A review is an evaluation of an item in the directory site. It is written by the customer who has sufficient experience to comment on reliability and whether or not the product, service, or information delivers on its promises. Usually, a review is composed of the following:

• a star rating
• a comment not longer than 5 sentences
• a Site Manager’s or Member’s reply to the review

This is how a review appears in the directory front:

eDirectory uses the Review feature to allow the site visitors see both the negative and positive feedback of customers to some listings and articles in the site. This feature should be enabled and configured first in the Site Manager account before it can be used. Once this feature is enabled, the Site Manager can manage all the reviews created in the directory front. By the word “manage”, we are referring to the privilege given to him/her to preview, edit, delete and approve reviews, and to approve the Members’ replies to the review authors.

Unlike Site Manager, the Members can only preview reviews and reply to their authors. They are not given full control over reviews to avoid having bias.

eDirectory application has the ability to trace the IP Address of a review author (the customer who created the review). Because of this, a review author with a static IP can only create one review for one particular listing or article.

Every time a new review is created, the application prompts the Site Manager by displaying a message (example shown below) in the To Do Items of the Home page.

Clicking on this message takes the Site Manager to the Reviews page shown below:

Observe that the review records displayed in the page above use different Status icons. These icons and their uses are discussed below:

– This icon shows up in the reviews that have not been approved yet by the Site Manager. When a review is not approved, it will not appear in the directory front and the Member (or the owner of the listing or article to which the review is added) cannot use the Reply-to-Review-Author feature of the application.

– This icon shows up in the reviews that are approved already. These reviews are the ones currently displayed in the directory front.

– These two icons come together as one. They indicate that a reply to the review author is made by a Member. This reply will only be sent to the review author’s email address if it is approved by the Site Manager.

– These two icons come together as one. They indicate that a reply to the review author is already approved.

To preview a review, do the following:

1. In the left navigation panel, click on the item type under Modules where you think the review falls under (Listings or Articles). After doing this, a page will appear like the one shown below:

   

2. Click on the Reviews sub-menu on the top of this page. After doing this, a new page will appear like the one shown below:

   

3. Click on the  icon of the corresponding review. After doing this, a page containing the review content will appear like the one shown below:

   

To approve a review, do the following:

1. In the left navigation panel, click on the item type under Modules where you think the review falls under (Listings or Articles).
2. Click on the Reviews sub-menu on the top of this page.
3. Click on the icon of the corresponding review.

To approve a Member’s reply to the review author, do the following:

1. In the left navigation panel, click on the item type under Modules where you think the review falls under (Listings or Articles).
2. Click Reviews on the top of this page.
3. Click on the icon of the corresponding review. After doing this, an area will appear like the one shown below:

   

4. Click on the Send button.

Enabling/Disabling The Review Feature