I actually don't read many review sites for just that reason. I don't trust many of them. However, I don't agree that word of mouth is not a good way to get reviews. I think it's the only way if you are talking about someone's opinion of their experiences at a hotel or restaurant. Especially if it's someone you know and can determine that you have similar tastes in other things.
I think Trip Advisor published all those rules when they got busted all those years ago for knowingly allowing fake reviews. It's been quite some time but I have vague recollection of the story. And I'm sure they do try hard to control their reviews. I just am not sure it works
It's not that word of mouth is not a good place to get reviews. That's not what I was going for. I was saying it can be the same as review sites in false information or whatnot and can also act like the telephone game at times.
A disgruntled employee can just as easily spread the word through their friends "hey don't go to this place it has x,y,z" or they can put that up on social media. I've seen plenty of "sittin' in my car wanna hear my story" videos on FB. Pretty sure some of those are made up, contain at least some false information, etc.
It's just as easy for someone to say something negative about their competitor by word of mouth.
Our neighborhood social networking site has where people can ask for recommendations which of course is all word of mouth as it doesn't contain a way to rate a business. Some of people's praises and warnings are comical for how over the top they are. And it's pretty easy to say "don't use X because of what they did for me" as well as someone else saying "oh no we didn't have any problems are you sure you're talking about the right company"
And then there's the whole disaster with my mother-in-law who can't decide what car manufacturer you really should and shouldn't go with for all the various arbitrary reasons (currently the most important reason is you should buy a GM because her daughter currently works for GM)
More or less all things have their pros and cons. Sometimes it's more about taking a look at what is being said and asking "does that sound real or over the top or embellished or that sounds way out there or that actually sounds like a legit thing, etc"
I only posted the TripAdvisor rule part because I think you had mentioned it had been a few years since you last used them so I didn't know if you even knew about their 'official' way of handling reviews.