New product reviews strangely few and far between

[EAProwlerB]

I am somewhat new to Seymou Duncan pickups so I tried to take a look and see what people that owned them are saying, not much it seems, puzzling.

Looked all over the usual places: Amazon, Ultimate Guitar, Sweetwater, Musicians Friend...To find buyer reviews or even magazine reviews and found one here and there but not much at all on Seymour Duncan Mark Holcomb Alpha Omega; Jeff Loomis Blackouts; Dave Murray; Saturday night special; Jimi Hendrix set; Duality. Too early to expect anything on Duality but certainly the rest of the pickups should be getting something more than a mere DP review here and there. It seems like after the Whole Lotta Humbuckers the new pickups dropped out of sight.

What is the story? Are the new pickups getting any farther than the distributors? How are end user sales going on the new releases? Has it all been done before and covered by the many winders out there?

 

[daenius]

Re: New product reviews strangely few and far between

Well too be honest, pickup reviews are kind of niche...

* You need someone who gives enough of a **** to replace the pickups by either DIY or pay someone to do it
* You need this person to then care enough to go back to the retail site to post a review that's hopefully not just a one line "OMG BEST PICKUPS EVER" or "OMG WORST DECISION EVR"
* Or have someone who bought a guitar with the pickups already in it and then be bothered enough to post a review somewhere

People already don't really review products in general. Go on Amazon and find an item that's probably bought by millions of people, and you'll find maybe hundreds or thousands of reviews? Maybe 10k ish at best. That's a pretty low percentage... a thousand in a million means 0.1% of the customers actually come back to write a review... even at 1% it's pretty low

Probably most guitar players don't ever bother swapping pickups because they just go by playability and sound upon purchase, and if it's good, they're unlikely to mess with it again. Not everyone is into modding and tickering with their axes, and hey, there's always the chance that you'll replace it with something you dislike.

That said... given that there's a total of like 9 people buying pickups... (Darth Phineas, Mincer... and... yeah a few more? LOL) your chance of having someone who bought it go back and review it is pretty low

I buy plenty of pickups... I've never written a single review, LOL

I also have guitars that come with whatever pickups, and again I've never written any reviews about the pickups that came on my guitars

You put all of those together and you're trying to find product reviews on pickups not named "JB" or "Super Distortion" on retail sites... quite unlikely

Sad reality... haha, I'm guilty of contributing to it too xD But yeah seriously I'd love to be able to find reviews on all the Duncan models and what not

 

[LtKojak]

Re: New product reviews strangely few and far between

What are you saying, Lee?

 

[darthphineas]

Re: New product reviews strangely few and far between

you can find reviews of the Alpha-Omega and the SNS sets at those links.

could also be that, like daenius said, there just aren't that many reviews of some brands or products. this screen shot is from this morning.

there is an "ad" at the top from a Duncan dealer. the one at the very bottom is also a Duncan dealer. the only other 2 things shown are from me (I am not a dealer nor paid by the Duncan company) and this forum.

and then you have to look at how many new products are being released. for the people that are self-funded, I can only speak for myself but if I'm buying something it had better be something I have an interest in. since Duality was mentioned in the OP, I simply had no interest in it... same as with the EMG Retroactive that came out previously - so that would account for the lack of Blackout coverage by me as well. it simply takes a lot to get me interested in an active pickup.

other aspects that come in to play are not something I think belong in this thread at this time, but I discussed not long ago in a but of an editorial on 'sponsor-friendly reviews'.

however... I do think consumers have been grasping ahold of being able to see real-life evaluations and reviews from other end-users. I also think these same consumers can tell the difference between comments based from a hands-on experience and an outlet that's reprinting content.

What are you saying, Lee?

 

[EAProwlerB]

Re: New product reviews strangely few and far between

Thank you for the thorough and thoughtful reply's. This came about as I am considering picking up a clone LP and want to put some good pickups in it. I thought first of the latest releases being strong candidates but when I looked for user reviews I came up empty handed - I was kinda shocked so did the hip shot thread to get an idea about what was going on - you two gave me my answer (what is the deal with the little movie? I don't see the humor).

For example there are hundreds of reviews on Whole lotta Humbuckers but then little if nothing say on Saturday Night Specials. Here is my list of Humbuckers that have large numbers of reviews that will help me make my selection:
Whole Lotta Humbucker
JB/Jazz
Pearly Gates
59s
Dimarzio:
Distortion
Air Norton
Bluesbuckers
Fralin Pure P.A.F.
(Gibson 57 Classics not included because I already have a guitar with some kind of Gibson pickups in it)
Once I decide on a LPC this will be the list I will use to review user comments to guide me to the pickup decision.
Who cares, right?

 

[PicoRiveraTele]

Re: New product reviews strangely few and far between

I am somewhat new to Seymou Duncan pickups so I tried to take a look and see what people that owned them are saying, not much it seems, puzzling.

Looked all over the usual places: Amazon, Ultimate Guitar, Sweetwater, Musicians Friend...To find buyer reviews or even magazine reviews and found one here and there but not much at all on Seymour Duncan Mark Holcomb Alpha Omega; Jeff Loomis Blackouts; Dave Murray; Saturday night special; Jimi Hendrix set; Duality. Too early to expect anything on Duality but certainly the rest of the pickups should be getting something more than a mere DP review here and there. It seems like after the Whole Lotta Humbuckers the new pickups dropped out of sight.

What is the story? Are the new pickups getting any farther than the distributors? How are end user sales going on the new releases? Has it all been done before and covered by the many winders out there?

There have never been many Amazon product reviews for pickups. There are even less for DiMarzio. Heck, there are some pickup models from DiMarzio for which you can hardly find reviews, anywhere.