We were recently invited to provide some feedback on a fairly new software applications review website called G2Crowd.
G2Crowd is a "Yelp for Business Software Applications." When you sign up you use your LinkedIn account to register so a lot of business oriented information instantly flows into your profile. This is a nice touch, but I am sure you can register without LinkedIn credentials as well.
As a customer of any web application or software solution, you can read reviews from other customers or leave your own. A potential customer of an application can read unbiased reviews of products you may be looking at evaluating or ones you are already using. Here for example is the "CRM" vertical describing all customer relationship management systems. The handy maturity grid is helpful to evaluate the products, but it is not clear how that grid is put together.
G2Crowd can become a great marketing tool for software vendors, that much is clear. I don't see a compelling reason why customers would leave many reviews on a software product on G2Crowd even with the "badge" gamification concept prominently woven into the site. The reviews can be a short write ups, but the most valuable reviews actually provide much more detailed grading on various aspects of the product. It takes a good 15-20 minutes to provide the best reviews, and I wonder why anyone would do that on an ongoing basis.
G2Crowd asks a reviewer how long you've been using a product but that information is not clearly identified on each review. A 5 star review from a new customer and a 3 star review from a 5 year customer of the same product are 2 very different things. I would value the 3 star review much more, but it is hard to see that.
If you want to try G2Crowd, here's an invite link. Tell them Alex sent ya.
ps. The website has been around for 2 short years, so it is still finding its audience. You may not find a product you use to review, so go ahead and add it!
pps. A video too:
