Mystery shopping or mystery consumer is a tool which is used by many market research companies to measure the quality of retail services and to gather knowledge regarding some specific information about the products and services available.
He or She will be hired by a company to pose as a customer in order to evaluate the quality of its service.
Mystery Shoppers are instructed to pose as a normal regular customers and perform specific tasks. Such as purchasing product, asking questions, registering complaints and so on - and then provide detailed reports or feedback about their experiences to the research company who hired them for money.
The most common places where mystery shopping is used are retail stores, fast food chains, restaurants, movie theatres, gas stations, car dealerships, health clubs, as well as health care facilities, banks and apartments. In UK, mystery shopping is usually used to provide feedback on customer services which are provided by local authorities and other non-profit organizations like housing associations and churches.
The purpose of Mystery Shoppers is to help businesses increase sales and improve employee customer service awareness.
Becoming a mystery shopper is free. It doesn't cost a penny to find out about shopping opportunities. Legitimate mystery shopping companies will not charge you to apply to them. Being a mystery shopper is a way to earn extra money in your spare time as a market researcher. Always be careful of commercials and an emails claiming there are hundreds of mystery shopping jobs and that companies are looking for people to hire to work for them etc..etc and to be honest, let me remind you again that this cannot substitute your regular job. It only adds extra cash to your income.
There are many reputed mystery-shopping companies who will pay you to be a mystery shopper but let me remind you that mystery shopping should not be considered as full time job, but the job provides a good supplemental income.
If you go online and apply to become a mystery shopper, look for the initials MSPA because it means that the company is a reputable member of the Mystery Shopping Provider Association.
Note : There is lot of information on Mystery Shopper on the internet if you want further details on the topic. You can just google it, but be careful because there are many scam websites.
