For Brands

Shping Review Content & Moderation Policy

1. Overview

Shping is a consumer rewards platform that enables users to submit product reviews, comments, and media content based on real product experience.

This policy defines the standards, eligibility criteria, moderation processes, and data integrity principles applied to all user-generated content collected and distributed by Shping.

This policy applies to all user-generated content on Shping, including:

  • Product reviews
  • Review comments
  • Images and video reviews
  • Any associated media or interactions

Shping is committed to maintaining transparency in how content is collected, moderated, and distributed. Shping’s model is built on:

  • Purchase verification
  • Transparency
  • Neutrality of sentiment
  • Full dataset integrity

In this Policy, “objective eligibility criteria” means only the expressly stated requirements in this Policy relating to purchase verification, authenticity, duplicate detection, prohibited content, and the moderation criteria set out in Sections 5 and 6. No additional editorial, subjective, commercial, reputational, or sentiment-based criteria are applied.

2. Content Eligibility

2.1 Reviews

A review is eligible if it:

  • Is based on genuine, first-hand product experience
  • Is submitted by a valid user account
  • Relates to a clearly identifiable product
  • Meets the objective eligibility criteria expressly defined in this Policy

Where applicable, reviews are linked to purchase verification via receipt data. Users are not permitted to submit more than one review per product within a 90-day period. Platform controls are in place to enforce this restriction.

2.2 Comments

Users may submit comments on reviews. Comments are open to all users and do not require purchase verification.

Comments must:

  • Be relevant to the review or product
  • Contribute constructively to the discussion
  • Comply with all content standards outlined in this policy

Comments must not:

  • Be used for spam, promotion, or solicitation
  • Attempt to manipulate, pressure, or influence reviewers
  • Contain misleading or abusive content

2.3 Impartial Review Collection

Where Shping collects reviews for syndication to third-party review platforms, review invitations are provided on an impartial basis to all eligible verified purchasers of a product. Review invitations are not targeted, withheld, or varied based on:

  • predicted or actual review sentiment
  • customer profile or demographic characteristics
  • purchase behaviour or loyalty status
  • commercial considerations or brand instruction

Brands cannot configure, restrict, or direct review invitations to specific consumer segments for the purpose of influencing the sentiment composition of collected reviews.

3. Purchase Verification

Shping uses receipt-based verification systems to validate review authenticity. Validation includes:

  • Product presence in receipt data
  • Retailer identification
  • Purchase timing
  • Consistency with user activity

Only reviews that satisfy the objective eligibility criteria expressly defined in this Policy, including purchase verification where applicable, are eligible for publication on the Shping platform and for inclusion in external data feeds, including those provided to third-party platforms such as Google.

Reviews that do not meet these criteria are rejected, are not published within the Shping app or associated web properties, and are not included in any external data integrations.

4. Incentivisation and Neutrality

Shping operates an incentivised participation model in which users may earn Shping Points for eligible activities. However:

  • Incentives are not linked to rating or sentiment
  • Users receive equal rewards regardless of feedback outcome
  • Reviews are not filtered or suppressed based on sentiment

Shping does not selectively prompt users to leave reviews based on predicted sentiment or user experience, and does not restrict review invitations to users with positive experiences.

Rewards are paid for participating in the review process and are not influenced by the rating, sentiment, length, or opinion expressed in the review.

Comments are not incentivised and are not treated as review content for data feed purposes.

All incentivised content is clearly disclosed within the platform and can be identified in data feeds where required.

5. Content Standards

5.1 Review Content (Written Reviews)

Reviews must contain discernible content relating to the reviewer’s genuine experience with the product. A written review will only be rejected or removed where it falls into one of the following objective categories:

  • Spam or commercial solicitation
  • Duplicate review content (the same or substantially identical text submitted more than once)
  • Content with no discernible relation to a real product experience (e.g. gibberish, repeated-character strings, or templated/copied text detected via automated similarity checks)
  • Hate speech, discrimination, or targeting of individuals or groups based on protected characteristics
  • Personal, confidential, or sensitive information (see Section 5.3)
  • Impersonation of another person, entity, or brand
  • Content submitted by an individual with a direct commercial interest in the product (e.g. brand owner, employee, or affiliate) without clear disclosure
  • Content with reliable evidence indicating it is not authentic user-generated content, including automated, copied, impersonated, or otherwise fraudulently submitted content

Shping does not reject or remove a written review on the basis that it expresses a critical, negative, unfavourable, short, or subjectively “low value” opinion of a product. Genuine reviews of any length or sentiment — including single-sentence reviews — are eligible for publication and syndication provided they meet the objective criteria above.

Shping encourages users to provide detailed feedback because it is more useful to other shoppers, but detail or length is not a condition of eligibility.

5.2 Media Content (Photos and Video)

Photos or video submitted with a review may be rejected or removed if the media:

  • Is unrelated to the product being reviewed
  • Is blank, corrupted, or technically unusable
  • Does not identify the product, where reasonably necessary to identify the product being reviewed
  • Contains sexually explicit, offensive, or unlawful content
  • Infringes copyright or trademark rights
  • Contains sensitive personal information or unrelated individuals without consent
  • Is a screenshot, stock image, or reused/non-original content

Rejection of attached media does not affect acceptance of the written review where the written review otherwise complies with this Policy. A review’s text and rating will be published and included in syndicated feeds independent of any media rejection.

5.3 Prohibited Content Categories

The following content categories are strictly prohibited and will be removed:

  • Sexually explicit or pornographic content
  • Content containing personal, confidential, or sensitive information (e.g. phone numbers, addresses, financial data)
  • Content that infringes intellectual property rights, including copyright or trademark violations
  • Links to malware, phishing sites, or harmful software
  • Content promoting illegal activities or unsafe use of products
  • Reviews relating to prohibited or dangerous products where publication would breach this Policy or applicable law

6. Moderation and Enforcement

6.1 Automated Signals

All user-generated content — including reviews, comments, images, and video — is subject to automated and manual moderation. Automated signals are used solely to detect inauthenticity, fraud, and abuse, and include: duplicate detection, repeated-character and gibberish detection, copied-content detection, account velocity analysis, and account behaviour pattern analysis (e.g. multi-account abuse). These signals are not used to assess or score the subjective quality, accuracy, or persuasiveness of a review’s content or opinion.

Content may be rejected or removed if it:

  • Fails verification checks (for reviews)
  • Violates the objective content standards in Section 5
  • Falls within a prohibited content category (Section 5.3)
  • Is identified as fraudulent, duplicate, or inauthentic

Reviews are never rejected, modified, or removed based on rating, sentiment, or Shping’s or any third party’s assessment of whether the review is “accurate,” “fair,” or “controversial.” Shping does not alter, normalise, or otherwise manipulate rating values or review content.

When content is rejected or removed, the submitting user is notified via the platform with a reason for the decision. Shping may restrict or suspend accounts engaged in abuse or fraud.

6.2 Internal Platform Features

Internal platform features, reward mechanics, and engagement systems do not determine whether an otherwise eligible review is published, retained, or included in any data feed, and have no effect on review visibility, ranking, or syndication eligibility. Review publication and syndication are determined solely by the objective eligibility criteria set out in this Policy.

7. Review Disputes and Appeals

Users whose reviews or comments are rejected or removed may request a review of that decision. To initiate an appeal:

  • Contact Shping support within 30 days of the moderation decision (see Section 15 for contact details)
  • Reference the content in question and provide grounds for reconsideration
  • Appeals are assessed against the same objective policy criteria applied in the original decision
  • Users will receive a written outcome within 14 business days

Appeals are assessed solely against policy criteria and do not guarantee reinstatement of content. Moderation decisions cannot be appealed on the basis of rating or sentiment. Shping does not modify content as part of any appeals process.

Brand-initiated disputes regarding review content are not accepted. Brands and third parties have no standing to request removal or modification of reviews. Any such requests will be declined and the relevant content preserved in the dataset, provided it meets the objective eligibility criteria defined in this Policy.

8. Editorial Independence

Shping maintains full editorial independence.

  • Brands and third parties cannot influence reviews, ratings, or visibility
  • Content is not edited or altered by Shping
  • Content is not prioritised, ranked, or promoted based on payments or commercial relationships
  • Moderation decisions are based solely on objective policy criteria

9. Data Ownership and Collection

Shping directly collects and manages all user-generated content through its platform.

  • Reviews are submitted by users within the Shping environment
  • Shping does not ingest, syndicate, or republish reviews from third-party platforms
  • Brands do not submit, edit, or control review content within Shping’s collection process
  • Shping maintains full control over collection, validation, moderation, and distribution of review data

Where reviews are shared with brand partners, limited non-contact metadata (such as display name, avatar, and general location) may accompany that content, as described in the Privacy Policy.

10. Data Completeness and Feed Integrity

Shping is committed to providing a complete and unbiased dataset.

  • Shping’s policy is to include all eligible reviews in data feeds without sampling, filtering, or volume-based selection
  • Shping’s policy is to submit all eligible reviews collected by Shping in full to data feeds provided to partners, including Google
  • Reviews are not excluded based on sentiment, rating, brand, or product
  • Negative and low-rated reviews are included

Shping does not selectively include or suppress reviews. Comments are excluded from external review feeds. Shping’s commitment to dataset completeness is policy-based; isolated technical issues affecting individual reviews or feed synchronisation (such as API outages, processing errors, or third-party platform delays) may from time to time temporarily affect specific records, in which case Shping uses reasonable efforts to identify and correct the affected records.

10A. Google Product Ratings Syndication

Reviews syndicated to Google Product Ratings are selected and transmitted in accordance with Google’s Product Ratings program policies.

Internal platform features, engagement mechanics, editorial rankings, or other quality or trust signals do not determine whether an otherwise eligible review is included in the Google syndicated feed. Eligibility for syndication is based solely on the objective criteria set out in Sections 2, 5, and 6 of this Policy: verified purchase status (where applicable), and absence of fraud, duplication, or prohibited content.

Shping does not remove, suppress, deprioritise, or exclude reviews from the Google syndicated feed because they are negative, critical, or express an unfavourable opinion of a product.

Every eligible review that satisfies the objective eligibility requirements of this Policy is included in the Google syndicated dataset, irrespective of whether the review is favourable, neutral or unfavourable.

11. Data Freshness, Updates and Retention

Shping maintains continuously updated review datasets.

  • Review feeds are refreshed at minimum on a monthly basis, with more frequent updates as volume warrants
  • Full datasets are provided on an ongoing basis
  • Historical reviews are retained indefinitely unless removed for policy violations or as required by applicable law or a valid privacy request (such as a verified erasure or de-identification request under applicable privacy laws)
  • Reviews removed for policy violations are excluded from feeds but retained in internal records for audit purposes

Audit records are retained in anonymised or de-identified form only, such that they cannot be used to identify the original submitter.

12. Product Identification and Mapping

Reviews are mapped to structured product entities using:

  • GTIN (primary identifier where available)
  • MPN (Manufacturer Part Number, where GTIN is unavailable)
  • Brand attributes
  • Product metadata derived from receipt data

This enables consistent product identification across multiple retail environments.

13. Policy Enforcement and Updates

Shping continuously monitors platform activity to maintain review quality, integrity, and compliance with applicable standards.

This policy may be updated from time to time to reflect:

  • Regulatory requirements
  • Platform improvements
  • Evolving industry standards

The version number and “Last updated” date at the top of this document will be revised with each update. For material changes, Shping will provide users and partners with no less than 30 days’ advance notice through the App and/or by email before the change takes effect, in accordance with clause 1 of the Shping App Terms of Use Agreement. Non-material or operational changes (including clarifications, corrections, and routine adjustments) may take effect with reasonable notice. Continued use of the platform on or after the effective date of an updated policy constitutes acceptance of the revised terms.

14. Related Policies

For additional platform rules, please refer to:

15. Contact

Shping Support

Email: info@shping.com

Web: shping.com/faq

Effective Date: 2 July 2026
Version: 020726_RCMP