Reefview's Glowing Reviews?

That's odd!
While I not only am revealing "ReefviewApartments and Cottages" to be the "hell-hole", the "Antigua-Psycho-Apartment" it really is - and also providing evidence of this claim....
....how to explain all these "glowingly positive" reviews one can find for that dump at Tripadvisor, VRBO, Homeaway et al?

That's a complex question and did take me some time and investigation - and the help of two friends of mine - to explain.
But first let me introduce the two friends of mine:
(a) Prof.Dr. Franz K, a very respected professor for English and linguistics at Vienna University, and
(b) Mag.Dr. Karl B., a psychologist and very sought after consultant to quite a few international corporations.

OK, and now, here are the answers / reasons:

1.: Self Fabricated Reviews.
Prof.Dr.K. did examine 60 randomly selected "reviews", allegedly published for Reefview Apartments and Cottages, Antigua by "fellow travelers" on Tripadvisor.
He concluded that according of phrases used, the way sentences are structured and other scientific criteria applied, as many as 53 (!) of those have actually been written by the SAME PERSON!
In other words: Nick or Carol Williams are either writing their own "Reviews" - or they are employing the services of some ghost-writer (but if so, then always the same one) to write all the praise about their place!
That is a raving almost 90%! of all of their reviews - and most certainly does explain, why they not only have more reviews than much larger hotels/apartments etc. - but also than places that have been in business much longer......

2.: Psychological Effect
Now, Mag.Dr.B did have a look at this strange issue from a different perspective. Obviously the one he is the expert for. Even so undeniably there are some 90% of the praise-reviews self-fabricated, that still leaves some 10% of actual travelers who really did "recommend" Reefview Apartments Antigua DESPITE that they obviously had been staying there and obviously know that the place at least is heavily misrepresented and lied about by the owners - as I have clearly documented at http://reefview-apartments.com/location/
So?
Obviously there are a number of factors working in favor of Nick and Carole Williams of these Reefview Apartments:
--2a-- The "Happiness-Hormones"; aka: The Brain of People finally arriving at their destination, for a vacation they have looked forward to for usually quite a while, escaping nasty weather at home and diving into the colors and beauty and warmth of wonderful Antigua - simply refuses to allow any facts to reach their brain that could spoil the pleasure they so much are longing for.
The effect of the almost proverbial "rose colored glasses".....
--2b-- The "Group Effect"; aka: Most - if not all - will have made their decision to stay at the Reefview Apartments during their visit of Antigua, because of the very "glowing reports" of "others" they found at: Tripadvisor! So they actually start to chide themselves to be "narrow minded" or something along these lines, when their brains finally allow the facts to trickle in.
"Everybody says the place is set in simply wonderful lush tropical gardens, so I probably am a snob or something, if I simply can't see any "lush tropical gardens"!"
--2c-- The "Good Bye Effect"; aka: Having to leave the place, having to leave truly tropical Antigua for the dreaded trip back into the cold, the every-day life, the problems at home, the treadmill etc., does even make the very first look back at the vacation make it seem as if it had been "the dream-vacation" of a lifetime.  All the negative vibes that had come up - especially if the stay had been for more than a week (because the brain started to give up on its refusal to see ReefviewApartments  for the dump it really is) - are being suppressed (also for reason 2d) - AND: because Carole literally is begging departing guests to give her a good review on Tripadvisor!
(or else she just has to write another one herself....)
--2d-- The Sweet Memory Effect": aka: The whole point of spending all that hard earned money to go on a trip, to take that well deserved vacation, is, to return with lots of sweet memories to draw energy from until the next time one can take off to chill and relax and enjoy.... It consequently would be outright stupid(!) to allow all the negative vibes, the dark impressions, the moments when anger had started to form etc. to sort of "creep into your mental luggage" - the one you are taking home with!
===
So, all in all, from a psychological view-point, all those who actually do write a positive review for Reefview Apartments in Antigua, don't do so because they really liked what they had found and experienced, or because the would have been oblivious to the fact that this place does misrepresent, not to say lie) itself in their promotion, but because they simply have to "protect their own behinds"!

And what about Tripadvisor?
After all they are the ones publishing all these glowing reviews.
Don't they know that most them simply are fakes?
There can be little doubt that they do.
Just like everybody in the Internet running a website allowing "the input of unknown 3rd parties" - Tripadvisor sure does keep a close eye on the IP-addresses of all those who log into their site. So, yes, no question, Tripadvisor knows EXACTLY that 90% of all reviews are self-manufactured and written by the same person.
BUT: (!)
Tripadvisor is making money (and tons of it since they, together with their mother corporation "HomeAway" have taken the travel-community literally "hostage") off people taking trips! Of people spending money at the places Tripadvisor publishes "reviews" about.
Not much money to be made, if people, travelers, really(!) would start to communicate and warn each other about the pitfalls and hell-holes of this world! Right?!
So:
-1- Tripadvisor actually is not even ashamed of actively asking only for "positive reports" (see their automated mails) consequently communicating: "Don't bother to write a bad review. We have no use of such!"
-2- Tripadvisor (Homeaway.com) is using their sheer "Internet-Power" by owning a couple of hundred domains and cross-linking, cross-referencing only positive feedback for a place. Thus you will find the same "glowing review" of i.e. Reefview Apartments in Tripadvisor.com, but also on Tripadvisor.co.uk and *.de and *.ch and *.it and *.__ and *.__ etc!
To you, if researching a property like on Google, it would look like "everybody, everywhere" has "nothing but praise for this place! So: Let's go there!"
Who'd really compare entries? Who'd really check and cross-check? Who'd really question if not all these websites popping up in your search-results, actually do belong to the SAME CORPORATION?!
-3- At the same time they do select some very few "negative reviews" which they do let "slip through" their watertight censorship. Coincidence? Not really! They simply are smart enough to realize that even the most trusting people would grow suspicious if there would "never-ever" have been any guest who had not been at least a little bit "displeased".
But, Tripadvisor is not only making damn sure that even the complains actually "read nice" and don't slam the whole and ugly truth into a visitors face, PLUS they make sure that the complaints do retain the impression to be the exception, PLUS they limit the publishing of the complaints to those "sub"-websites of theirs they initially had been published to: Meaning, that you will find even some (quite intense!) negative reviews for ReefviewApartments, Antigua, but it'll take you quite some "deep-digging" to find those!

The sort of "strange thing" about this is, that Google actually does have Algorithms in place that prevent that trick of posting the same content to a number of different URL's and only creating the impression of some opinion or content to be "widely spread".
Usually if you'd post the same content to i.e. 3 different websites, Google would not only ignore 2 out of these 3, but actually "punish you" by kicking all 3(!) websites off their search-results.
The fact that this does not happen to Tripadvisor must have something to do, that Homeaway with all their different "fronts" are one hell of a customer to Google's Advertising Empire.
Or, in other words: One shark feeding the other.... at our expense of course............