About Us
Before You Buy – FinalCheck!
FinalCheck is an independent product comparison website. Our mission is to make sure that you are as well informed as possible before deciding to buy. We support consumers with diligently researched product information, well-arranged comparison charts, and concrete advice.
Making the Right Decision
Our experienced editors examine products from various sources, assess each article and thoroughly compare every detail.
Our website is already home to thousands of different products, selected to reflect the needs of our online customers. For instance, the site compares: consumer electronics, bikes, garden tools, and much, much more. Our editing team is always on the lookout for the best new products on the market.
For each article, they decide between three different approaches to their comparisons based on online product information and what we think our readers want to see.
Comparison
Our comparisons make use of carefully researched information, experts’ assessments, results from testing institutes, and user reviews. We choose this approach when we cannot test the products ourselves due to feasibility or availability issues
Guides and Infographics
In our guides and infographics, we deal with topics that are relevant to consumers. We analyse statistics, compare costs, and evaluate deals from notable online retailers. We present the collected information in a clear and concise way with visualised data and infographics.
Our Work Process
When we compare products, we play the role of a critical customer. Typically, the first step that somebody looking to buy a new TV, a new washing machine, or a new bicycle may make would be to search the market for the best offers. This is followed by a thorough investigation and comparison of the individual products available. Our editors do exactly the same, only on a bigger scale. In doing so, they act impartially, truthfully, and professionally. Manufacturers and retailers have no control over our testing criteria and results.
Market Analysis
We analyse the market and carefully select the most popular articles in each category. We make sure to only show products that are actually available online.
Research
Our reviews take into account all the information needed to make an informed purchase. We even go so far as to incorporate customer reviews and ratings.
Comparison Summaries
We present product data in comparison charts, helping to give you an immediate understanding of a product’s capabilities and features. We then show you where you can find the best deals for each product.
Rating
We rate the products in each category based on their features and accessories, as well as their useability and manufacturing quality. Although we are confident in our own rating system, we also keep an eye open for public opinion by factoring in reviews from users and testers.
Our Evaluation Criteria
To get as clear a picture as possible of the products and retailers that we recommend, we analyse customer reviews from Amazon. Every buyer is looking for something different and is therefore likely to assess products differently to the next. For a well-rounded impression of a product, we evaluate as large an array of reviews as possible. This is proven to be the best way to estimate whether a product works as advertised— even after it has seen a lot of use and misuse.
Customer reviews also help us to select the criteria by which we evaluate products. It is important to us that the criteria allow for a fair comparison. Furthermore, we want our comparison charts to reflect the real things that customers should be looking for when making buying decisions.
Quality and Manufacturing
We collect information about the manufacturing processes used to create a product. This helps customers to distinguish between top-of-the-line products and cheap gimmicks.
Technical Details
Be it watts, megabytes, or kilograms, we crunch all the numbers and details about products and their parts.
Accessories and Special Features
What are you getting for your money? Does this mobile phone come with a charger? Is a headset included? Is the camera ready to use or do I need to buy accessories? Suppliers who go the extra mile definitely score additional points with us.
Range of Features
As much as we appreciate it when something does its job perfectly, we also know that products with extra features often offer better value for money. How about a washing machine that dries your laundry too? Or an electric drill that also functions as a screwdriver? Sometimes you get two things for the price of one.
Price and Shipping
We don’t want products to just be cheap—we want them to be good value for money. That’s why we try to factor in hidden costs, such as the price of shipping. It’s a sad truth of online shopping that cheap products often come with exaggerated shipping costs.
Customer Experience
We don’t mistake customer reviews for expert opinions. They can, however, give us clues as to how a customer’s experience with a product may be. For this reason, we try to listen to as many informed voices as we can.
How does FinalCheck earn money?
We offer our services to readers for free, giving you access to an enormous range of products and to all our comparison charts. You don’t even have to sign up to use the site. Our sole purpose is to describe and compare products—we are not an online shop. If you find something on our site that you want to buy, clicking on the shopping link refers you directly to a seller. We ourselves don’t sell anything and we’ll ship nothing to you. That said, producing content and running a website creates expenses for us each month. To earn the money necessary to do this, we use affiliate links.
How does affiliate marketing work?
Affiliate marketing is a form of performance-based marketing. This means that it works with a reward system. By contrast to conventional advertising, in print or broadcast media, buyers of advertisements don’t pay for pure advertisement space, but instead for customers who are interested in what they have to offer.
Affiliate marketing earns us money when our readers click on a link that leads them to one of our partner online shops. Depending on the details of the specific contract, we either get a reward for each visitor sent to the partner website or for each purchase made there. The good news for you is that we are paid by the retailers, meaning that our site can stay free for readers.
For you as a customer, it makes no difference whether you visit a retailer directly or via one of our links. In both cases, the price of the product stays the same. The advantage of using us is that you are better informed, while the retailer gives us a small share of the profit.
How this benefits you
As said before, some retailers pay us for each visitor we send them, while others only pay us for visitors who buy their products. In fact, most retailers fall into the latter category.
This serves as our motivation to show you products that work well, are relevant to you, and are of a high quality. In case we make a mistake with one of our recommendations, as everyone does sometimes, we lose our reward when you return the product. We also really appreciate it when you tell us about your customer experience. This gives us the chance to review the product in question and even remove it from the site if necessary.
Our ability to earn money is directly tied to our ability to show you the best products. Our goal, therefore, is to make sure that both customer and retailers are as happy with the arrangement as possible. If both parties are happy, then so are we.
FAQs about Our Work
How do editors choose which type of products to review?
The needs of our readers are at the forefront of our decisions. In Spring, for example, garden and outdoor products are in high demand. In Autumn, meanwhile, home entertainment and heating units are a higher priority. Our goal is to offer a broad spectrum of products and to provide valuable information about almost everything you might want to buy.
Are the products included in your comparisons currently available?
Competition drives companies to constantly improve their products. Accordingly, updated versions and product improvements are released at a frantic pace. In many cases, a model can be replaced by a newer one in under a year. Luckily for you, our editors follow the latest market developments extremely closely. Updating our comparison charts is, therefore, a continuous process for us. If you discover something that is out of date, please let us know.
How do your ratings work?
Our rating system is twofold. On the one hand, we base our ratings on hard facts about a product by looking closely at things like the range of features, number of accessories, etc. The other side of our analysis takes external sources into account. We rely heavily on Amazon customer reviews and results from testing institutes like the highly acclaimed German institute, Stiftung Warentest. We summarise these assessments and use them to determine an overall rating.
What to do if you find a mistake
We are always happy to hear constructive criticism and suggestions for areas of improvement. If you have any remarks or questions, please send us an email at mail@finalcheckaustralia.com. We try to reply promptly to every message.