Why some online product reviews have no usefulness rating?

Combining econometric analysis with text mining techniques, this study attempts to explore why some online product reviews have no usefulness rating through examining review posting time and text features. Later posting time may reduce the probability of some online reviews being seen and thus lead to their being not rated for usefulness. Besides, the neutral diagnosticity of reviews reflected from the text features may cause difficulty for readers to judge and evaluate the usefulness of these reviews. Our study finds that, though not being seen due to later posting time obviously explains no usefulness rating for some online reviews, the neutral diagnosticity of these reviews is also an important and non-neglectable cause for their lack of usefulness rating. Further, we identify the text features which may lead to the neutral diagnosticity of the review. Our study has implications for online product reviews website managers in identifying and dismissing the reviews with no usefulness rating to improve readers’ information retrieving efficiency and also for reviewers in improving the quality of their reviews.