Content & Photo Guidelines
How reviews, ratings, and photos work on StoreDekho — for shoppers browsing pooja essentials, hardware, and everything your local stores carry, and for the stores sharing their listings with the community.
Introduction
If there's one thing we truly love, it's sharing in your everyday shopping moments. Praise when a store had exactly the pooja samagri you needed in stock, frustration when a hardware order was packed wrong, quick notes from your local shopping runs — they all count. We encourage you to share your experience, as your reviews help other shoppers make informed decisions. They also contribute to a store's overall rating, calculated using a proprietary weighted average that factors in recent experiences among other considerations. Your feedback helps stores improve and keep serving the neighbourhood well.
While we welcome honest opinions and descriptions of your experiences, there are a few things we expect from every user on StoreDekho. Your reviews and photos, as well as your profile and comments, are publicly visible and are subject to the Content Guidelines below.
If your activity on StoreDekho doesn't match up to these guidelines, we reserve the right to take action as we deem necessary — including altering or deleting reviews or comments, restricting your review activity, or deleting your StoreDekho account, with or without notice. StoreDekho also uses an algorithm to help flag and remove suspicious reviews.
If you see content that doesn't align with these guidelines or our Terms of Service, let us know at help@storedekho.in. We will consider every report — though given the diversity of our community, content you disagree with may not always meet the criteria for removal.
Why Reviews & Photos Matter
StoreDekho connects you to the shops already around you — the pooja store that always has the right diya oil, the hardware shop that stocks the exact bolt size you need. Genuine reviews and real photos are what make that discovery trustworthy. A clear photo of a shelf, a product, or a store's storefront tells the next shopper more than any description can.
Content Guidelines
To make sure we collectively build content that's useful to everyone, here's what we expect from every review, comment, and profile on StoreDekho.
Keep It Relevant
Please keep your contributions relevant to StoreDekho. Accounts posting irrelevant, inappropriate, or promotional content, reviews naming individual staff, reviews with similar digital signatures that spam stores, or reviews based on a store's already-disclosed policies and practices, may be deleted without notice. If a review of yours has been removed or moderated and you repost another for the same store, we reserve the right to remove that too. In cases of spam, we may restrict your review activity on StoreDekho.
Keep It Clean
Whether it's a quick line or a detailed account of your shopping trip, keep foul, abusive, or hateful language, threats, and lewdness out of it. We will delete reviews with such content. This includes (but isn't limited to) derogatory comments about someone's protected characteristics — race, gender, religion — or content that reads as a personal vendetta against a store and its staff.
Keep It Fresh
Submit only one review per experience, whether it's for a store visit or an order placed through the app. Make sure your review reflects your most recent visit — that's what genuinely helps other shoppers. We don't remove older reviews unless they violate our content guidelines, but reviews describing experiences older than six months may be removed from the platform.
Keep It Real
Write your review based on facts and your own experience — not a friend's, not hearsay, not something you read elsewhere. Your review should be genuine and factually correct; please don't exaggerate or falsify it. We don't take sides in disputes, so stand by what you write. Content that indicates the author never actually visited or ordered from the store will be removed — for example, "Never been here, never want to. Terrible place!" Deceptive, fake, or misleading reviews will be removed. Reviewing a cluster of stores in quick succession is treated as suspicious activity and may be moderated. Accepting or soliciting a kickback — monetary or otherwise — in exchange for reviews or photos is also unacceptable and could result in profile removal.
Don't Solicit
Identifying or promoting yourself as an official StoreDekho reviewer or blogger, or using that status to solicit any benefit (money, free products, discounts) in exchange for reviews — or at the threat of a negative review — will not be tolerated. If we're made aware of such instances, we reserve the right to delete the profile involved, no questions asked. This includes explicit or implied agreements to write reviews in exchange for compensation, and participating in groups (WhatsApp, social media, or elsewhere) that offer incentives for reviews.
Don't Steal
We take plagiarism seriously. Copying others' reviews or photos from StoreDekho or other platforms, or reposting your own content in multiple places on StoreDekho, will not be tolerated and may be removed. Create your own content — we trust you to play fair.
Tell The Whole Story
If you received a free product, a discount, or have a relevant association with a store or its owners, disclose it fully in your review. Honesty is the best policy, and other users will respect you for it. We reserve the right to remove reviews where this kind of disclosure is missing.
Be Yourself
Your profile is your identity on StoreDekho, so keep it authentic. You're free to use a screen name, but avoid inappropriate names, bios, or profile images. Accounts suspected of being spammy or bot-driven may face strict action, including removal. We may also run occasional random checks to verify a reviewer's profile.
Be Cautious
This is a public platform — every published review is visible to everyone. Please avoid sharing personal or sensitive information in your review or username, such as phone numbers, addresses, email IDs, or card and bank details, as it may lead to identity theft or fraud. To protect user safety, we reserve the right to remove reviews containing such information.
Don't Be A Bully
We take allegations of blackmail or threatening behaviour towards stores and their staff very seriously. This is strictly against our guidelines and may be illegal in many locations. Reviews submitted as an attempt to blackmail a store or its associates will be deleted.
Play By The Rules
Content you add should comply with StoreDekho's Terms and Conditions, as well as prevailing local laws and regulations. Local laws take precedence, and content may be moderated or deleted to stay compliant.
Photo Guidelines
A clear photo of a store's logo and its products, a pooja thali set, or the right size of bolt at the hardware shop does more than any description. Keep our photo guidelines in mind, and understand why some photos may be moved or removed once added.
Clear, well-lit product and storefront shots that genuinely show what a store carries will be featured in that store's photo gallery. Shots that highlight the overall look and feel of a store will also be highlighted on its page.
Photos that don't make the cut for a store's page may still show with your review or on your profile, depending on how useful and relevant they are.
Photos that may reduce visibility or get removed
- Exact duplicates, or multiple clicks of the same shelf or item from different angles
- Plagiarised photos
- Photos of people, posted without their permission
- Photos containing promotional content or watermarks
- Blurry or unclear photos
- Photos containing text unrelated to the store or product itself
- Photos of damaged, opened, or already-used packaging
- Photos taken mid-unpacking or mid-preparation
- Photos that focus on subjects other than the store, product, or its stock
Guidelines For Stores
StoreDekho is a great way for local stores — from pooja essentials to hardware and beyond — to reach shoppers nearby. A few things to keep in mind:
Keep your listing updated
We make every effort to keep information on StoreDekho current, but we appreciate you letting us know when an update is needed. If your timings or stock change and your listing isn't updated, shoppers arriving to a closed store won't be too happy — with you or with StoreDekho.
Upload real, current photos
Photos should reflect your store and stock as they actually are — the In/out of stock, the storefront, the products you currently carry. Avoid stock images, photos borrowed from elsewhere, or shots that no longer represent what's on sale.
Don't solicit reviews
The best way to earn reviews is to delight shoppers with your products and service. Selective solicitation is a strict no, and offering compensation or a kickback for reviews is unfair.
- Don't offer freebies, discounts, or payment in exchange for reviews
- Don't offer incentives for users to remove reviews
- Don't ask staff to compete with each other to collect reviews
- Don't work with agencies offering to "fix" your reviews or ratings
If we come across direct or indirect evidence of solicitation, we will activate a disclaimer on your store's page informing the StoreDekho community that reviews may be suspicious.
Respond to criticism positively
Take a breath when you get a negative review. This happens to every store with customers. Treat unflattering reviews as constructive feedback, and use them to fix things. You can reply with a management response to show you care — but please don't use it to argue with the customer or offer an incentive to edit the review.
Be accountable
StoreDekho does not moderate questionable activity about your store reported in reviews. This business requires a thick skin — stating a perceived attitude of owners or staff, or reporting individual actions, is not considered a personal attack.
Neutrality of reviews
In the interest of maintaining neutral content on StoreDekho, store owners, employees, and anyone with a business interest in a store are not permitted to write reviews for that store. We understand the passion that comes with running your own shop — but when you're invested in the business, it becomes hard to leave bias at the door. This is a step towards keeping StoreDekho's content trustworthy.
StoreDekho Employee Code Of Ethics
Employees of StoreDekho are expected to uphold the highest standard of ethics and integrity, in line with our core values and the policies below.
- Employees may not use their StoreDekho status to solicit discounts, freebies, or special treatment at stores
- Unless visiting a store on official business, employees should not identify themselves as StoreDekho staff
- Employees in client-facing roles — Sales, Sales Support, Neutrality, Media Content, and Client Servicing — are prohibited from writing reviews or ratings on StoreDekho, from personal or official accounts, and may not influence others to write biased reviews
- Review and photo moderators must always act to keep StoreDekho a neutral platform, use their best judgement, and never give preferential treatment to any store
Please email legal@storedekho.in if you witness any behaviour that isn't in compliance with this code.
Reporting & Grievance
If you come across content that violates these guidelines, or a store or user engaging in the practices described above, please report it — your reports help keep StoreDekho trustworthy for everyone.
Report a concern
For content or review concerns: help@storedekho.in
For code-of-ethics concerns involving StoreDekho staff: legal@storedekho.in