Why A Good Report Is So Essential

A good report is tailored exclusively to the guidelines provided. Most should and will provide a style guide or word count beyond the questionnaire, if any. You will not only be telling the reader what happened, you will be answering a list of predetermined questions, all predicated upon what areas a company’s management has determined to require examination. A good report will do both of these.

In order to accomplish these objectives, all relevant details of your mystery shopping experience are necessary. You may have to anticipate where clarification will be required, and attempt to provide it before it is asked for to the best of your ability.

Ideally, you should know and understand the guidelines provided by your scheduler before you do the mystery shop. If you have any questions, you should ask them before. It is necessary to know and understand exactly what you are looking for before you go looking for it. This will help you write the best report possible, mostly because the necessary structure will be mentally in place.

A good report will also be submitted along with all the correct forms and items required by your mystery shopping guidelines. This may include receipts, notes, questionnaires, pictures or video. Some of the more high paying jobs require no report whatsoever because the mystery shop is recorded on video.

Who Uses My Reports and Why Are They Beneficial?

Mystery shopping helps businesses gain feedback on more than just customer service. Management can choose from a variety of Mystery shopping programs to get an inside look at operations, employee integrity, merchandising, product quality and other areas. Mystery shopping allows companies to obtain a snapshot in time by trained shopping researchers.

Business owners and managers use shopper reports to:

• Enhance employee training materials
• Improve business operations
• Improve product quality
• Compare one location to another
Mystery Shopping programs are valuable to such a wide array of business owners because:
• Most customers who have unsatisfactory experiences will not complain. They simply never return.
• Dissatisfied customers are likely to tell others about their experience, who probably will avoid doing business with the merchant.
• The use of Mystery Shopping to provide impartial feedback reduces favoritism in incentive programs.
• Shopping programs can identify where employee training and incentive programs need improvement.
Forget manager’s reports or employee assessments. The best way to ascertain the real impact of your brand is through a carefully designed mystery shop – and not just one.

Objective mystery shopper reports create a clear picture of just where the store’s promotion is or is not working.Those reports are invaluable for the company who is serious about finding out what is working and what is not.

Extra! Extra! Read All About It! An Exploding Demand For Mystery Shoppers!!

Demand for mystery shoppers has exploded. It’s simply the net result of the industry’s unique ability to help clients troubleshoot their product, sales and presentation to create the ultimate customer experience.

The Mystery Shopping Providers Association (MSPA) offers the following information:

• MSPA databases have rapidly grown from several thousand mystery shoppers to over 20,000.

• Approximately 1 million mystery shoppers operate in the United States and roughly 500,000 assist clients internationally.

• The MSPA is the largest trade organizations in its industry. It has more than 225 affiliate organizations, around 150 of which are in the US.

• There are 600 mystery shopping organizations in the US and 400+ more around the world.

• Mystery shopping was a $600 million industry in 2005, and it grew more than 11% from the previous year. Projections from these years make the estimated value of the industry at over $800 million today.

• Part time incomes from mystery shopping can range from $10 – $40 per hour.

Mystery Shopping – Fun, Yes, But It’s a Business Too

Many shoppers choose mystery shopping because it’s a fun and exciting way to make money. But you must remember it is a business. The best mystery shoppers care about customer service and want to help businesses improve. The Mystery Shopping Providers Association is a good starting point for information related to this field (www.mspa.org). They offer the following information to demonstrate the wide range of services provided by mystery shoppers:

• Traditional Mystery Shop or Customer Service Evaluation
• Purchase and Return
• Integrity Evaluations
• Reward (Incentive Based) Shop
• Competitive Shop
• Mystery Calling or Telephone Shop
• Audio and Video Mystery Shops
• Cyber shops or Internet Service Evaluation
• Discrimination Testing
• Manufacturer’s Promotions
• Merchandising Audits
• Operations (Quality Control) Audits
• Price Audit
• On-Site Interviewing

With so many opportunities to use your skills as a mystery shopper, you can combine fun and excitement with running your own business, and still have time left over to enjoy your family and pursue other goals. What other field of work can make this claim?

How Do Companies Use Reports To Their Advantage?

Here are a few ways companies use the information provided in your reports:

• Establishing Measurable Evaluation Criteria with Specific Questions
This creates as accurate an assessment as possible. If you are shopping a store, for example, you can monitor every aspect of the experience, from merchandising and signage to temperature, background music, even the length of time it takes to be greeted by a sales representative.

• Testing Their Training Effectiveness
Shopping a promotional event like a giveaway provides an excellent opportunity to test the effectiveness of company training programs at all levels – and the results may surprise the storeowner. While it is easy to assume employees are following brand guidelines and complying with promotional guidelines, mystery shopping is really the only way to find out – and to use the results to create additional training or compliance incentives.

• Establishing a Benchmark
The results of a company’s brand shopping program are used to initiate immediate improvements in promotional and brand compliance, employee behavior and training. The same criteria and results are utilized to establish a clear set of performance and compliance benchmarks and improvement objectives against which future store shops and similar events can be measured. Likewise, data from multiple mystery shops identify trends to establish directions for large-scale improvements.

• What Gets Measured Gets Done
The basic reason for mystery shopping is simple: If the store knows which areas need improving, and which areas are working well, they can implement specifically targeted training and incentive programs – and, of course, ensure that promotional dollars really are generating value. So in turn, what gets measured gets done.

Points To Remember When Looking For The Best Work Available

For many, shopping is fun, necessary, and occasionally, both. Being a good mystery shopper involves not only finding work, but finding the best work. The process involves research that will target reputable firms, reliable records of accomplishment and the highest professional standards possible. You will be required to draw upon the greatest degree of thoroughness, observation and professionalism to the very best of your ability.

Opportunities to work as a mystery shopper are numerous, however no real opportunity will charge you a fee in order to perform the work. After all, your services will enable future clients to make money, so there is no reason why any reputable company would want to charge you a fee.

You will also notice that there are vast resources to draw upon for information. This information includes what qualifications you’ll need, where opportunities to find work are located and where to go for networking opportunities. The Mystery Shopping Providers Association and the National Center of Professional Mystery Shoppers are just two examples.

Successful Businesses Rely on Secret Shoppers

Respect is key for any business that wants to become an industry leader. No business will succeed unless it consistently shows a deep respect for the customer. Successful businesses need to rely on secret shoppers if they want to keep their finger on the pulse of their customers.

Businesses will succeed only when managers, business owners and staff:

1. Understand that customers will always demand quality service and merchandise at a fair price.
2. Acquire superior knowledge of their customers’ wants and needs and know how to satisfy them.
3. Are always customer focused
4. Are on top of consumer behavior trends
5. Anticipate and react quickly to changes in customer behavior.
6. Realize the magnitude of diversity within their customers’ demographic make-up.
7. Know that customers have more power and control than ever before and that they have unlimited information to help them make their buying decisions.
8. Are aware that customers are intolerant of anyone who wastes their time.
9. Understand that their customers are not just dollar signs with feet and are mindful of their feelings, wants, needs and right to go elsewhere.
10. Know that customers are constantly seeking ways to balance their hectic lifestyles.

Is Mystery Shopping Right For You?

The best mystery shoppers care about customer service and want to help businesses improve. And they love to shop!

If you’re ready to apply for jobs, you may be surprised to learn that you already have experience that can help you get hired. For example, a former career in retail, hospitality or other service fields can give you an edge. Some companies prefer experience, but most companies hire inexperienced shoppers if you can show you have what it takes.

Even if you’ve never held a job outside the home, women who are fulltime mothers make excellent mystery shoppers, due to their familiarity with local merchants gained from the enormous task of running a household and managing a family. So don’t assume because you have not worked outside the home that you do not qualify as a mystery shopper. You have excellent skills many mystery shopping companies would be happy to tap into.

The registration process with leading Mystery Shopping companies has improved over the years. Most provide a simple online form that takes only a few minutes to complete.

The Importance of Consistency and Customer Service

Consistency is the key to a successful brand. People like to know that a product they enjoyed the first time will be just as enjoyable the second time or the one hundredth time.

Now let’s apply this reasoning to the world of retail, banks and restaurants and mystery shopping. Mystery shopping works because it is a tool that measures consistency proactively… before customers leave to go elsewhere in search of a better brand experience.

You’ve no doubt experienced both excellent and very poor customer service in the same store on different occasions. Perhaps one cashier was alert and interested and another seemed half asleep. Maybe staff was helpful and friendly one time, and on another visit, staff seemed bothered when you asked for help. It’s this inconsistency that plagues the modern retailer and can literally ruin a company. There are four main reasons why:

What Are The Perks of Becoming A Mystery Shopper?

Many stories have been told about how much money can be made as a mystery shopper. It’s safe to say you can earn a good part time income, depending on how hard you want to work at it. And perks? Well, let’s take a quick look: