ℹ️ Although one can give ratings to pretty much anything, for the sake of simplicity I'll stick to an example of rating restaurants. But everything mentioned here could be easily applied to products in online shopping, barbers, cinemas, what have you…
The currently dominant rating system SUCKS…
While there are many systemic issues with existing rating systems, including business owners shamelessly buying positive reviews, and businesses bombing their competition with negative ones – there's at least one problem that I would argue is relatively simple to solve.
When we're rating something on the popular scale of 1–5 stars, technically we have five options to choose from, but in practice… if you saw a restaurant with 3.2 stars, would you think it's an average, regular, okay restaurant? I'm quite sure you'd think it's terrible and keep looking for something that's at least a 4.0.
The five stars system is massively skewed towards the end of the scale. Many people would interpret it this way:
Basically: a star is so abstract that we can't just collectively agree on what any particular number of stars actually means. Businesses are incentivised to push for five stars as much as they can – so they keep pushing the scale to the point of it becoming practically useless, meaningless.
What could we use instead?
In search for a better system, I think we should focus on something that most people would already be familiar with. Something that already has, at least in broad strokes, a collectively agreed upon meaning. Something that's not abstract and can immediately be understood as a clear indication of the quality of a product or emotions felt during an experience. A system that any website collecting reviews would be able to just adopt, without a need for lengthy explanations, coordination, awareness campaigns…
Well… we already have such a thing! Emojis ✨
Have a look at this scale:
Take a few seconds to think what kind of restaurants you'd give each of those faces to. Then you can read my proposal below and see how much our interpretations overlap. And if they do, that's a sign that this scale is way more meaningful than some abstract stars.
My interpretation
The scale is balanced around 🙂, our starting point.
If you rate a restaurant as 🙂, that's obviously good. It's a good restaurant. The food was tasty, it was appropriately priced, it didn't make you sick, the atmosphere was nice, service was okay. A perfectly acceptable experience. It's the kind of place that you'd probably visit again, whenever you're hungry and in the neighbourhood – but not necessarily something you would excitedly recommend to all your friends unprompted.
A restaurant rated 😊 has provided something extra. It was above expectations. It's an above average experience compared to similar places around. It's something that you're likely to recommend to friends and come back to.
If you rate a restaurant 😍, it means you've had an amazing experience. Something that you won't simply forget next week – but rather excitedly tell all your friends about. Maybe something that you're gonna treat yourself for special occasions. It doesn't have to be fine dining, it doesn't necessarily mean it's a fancy, expensive option – but it needs to actually stick out above competition in some significant way.
On the other side of the baseline there's 😢. It means you had a disappointing, but not terrible experience. You're not really planning to come back, but if you're on a budget or other options are closed when you need them, you wouldn't necessarily mind possibly trying that place again.
Restaurant rated as 😡 has made you angry. Maybe it's an overpriced tourist trap. Maybe they serve food that makes people sick. Maybe the crew is racist or homophobic. The kind of experience that made you wanna be loud about warning others about this place. You're definitely not coming back.
Okay, so what's next?
I don't know 😅 I just wanted to share my frustrations about the stars scale and my idea of the emoji scale. It would be great if it caught on, or if someone improved upon the idea – but I'm not holding my horses.
🗣️ If you like the emoji rating system and want to make some noise about it online – that would be very appreciated!
🧑💻 And if you're creating a system that lets people rate products or services – please consider using a scale that's more meaningful than some abstract stars. Not necessarily this one, but if you want to – go for it! It's free and open.