Quinux Acquoxis - a great example of reviews-based 'hit and run' marketing

The name, with hindsight, probably gave us a clue. So what are we talking about here? It's a 'miracle' pressure washer. And if you watch YouTube at all, you will have seen their advertisements in the last three weeks - perfectly timed for the Easter/Spring garden/DIY spending surge. 

Here is just one of their websites.

Let's take a look...

Note the prominently displayed stars and score (4.8), as well as the tab, which leads to these...

all, as far as we have been able to establish, fake. No source.

This as well...

Not entirely sure what the customers who voted the item 5.0 for 'Comfort' were referencing

We did a quick scrape of the usual websites to see if we could find any genuine reviews. Here's Trustpilot...

Nice of Trustpilot to give them a score of 1.9 or 1.4; 2.9 even better, given that between the three listings there's only one 5* review - and that is thanking the business for a full refund! At least Trustpilot cannot be accused of lending credibility in this instance, but we are surprised that they will even grant a listing, let alone three, to such a business.

The point at issue here is that unscrupulous businesses - in this case, the parent appears to be a company called 'Cablelinker' based, again 'allegedly' in Hong Kong - can bypass the conventional online review channels entirely to make a quick buck. There are undoubtedly tens of thousands of unhappy new 'owners' of one of these seriously misrepresented and overpriced product (£50 in the UK - the same product can be had for £10 by searching Google shopping). 

We will forward this article to the CMA in the hope that the advertisements on YouTube can be shut down.