maps to see if it really exists and looks appropriate for the business in question using street view. A place selling second hand furniture should be a warehouse or large industrial building on Maps but it should not look like a dodgy apartment above a curry shop. A place that sells loads of caravans probably won’t have a lot in the middle of the Sandton CBD. Things like that. Make sure the business fits with the address and that the address exists at all.
It’s always good to know where to go if something goes wrong with your online order.
-Check Google reviews / Hello Peter reviews
Even if a brand won’t let people leave nasty reviews on their social media, disgruntled customers will find a way! Luckily for us. Check out Hello Peter and Google Reviews for the brand to feel out the general opinion of the brand and learn if they’re a scam or not.
-Contact the brand
This may seem old school, but message the brand on social media, email them, or call them. If they don’t answer in a timely fashion, they could be a scam or you just probably don’t want to be working with them anyway. However, if they’re just a little mom and pop shop who aren’t comfy on social media just yet, you’ll find out. This is probably the easiest way to decide how you feel about giving your money to a brand.
Remember not all businesses are scams but do be careful out there!
Did you read this and realise your company’s online presence looks a little scammy?
Let HashTag Marketing turn your red flags into green flags now! See what services we offer below.
