ProductReview AU Scraper

The ProductReview Australia actor scrapes product and business listings from ProductReview.com.au including detailed reviews, ratings, and business information.

Features

• Search for products and businesses by category URL (e.g., "home-garden-shops", "electronics")
• Filter by location (e.g., "victoria_au", "nsw_au")
• Apply custom search queries to find specific listings
• Set result limits and control detail page scraping
• Sort results by various criteria (rating, newest, most liked)
• Control whether discontinued products are shown
• Comprehensive data extraction including:
  • Business/product details (name, slug, contact info)
  • Category information
  • Ratings and statistics
  • Featured and highlighted reviews with images
  • Business hours and locations
  • And many more fields

Usage

Input Parameters

Parameter	Type	Description	Required
searchQuery	String	Search query to filter listings	Yes
limit	Integer	Maximum number of listings to scrape (max 100)	No
scrapeDetails	Boolean	Whether to scrape detailed information from listing pages	No
location	String	Location slug to filter results (e.g., "victoria_au", "nsw_au")	No
showDiscontinued	Boolean	Whether to include discontinued products/businesses	No
sortBy	String	Sort order for listings ("overview", "ratingHighest", "newest", "ratingLowest", "mostLiked")	No
maxDetailPages	Integer	Maximum number of detail/review pages to scrape for each listing	No

Advanced Options

Parameter	Type	Description
extractReviews	Boolean	Extract reviews as separate items in the dataset
separateReviewsDataset	Boolean	Store reviews in a separate dataset
proxy	Object	Proxy configuration for scraping. Can use Apify Proxy or custom proxy URLs. Format: {"useApifyProxy": true/false, "apifyProxyGroups": ["GROUP1", "GROUP2"], "apifyProxyCountry": "US", "proxyUrls": ["http://proxy1", "http://proxy2"]}
saveLocalFiles	Boolean	Save JSON output files locally in the 'output' directory
dev_transform_fields	Array	Transform the output by selecting only specific fields. For nested objects use dot notation (e.g., "statistics.rating"). For array elements use index (e.g., "categories.0.name").
dev_dataset_name	String	Custom dataset name with placeholders: {ACTOR} = actor name, {DATE} = date (YYYYMMDD), {TIME} = time (HHMMSS). Use "default" to use Apify's default dataset.
dev_dataset_clear	Boolean	Clear the dataset before inserting new data

Output Format

The actor stores results in the dataset with the following structure:

Listing Objects

{
  "id": "123456",
  "name": "Product or Business Name",
  "slug": "product-or-business-name",
  "detailsUrl": "https://www.productreview.com.au/listings/product-or-business-name",
  "brand": {
    "id": "7890",
    "name": "Brand Name",
    "slug": "brand-name",
    "url": "https://www.brandname.com.au",
    "isManaged": true
  },
  "contact": {
    "email": "contact@example.com",
    "website": "https://www.example.com"
  },
  "categories": [
    {
      "name": "Home & Garden",
      "level": 1,
      "hook": "home-garden",
      "ancestors": []
    },
    {
      "name": "Garden Shops",
      "level": 2,
      "hook": "garden-shops",
      "ancestors": ["home-garden"]
    }
  ],
  "locations": [
    {
      "name": "Melbourne, Victoria",
      "shortName": "Melbourne",
      "slug": "melbourne",
      "level": 2
    }
  ],
  "statistics": {
    "rating": 4.5,
    "numberOfReviews": 125,
    "numberOfQuestions": 3,
    "ratingDistribution": [
      {"rating": 5, "count": 80},
      {"rating": 4, "count": 30},
      {"rating": 3, "count": 10},
      {"rating": 2, "count": 3},
      {"rating": 1, "count": 2}
    ]
  },
  "isDiscontinued": false,
  "featuredReview": {
    "id": "12345",
    "title": "Great product and service",
    "body": "I've been using this product for months and it's fantastic...",
    "rating": 5,
    "submittedAt": "2024-12-15T10:30:45Z",
    "authorName": "John Smith",
    "authorLocation": "Melbourne",
    "hasVerifiedPurchase": true
  },
  "highlightedReviews": [
    {
      "id": "12346",
      "title": "Excellent customer service",
      "body": "The staff were very helpful when I had questions...",
      "rating": 5,
      "submittedAt": "2024-11-20T14:25:30Z",
      "authorName": "Jane Doe",
      "authorLocation": "Sydney",
      "hasVerifiedPurchase": true,
      "images": [
        {
          "id": "img123",
          "url": "https://cdn.productreview.com.au/resize/review-attachment/img123",
          "type": "image",
          "source": "user"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "logoUrl": "https://cdn.productreview.com.au/resize/brand-logo/logo123",
  "pictureUrl": "https://cdn.productreview.com.au/resize/listing/pic123",
  "pictures": [
    "https://cdn.productreview.com.au/resize/listing/pic123",
    "https://cdn.productreview.com.au/resize/listing/pic456"
  ],
  "createdAt": "2023-05-10T08:15:20Z",
  "scrapedAt": "2025-05-17T12:30:45Z"
}

Detail Objects (when scrapeDetails is enabled)

{
  "id": "123456",
  "name": "Product or Business Name",
  "slug": "product-or-business-name",
  "reviews": [
    {
      "id": "rev123",
      "title": "Great experience",
      "body": "I had a great experience with this business...",
      "rating": 5,
      "submittedAt": "2025-01-10T09:45:30Z",
      "hasVerifiedPurchase": true,
      "attachments": [...],
      "images": [
        {
          "id": "img456",
          "url": "https://cdn.productreview.com.au/resize/review-attachment/img456",
          "type": "image",
          "source": "user"
        }
      ],
      "author": {
        "id": "user123",
        "displayName": "John Smith",
        "locationName": "Melbourne"
      },
      "comments": [
        {
          "id": "cmt789",
          "body": "Thank you for your review!",
          "submittedAt": "2025-01-11T11:20:15Z",
          "author": {
            "displayName": "Business Representative",
            "isBrandManager": true
          }
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "totalReviews": 125,
  "reviewPages": 5,
  "pagesScraped": 3,
  "detailUrl": "https://www.productreview.com.au/listings/product-or-business-name",
  "contact": {
    "email": "contact@example.com",
    "website": "https://www.example.com",
    "phone": "03 1234 5678"
  },
  "address": {
    "streetAddress": "123 Example Street",
    "suburb": "Melbourne",
    "state": "VIC",
    "postcode": "3000",
    "country": "Australia",
    "formatted": "123 Example Street, Melbourne, VIC 3000, Australia"
  },
  "businessHours": {
    "monday": {"open": "09:00", "close": "17:00"},
    "tuesday": {"open": "09:00", "close": "17:00"},
    "wednesday": {"open": "09:00", "close": "17:00"},
    "thursday": {"open": "09:00", "close": "17:00"},
    "friday": {"open": "09:00", "close": "17:00"},
    "saturday": {"open": "10:00", "close": "15:00"},
    "sunday": {"closed": true}
  },
  "description": "This business specializes in high-quality garden products...",
  "faqs": [
    {
      "question": "Do you offer delivery?",
      "answer": "Yes, we deliver to all metropolitan areas.",
      "submittedAt": "2024-10-15T14:30:00Z"
    }
  ],
  "specifications": {...},
  "scrapedAt": "2025-05-17T12:30:45Z"
}

Data Storage

The actor stores the scraped data in two different storage types:

1. Apify Dataset

The primary storage is an Apify dataset, which allows for structured data storage and easy export in various formats (JSON, CSV, Excel, etc.).

You can configure the dataset name using the dev_dataset_name parameter:

• Using "default" (or leaving it empty) will use Apify's default dataset
• Using a custom name like "productreview-{DATE}" will create a named dataset with the date

2. Key-Value Store

For convenience, the scraper also saves the data to the key-value store under two keys:

• RESULTS: Contains the full scraped data (listings and details)
• METADATA: Contains metadata about the scrape operation (counts, parameters used, etc.)

This makes it easy to quickly access the results from your Apify dashboard or via the API.

Dataset Views

The actor comes with several predefined dataset views for easy visualization:

• Listings Overview: Basic details about each product/business
• Contact Information: Contact details for businesses
• Categories: Category information
• Reviews Summary: Rating statistics and featured reviews
• Reviews Detail: Full review content
• Images: Links to product and review images

Field Transformation Examples

Use the dev_transform_fields parameter to extract only the fields you need. Here are some examples:

Basic Product Information

[
  "name",
  "statistics.rating",
  "statistics.numberOfReviews",
  "contact.website",
  "isDiscontinued"
]

Review Analysis

[
  "name",
  "reviews.id",
  "reviews.title",
  "reviews.rating",
  "reviews.body",
  "reviews.submittedAt",
  "reviews.hasVerifiedPurchase"
]

Category and Brand Data

[
  "name",
  "brand.name",
  "brand.url",
  "categories",
  "statistics.rating"
]

Proxy Support

The scraper includes support for proxies to avoid IP blocking and improve reliability. You can configure proxies in several ways:

Using Apify Proxy

{
  "proxy": {
    "useApifyProxy": true,
    "apifyProxyGroups": ["RESIDENTIAL"],
    "apifyProxyCountry": "US"
  }
}

Using Custom Proxies

{
  "proxy": {
    "useApifyProxy": false,
    "proxyUrls": [
      "http://username:password@proxy1.example.com:8000",
      "http://username:password@proxy2.example.com:8000"
    ]
  }
}

The scraper will automatically rotate through the provided proxies and retry connections if there are issues.