The Best of the Best

It’s back to school time, which means shopping, finding the best deals, and finding the best products for your kids.

What better time to introduce you to a new web site, ConsumerSearch.com? This new site, which is part of The About Group, reports the truth about what experts and consumers are saying about a variety of products. Anything from from laptops to backpacks. ConsumerSearch.com searches and searches through the Internet and print publications for comparative reviews. These reviews are then analyzed and ranked according to how credible they are.

I recently had the opportunity for a Q&A session with Christine Frietchen, ConsumerSearch’s Editor-in-Chief 6 questions about ConsumerSearch.com.

How do you collect the “best” product reviews?

There’s so much available online today that it’s sometimes very hard to tell the credible reviews from the fluff – this is what ConsumerSearch.com does so well. We particularly look for transparency and balance in reviews. “Transparency” means that the author has told readers how they acquired the items being reviewed, how exactly they tested them, and what other products were included for comparison. “Balance” means that the review covers both the good and the not-so-good. We look all over the place for reviews: in professional publications, newspapers, TV pieces, government recall and consumer info, scientific journals, user review sites, blogs, and even some foreign magazines that we have translated!

How do you determine what qualifies a product as “best”?

Products we choose as “Best Reviewed” in their class have performed well in both professional testing AND in user reviews. It’s pretty common to see items that get a great score at Consumer Reports or Good Housekeeping or CNET, but actual owners say it’s awful. We look for agreement and disagreement in the reviews we find, and our picks come out of that analysis process.

Are any of your “best” products sponsored?

Nope. Our editorial team and our advertising team don’t even share office space. The ad team has no idea which items we chose as best until they see the report online. That way we’re not influenced at all by a manufacturer. A lot of manufacturers don’t like us very much anyway – because while we might say one of their products is great, we say others are terrible!

What are the “best”, must have back to school products for this year?

Plenty of parents are wondering if the iPad makes a good back-to-school gadget for middle and high-school students, but we don’t think it’s a good buy – that’s because it’s just too limited right now. At this point, you can even have a web browser and a document open at the same time. Instead, there are plenty of good cheap laptops and netbooks you should consider first. Lunch boxes have come a long way from the metal Charlie’s Angels box I had. We like Laptop Lunch Bento Sets; they come with smaller containers that fit inside the larger lunch box. You can keep using the small containers after you’ve retired the lunch box. Lastly, there’s been a lot in the news lately about kids getting back injuries from carrying too-heavy backpacks. One pack that’s top-rated for middle-schoolers is the Lucky Bums Dragonfly 15. It’s on the pricey side, but it has hip and sternum straps to help distribute weight, plus it’s smaller capacity makes it less likely to be overstuffed. It also includes reflective patches for safety.

If you could give shoppers one piece of advice, what would it be?

Don’t be trendy. You can save money and hassle by NOT being the first to buy the latest gadget. Sit on your hands for few months and wait for the kinks to be sorted out.

Does ConsumerSearch.com have plans for an iPhone App?

We’re currently working on a mobile version of ConsumerSearch so our pages can be viewed better on phones, including the iPhone. Then we’ll decide if an app is right for us… stay tuned!

The next time you are looking to make a new purchase, big or small, head over to ConsumerSearch.com to get the full, honest truth. And maybe send them a note about an App, I know I would use it.

Note: I was not paid to review ConsumerSearch.com or to post this Q&A session. But, if they offered, I wouldn’t turn them down.

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