Number of registered Mystery Shoppers
- + for Clients
- What is Mystery Shopping?
- Inspections
- Difference between Mystery Shopping and Market Research
- What can be measured?
- Involvement
- Myths and Pitfalls
- Methods
- Guidelines and Ethics
- Quality assurance
- Certification
- Shopper profiles
- Reporting online
- Benchmarking
- Audio reporting
- Alert reporting
- Identification
- Global projects
- Incentive programs
- Communication
- Read more
- + for Shoppers and Inspectors
- + FAQ
Definitions
Mystery Shopping is the use of individuals trained/briefed to experience and measure any customer service process by acting as potential customers/actual customers and in some way to report back on their experiences in a detailed and objective way.
A Mystery Shopper can also be called a virtual guest, a trial customer, a test client etc. A group of visits done during a certain time period can be called a wave. Visits can be done with many different purposes and in many different ways, test visits, pilot visits, baseline measurements etc. We recommend you to contact us for a meeting or to read our books for more detailed information about this.
Goal, Purpose and benefits
The purpose of Mystery Shopping is to define areas with a potential to improve by giving feedback on how the company is perceived from a customer’s perspective. Companies that use mystery shopping in the right way can increase their sales, satisfied customers, satisfied employees and profit.
The Anonymous Customer discovers educational needs and small problems before they get big. Employees can get feedback on how their performance is perceived from a customer’s perspective. The company receives a unified follow up of the concept and the service level, which is a helpful work tool for benchmarking and continuous improvements on all levels in the organization. Mystery Shopping can also be used for incentive programs and as a part of the companies’ Balanced Score Card.
Mystery Shopping
We have experience from doing Mystery Shop visits in person in retail stores, restaurants, hotels, cinemas, banks, car dealers etc. Most common measurements are signage, cleanliness, product display, uniform, customer treatment and add-on sales. Most common areas for improvements are often service and add-on sales. Mystery Calls, e-mails and evaluations of webs sites can be done in any industry. We also have experience from evaluating delivery services.
When starting a Mystery Shopping program, the company vision, goals, standards and training programs are the base for developing a relevant checklist. The written report can also include audio and/or video recordings.
