Improving Reviews

RonErez
RonErez Posts: 345 specialist rank
in First-time course creation

Hi

I have a course that's had some success and it's ups and downs. It seems like I get a bunch of 5 star reviews and lately about every 5-6 days I get a one star review from a student that hardly covered any of the course. This slowly is killing my ranking (now this course has dropped to a 4.2). Now my sales have dropped even though the course still appears in the top 5 when searching under the topic.

Any ideas how to improve reviews? I do address every complaint, respond to every single written review be it positive or negative. I also constantly update the course, add topics, redo audio after purchasing a new mic. To be honest I'm exhausted.

For example 5 days ago I received a review from a student that covered 1% of the course:

"He emphasized the fundamentals. The course is not designed to fully prepare you as a developer. It aims to teach essential aspects of SwiftUI, including networking and other major skills that a developer will need when entering the job market. However, I believe this approach may not be entirely realistic."

I politely contacted the student asking how I can improve the course experience but he never bothered to respond. 13 days ago I got this review:

"This information doesn't add much value"

This review is simply idiotic. The course covers just about every aspect of iOS development. Again I politely contacted the student with no response. Another 1 star review:

"I was endlessly shown GUI clicks. I didn't gain much iOS programming knowledge."

Again absolute nonsense.

Obviously I also get encouraging and positive reviews. Nevertheless these bad reviews are motivation killers and income killers.

The course has been available for nearly 3 years with its ups and downs going from a 5 all the way to a 3.9 and back to 4.8 and now down to 4.2.

Anyways if anyone has any actionable steps I'd be happy to hear them. I do hope these one star reviews are honest. Udemy has refused to remove any of them.

Thanks!

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Comments

  • FettahBen
    FettahBen Posts: 97 storyteller rank

    There are no solution of udemy did not do anything for that.

  • PuneetGupta453
    PuneetGupta453 Posts: 77 storyteller rank

    This recurring issue is challenging to address, particularly when participants submit a 1-star rating without engaging meaningfully with the course content. While a 5-star rating has minimal impact on the overall average (currently around 4.3), even a single 1-star rating disproportionately lowers the score. Recovering from this requires an additional 10–20 positive ratings to offset the imbalance, which complicates maintaining a fair representation of course quality.

    I’m also uncertain about the exact methodology behind the rating calculations. Greater clarity on how scores are weighted or averaged would help in strategizing solutions to mitigate such fluctuations.

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