The influx of skeptics: an investigation of the diffusion cycle effect on online review

Can online review ratings be lower for more popular products? Ironically, it might be inevitable. We utilize diffusion theory and predict that the influx of skeptic users into online reviews might be prevalent as products gain in popularity. We examined 6776 apps with more than one hundred installs and review counts on Google Playstore about the trends in their user ratings by the number of installs. We visualize how the diffusion cycle might affect this phenomenon and examine anomaly in the trend of review ratings by the number of installs to detect the significant influx of skeptic users. Interestingly, most of the apps in the early diffusion stage received significantly high ratings, and clustering results indicated a significant skeptics loop in the review ratings past the early diffusion stage. We suggest that businesses can keep skeptics satisfied by connecting experiences and creating newness.