In business, there are several guiding principles that lead to success.  Many of these same principles can help you in your activities relating to mystery shopping.  If you want to understand more about what mystery shopping is, click here.

1. Efficiency

Efficiency is something that businesses are constantly looking at.  In simple terms, this means minimising the length of time it takes to get things done.

If you look at mystery shopping in terms of dollars per hour, you’ll realise you get the best return on your time when you’re most efficient.  As a mystery shopper, the most wasteful time (least efficient) is learning the details of a job for the first time. 

Where your efficiency increases is after you’ve done a particular job a few times.  You’ll get to the point where you can quickly check the requirements to make sure nothing’s changed.

Then you’ll be able to turn up to the job and complete the work in the fastest possible time.  That’s efficiency.  Minimising travel is another way of maximising your efficiency.

2. Economies of scale

In business, it’s usually more economical to complete certain activities on a larger scale rather than one by one.  For example, a business can produce a clothes peg for just a few cents.  At home, you could never produce a clothes peg anywhere near that cheap.  This idea (grouping tasks together to minimise the cost per unit) is known as ‘economies of scale’.

When it comes to mystery shopping, economies of scale relate to the potential for you to group your jobs together.  If you do your mystery shopping jobs one at a time, chances are you’ll inadvertently maximise the time it takes and your travel costs (usually in terms of petrol and wear and tear on your car).

On the other hand, if you can group together a few mystery shopping jobs in the same trip, your petrol costs might end up being halved or even quartered – a much better situation.  Recently, I had to drop my son off at a local shopping centre.  I managed to pre-arrange two mystery shopping jobs at that shopping centre and did them during the same trip. 

Effectively, I had no additional petrol costs nor was there any additional travel time (I would have had to go anyway).  This is an example of where economies of scale can work to your advantage as a mystery shopper.

3. Don’t be all things to all people

Most businesses recognise that they can’t seek to provide every service to every customer.  The best businesses work out who their ideal customers are and target those people.  Porsche doesn’t target lower socio-economic areas for their customers; similarly you don’t see too many Cash Converters in affluent areas.

As a mystery shopper, recognise that you can limit the mystery shopping jobs you do too.  There’s no need for you to be all things to all mystery shopping companies (most businesses sub-contract their mystery shopping work to specialist mystery shopping companies). 

You may find that you’re best suited to certain types of jobs based on your interests, where you live, and what fringe benefits you like.  Maybe, you are prepared to travel for fewer, higher paying jobs or perhaps you prefer lots of smaller jobs closer to home?

4. Market yourself well

If a business fails to market themselves effectively, they’ll go out of business – simple as that. As a mystery shopper, you’re unlikely to go out of business but there are benefits of marketing yourself well.

Whether you realise it or not, you’re in a competitive environment as a mystery shopper.  There are often multiple mystery shoppers competing for the same jobs that you are.  Mystery shopping companies often have some discretion about how and to whom they allocate jobs. 

If you market yourself well, you can be picked more often and get more jobs.  So, how do you market yourself well?  Apart from providing good quality work, do whatever you can to make yourself stand out from the pack.  Go to extra effort when communicating with the company – even call them and ask how to be a preferred mystery shopper. 

If you get an email, make sure you reply and even use it start a brief conversation.  “Thanks for contacting me with this opportunity, I’ve applied online.  By the way, is there anything I can do to be a better mystery shopper for you?”  When it comes time to allocate jobs, make yourself an easy first choice.

5. Know the business you’re in

Businesses sometimes struggle to work out what business they’re in.  Did you notice there are not too many businesses making buggies for horses these days.  Yet, once upon a time buggies were in high demand and there were many companies producing them.  Where are they now?

One of the reasons these companies died is because they didn’t realise the business they were in.  Such companies thought they were in the buggy business.  The reality is they were in the transport business and because they failed to adapt, they went out of business.

As a mystery shopper, what business are you in?  Your main goal is to remain focused on providing great customer service and feedback (in whatever form is required), rather than just thinking in terms of filling out surveys.  Focus on great customer service and feedback and you’re unlikely to go out of ‘business’.

As time moves on, you may need to adapt too.  The types of mystery shopping jobs on offer seem to come and go – no longer is every job face to face.  More and more are via phone or even on Facebook. 

The way that you provide your feedback changes too.  Some mystery shopping companies are now offering phone apps for you to enter your work whereas others do the reporting via phone.  Are you moving with the times?

Conclusion

As a mystery shopper, you can learn a lot from how businesses conduct themselves.  A few small actions can be the difference between thriving and wallowing – I know where I’d rather be. 

If you’d like to learn more about how to become a mystery shopper, complete the details below to receive a free report on how to get started.

The post 5 reasons why you should treat mystery shopping like a business appeared first on mysteryshoppingguide.com.au.

If you’re new to the concept of mystery shopping, you may be wondering “what is it?” and “why bother?” 

Mystery shopping is also known as secret shopping, phantom shopping, being a shadow shopper or mystery guest, and can be defined as any number of activities where you get paid to shop.  It involves pretending to be a customer with a pre-determined scenario (which you are given) then reporting on your experiences afterwards.

In terms of “why bother?”, this article covers 5 key reasons you really should look more closely at what mystery shopping has to offer you.

1. Flexibility

One of the great things about mystery shopping is the incredible flexibility.  The most restrictive mystery shopping jobs require you to do the work within a window of a few hours on a particular day.  Much more common is the ability to do the job during business hours on a particular day, eg. anytime between 9am and 5pm. 

Also common are jobs that can be done virtually any time during a period of a week or more.  This means you can easily fit your mystery shopping jobs around the rest of your life whether that is your other job, family, study or sporting commitments.  Where else can you find work with that type of flexibility?

2. Extra income

Who doesn’t need extra income these days?  There are so many businesses using mystery shopping programs that your options for earning extra income (if you know where to look) are extensive. 

The extent of the income you earn from mystery shopping is really up to you and the time you’re prepared to put in. Some people use mystery shopping for extra pocket money such as to fund a particular hobby or just for general life.  Other people use mystery shopping as a significant source of additional income. 

I’ve even heard of a retiree doing mystery shopping effectively full time and earning a basic yearly income, earning over $10,000 a year.  How much do you want to earn from mystery shopping?

3. Fringe benefits

Many mystery shopping jobs give you the opportunity to receive a range of fringe benefits; that is various goods and services you get to keep for free.  The way that it works is some jobs will require you to pay for something for which you are reimbursed. 

The fringe benefits you can receive from mystery shopping are many and varied.  The most common options are food and drink and various retail items.  You can be reimbursed for buying hardware items or even receiving a pest treatment at your house.  An added benefit of this approach is that you’re not having to declare income.

4. Fun

I’m not sure what your idea of fun is but I’ve found a lot of mystery shopping jobs to be good fun.  For example, there are a number of mystery shopping jobs where you get paid to test drive cars – I’ve been paid to test drive a Holden, Toyota, BMW and a Porsche.  I’d call that fun.

Similarly, I’ve eaten at various restaurants and cafes and been paid for it.  Isn’t it true that food tastes better when it’s free : ) What’s not to love about being paid to eat?

5. Variety

As well as mystery shopping being very flexible in when you can do the work, there is also the great potential for variety of mystery shopping jobs.  Many industries are covered by mystery shopping including grocery, retail, automotive, entertainment, hospitality, travel and so on.

On the one hand, you can build your efficiency by doing the same kind of job over and over.  The more you do it generally the faster you get.  On the other hand, if you get bored and want more variety, the opportunities are there.  Along the way, you may get to discover all sorts of businesses and experiences you’d never have otherwise come across.

Summary

If you’ve never experienced mystery shopping before then you really should consider it.  It’s fun and flexible with good variety, and can provide good fringe benefits along the way. Finally, you get paid for it – perhaps the best benefit of all.

If you’re interested in finding out more about how to get paid to shop, enter your details below to receive the free report that should get you started.

The post 5 reasons to start mystery shopping now appeared first on mysteryshoppingguide.com.au.

You’ve applied for and been awarded the job, and you’ve gone and completed your super-sleuth work (having taken meticulous notes).  Now it’s time to enter the results.

Piece of cake?  Should be, but often this is the point where mystery guests (also known as mystery shoppers, or phantom shoppers) can come unstuck.  Here are 10 things to avoid when entering your survey.

1. Write in full sentences. 

I’ve seen a lot of mystery guest companies refer to writing in full sentences in their training material.  What I glean from that is this is quite a common problem.  Bear in mind that the final client may not always get to see the questions but just your answers.  Hence, the emphasis on full sentences.

If the survey question asks something like “How would you describe your interaction with the sales assistant?”,  it can be tempting to put your answer as: “friendly and helpful, discussed the options”.  What mystery guest companies want to see, however, is more like “I found the sales assistant to be friendly and helpful.  I asked for assistance with x product and they took me to the relevant part of the shop and showed me the different options”.

2. Check the naming protocol and be consistent         

By ‘naming protocol’ I mean the way you refer to the person you were dealing with.  Some companies are happy for you to name the individual others prefer the person’s title such as ‘staff member’, ‘sales assistant’.  “Fred showed me three options” versus “the staff member showed me three options”.

3. Do not refer to a previous experience or another store

Each report needs to be stand-alone.  Avoid referring to your previous experience if you’ve been a mystery guest with that business previously on a different job, eg. “like last time, they were slow to serve me”.  Similarly, comparisons with another store are not helpful.

4. Check spelling and grammar

In all things, imagine that you are completing the report to submit to your English teacher rather than your ‘m8s’.  Avoid abbreviations and SMS-inspired content. It’ll make your life gr8  ; )

5. DO NOT USE CAPITAL LETTERS

Unless you’re using capitals for a well-known acronym, it’s best to avoid them.  OTHERWISE THEY MAY THINK YOU ARE SHOUTING.

6. Don’t assume the reader knows what you’re experiencing

The whole purpose of a mystery guest survey is to get your perspective on the customer experience with a particular business.  As you complete the survey, try to join all the dots and fill in the gaps.

Don’t make assumptions about the reader – rather just give a detailed account of you found the experience.  It may be, for example, that the reader has never visited the particular store and/or may not know the staff.

7. Write in the past tense

To borrow our text from point one, avoid writing in the present tense: “I find the sales assistant to be friendly and helpful.  I ask for assistance with x product and they take me to the relevant part of the shop and show me the different options”.  Your mystery guest visit happened in the past, so make the text express that.

8. Try to avoid “see above”

I have to admit, there are various mystery guest surveys I’ve filled in where I found the questions incredibly repetitive.  If you find yourself in this situation, read the questions again.  There is usually a subtle different between the two questions.  Whatever you do, avoid writing “see above”.  If you really think the questions are identical (can happen), copy and paste the text from the duplicate question, rather than putting “see above”.

9. When you give an answer of “no” (or “yes”), explain it

Because client service experience can be open to interpretation, you need to explain what you mean when you’ve indicated that something did or didn’t happen.  For example, if the survey says “did the sales assistant greet you in a friendly manner?”, you need more than a “yes” or a “no”.

Explain what they did that made you feel they were friendly.  Did they smile or make eye contact, what did they say to you?

10. No speculation, no apologies for circumstances, just descriptions

Occasionally as a mystery guest, you’re going to come across a business performing badly for whatever reason.  Particularly in Australia, we’re not always inclined to lay the boot in if someone appears to having a bad day.

While mystery guest companies definitely want you to be objective and not overly critical, avoid the temptation to rationalise why performance was good or bad.  “They didn’t serve me for 10 minutes but that’s because the boss was difficult to work for”.

Conclusion

If you’ve done the hard work of attending the mystery guest job, don’t let yourself down with how you complete the survey – this is often the only thing mystery guest companies have to judge you on.  Avoid the 10 mistakes above and you’ll be well on your way to completing good reports and being offered mystery guest jobs again and again and again.

Angus

The post 10 things to avoid when entering your mystery guest survey appeared first on mysteryshoppingguide.com.au.

One of the great things about being a mystery guest is that you really only need to meet a few basic requirements to be able to get paid to shop.  It can be very flexible in terms of time and location and is therefore attractive to people from all walks of life.

Through my discussions with a range of different mystery guest companies, I’ve identified who your competitors are when you’re bidding for jobs.

School leavers and tertiary students

If you’re just out of school or studying at university/Tafe, you may be interested to know that there are plenty of people like you who are seeking to get paid to shop.  Partly, this is about supplementing income for entertainment or other purposes.  Some students take mystery guest jobs more seriously and use it to fund their education-related costs.

Stay at home parents

My wife did her first mystery guest jobs when my oldest child was just a baby.  I think for new mums and dads, this provides a way to get paid to shop (and thereby bring in a little bit of income) and arguably do some ‘adult’ work in the midst of so many goos and gaas.

Because most mystery guest jobs require that you do it unaccompanied, mums and dads are either going to need to rely on a relative or a partner to look after the kids.  This may mean that jobs after hours and on weekends are likely to be more competitive among this group.

Retirees

I heard recently that people in their 50s and 60s are the fastest group of people joining Facebook.  What does this have to do with working as a mystery guest?

Some people could be forgiven for thinking that retirees are less likely to do mystery guest jobs because they’re not as IT literate. It’s true that some IT skills are essential for entering the results of your work.  The Facebook statistic above suggests that IT skills for older people may not the hurdle it once was.

One mystery shopping company mentioned to me that they have a retired gentleman who practically makes effectively gets paid to shop as a full time shop.  If you really went nuts, earning $100-$200 per week (up to $10,000 per annum) is quite possible.

Other

In the ‘other’ category are people who maybe do mystery guest jobs just because they find it fun, not so much for the financial reasons.  Rather they see it as a way of providing some pocket money, perhaps for a hobby.

I started mystery guest jobs after hours even though I had a well-paying full time job.  I had moved interstate a few months ahead of my family and with all the time on my hands, was frankly a bit bored.  I was happy to receive some pocket money and a number of the fringe benefits that comes with the work.

Conclusion

As a mystery guest, you have a number of potential competitors out there.  Your best strategies to maximise your mystery guest income are:

1. Register to be a mystery guest for as many businesses as you can (the Mystery Shopping Guide simplifies this process enormously)
2. Make sure you are a valued employee by the mystery shopping companies.  Have a look here for further guidance

Angus

The post Who am I competing against to win mystery guest jobs? appeared first on mysteryshoppingguide.com.au.

During the time I have been developing the Mystery Shopping Guide, I have spoken to quite a lot of young people (late teens) about their earning habits.  This is particularly where they are looking to earn extra money before taking up full time work – either during high school or tertiary studies.  What was your first income source?

In all of this, I had wondered whether young people would be interested in mystery shopping.  My daughter is doing tertiary study currently and as it turns out, is a keen mystery shopper.  It’s fair to say she’s had a bit of a leg up from her old man (me).

She’s enjoyed getting hold of the information I’ve put together for the Mystery Shopping Guide.  As a result, she has done quite a lot of jobs in a relatively short time.

Amy says she’s earnt over $500 worth in the past 6 months and the jobs keep coming in.  She’s also developed quite a good collection of various bottles of this and that.  Liquorland is, after all, a pretty common mystery shopper job!

Mystery shopping in Australia

While it wasn’t around in Australia when I was a kid (not that I’m aware of), mystery shopping has been around for some time.  My wife did mystery shopping when Amy was a baby – Amy is now almost 20.  Curiously, my wife was mystery shopping at Bunnings back in those days (yes, Bunnings has been around that long).  You can still do Bunnings mystery shoppers today.

As I’ve spoken to people in their late teens, many have been more than interested in the idea of mystery shopping.  I suppose in previous eras there wasn’t the same focus on shopping as there is now.  Not so many shopping malls, and not the same range of shopping options.

Now that times have changed, the idea of mystery shopping is really attractive.  Let’s face it, who doesn’t like the idea of being paid to shop?  What is even more attractive is the wide range of businesses that use mystery shoppers – the Mystery Shopper Guide has identified over 100 such businesses in Australia.

The 1980s equivalent of mystery shopping

All of this discussion with young people lead me to reflect on how I first started earning money.  Back in the day for me, outdoors seemed a theme.  We had a family farm in Victoria (still do) and Dad used to pay my brother and me $1 an hour to help around the farm.

Secondly, my older brothers used to do gardening jobs for people (this was before Jim’s Mowing etc) and I would get to go along.  It wasn’t that long before I had some of these jobs in my own right.  I can’t remember the rate of pay but I think at that stage, any income was good income.

Hello milk

My next job involved milk.  I lived in Canberra as a teenager and believe it or not, in those days they used to deliver milk to your door.  I gather this type of service doesn’t exist anywhere anymore in Australia (I could be wrong).

I worked on a milk run after school for several years.  I don’t think it was well paid.  I recall getting $5 for a shift that went for about 2-3 hours plus a ‘free’ flavoured milk at the end of the shift (woo hoo!).

The job consisted of remembering the many obscure orders of customers: different types of milk, potentially in different quantities, on different days.  The tool of trade was a 2 x 8 delivery crate (with a handle) that we filled up based on the upcoming ‘run’.

A run consisted of up to 5-6 houses that you would run to, drop off the correct order, then run back to the truck and restock.  It was tiring work but good for your fitness.  The downside was some of the psycho dogs I came across which seemed to enjoy scaring the life out of milk runners.

Conclusion

While I don’t look back unfondly of my first jobs, it’s fair to say that mystery shopping is a sooo much easier way of making income for people these days.  This is either for the pocket money earners or those people seeking a more serious supplement to household income – a serious shopper can easily make thousands a year.

The wide variety of businesses that use mystery shopping these days (and the variety of fringe benefits on offer) couple nicely with the flexibility of when/where you work.  It does make me wonder whether employers of old would even be able to find anyone to do their milk runs these days.

So what was your first income source?

Angus

The post Life before mystery shopping – my first ever income appeared first on mysteryshoppingguide.com.au.

If you do a few mystery guest jobs from my time, it’s inevitable you’re going to find yourself with a job you just can’t do.

Worst case, you will have straight out forgotten to do the job.  Hopefully, you’ll realise just before the due date that you can’t do it.  This happened to me recently.  I was interstate and had a job to do in Sydney.  I’ll tell you how it ended up below.

First, let’s examine a couple of ways NOT to handle this situation.

HOW NOT TO DO IT

Get a friend/family member to do the job for you

In your regular job, would you let a friend or family member turn up to do the work for you?  Unless you’re dealing with blind people (!), of course not.  That is, not if you want to keep your job.

It is a surprise then that some shoppers get someone else to do a mystery guest job for them.  But this is a big risk.  Be aware that mystery guest companies warn shoppers that they check store security footage to confirm work was done.  Some companies ask you to provide a photo of yourself when you register – see a connection?

The other risk associated with letting someone else do the job for you is the potential damage to your reputation with the mystery guest company.  Most companies are continually rating shoppers (often after each shop).  Are you completely confident someone else will do the job and write it up to the same standard you would?

Bottom line: don’t go there.

Fake it or do it later than agreed

For the more adventurous (stupid) among us, you could pretend that you did the job (even though you didn’t) and fill in the survey as such.  This can be tempting if it’s a type of mystery guest job that you’ve done over and over.

However, this is very high risk option and obviously dishonest.  If you adopt this approach, who knows, you might even get away with it once? But in time, it will certainly catch up with you and is just not worth the risk.

Another alternative you may consider is to do the job at a time/date that wasn’t agreed but pretend you did it at the allotted time.  The problem with this approach (apart from the risk of an audit of security footage) is that you’re not actually looking at what the mystery guest company needs.

Furthermore, most mystery guest companies want you to fill in the online survey within a pretty quick timeframe after the business has been visited.  If you don’t visit the business until even just a day after what you’d agreed, you won’t complete the survey in time and probably won’t be paid.

When I was new to being a mystery guest, I didn’t understand the requirement (from one company) of having to do mystery guest jobs on a specific date/time.

Result: I did 6 jobs and didn’t get paid for any of them.  Ouch.

A MUCH BETTER APPROACH

Let them know early

Mystery guest companies in my experience, realise that mistakes do some times occur.  The earlier you can let them know you’re not going to be able to do a mystery guest job, the better.

If you’ve already missed it, whatever you do, don’t just ignore it and think it will go away.  The only thing that may be going away (if you adopt this approach), is your future employment prospects.

If you’ve got a reasonable track record as a mystery guest your best approach, after the job was due, is to fess up and apologise.  I wouldn’t recommend making up any stories, just tell them the truth.

Make sure, also, that you follow the company policy on what to do in this scenario.  It might be making a phone call, sending an email to a particular person/address, or cancelling the job online, or a combination.

Negotiate the deadline

Depending on the mystery guest company, one other option may be to negotiate the deadline.  There are a few factors that come into play here.  Often businesses will have a program of mystery shopping over a period of a few weeks/months.  As long as yours isn’t the last job in that program, you may be able to do it on another (later) date.

Typically the mystery guest companies just need to get the job done by someone and are grateful if you can do the job at all.  In the example I mentioned at the start of the article, I called up the day before the due date as well as sending an email.  As it turned out, I was able to complete the job a full week after the due date and I still got paid. Yay!

I can only imagine that at times, they really struggle meeting their own targets.  Be a part of the solution and you’ll stay in the good books.

Conclusion

To err is human, to forgive is divine.  We all make mistakes and occasionally, this may result in you not being able to do a mystery guest job you’ve agreed to do.  Wherever possible, avoid this situation.

But if you can’t do the job, get in touch with the mystery guest company as quickly as you can.  Be apologetic and see if you can reschedule the job.  You might just end up getting paid anyway and maintaining your all-important reputation for future jobs.

The post Help, I’ve forgotten to do my mystery guest job! appeared first on mysteryshoppingguide.com.au.

As a mystery shopper (AKA mystery guest, phantom shopper, mystery customer), you are paid to be a ‘fresh set of eyes’ on how businesses treat customers.  If you’re good at it, you can earn good money doing so.

But there are mistakes you can make which can curb your income.  Here are the 10 biggest mistakes you can make and how to avoid them.

Not Following Instructions

Mystery shopper instructions are there for a reason – they tell you what to do, so that you can answer the questions. If the instructions say you are to make an objection, and you decide not to, then you can’t answer the questions on objection handling. Similarly, if you don’t read the instructions and go to the wrong business, you won’t get paid.

As you start to do mystery shops, be extra careful to make sure that you don’t treat them all the same.  Even if you’ve done the same type of job several times before, mystery shopping companies are known to change the requirements from time to time.  Moral: read the instructions every time you get a new job.

Unhelpful Descriptions

Remember that people will be reading your reports.  Would you be happy to be described as ‘fat’, ‘short’ or ‘spotty’?  It can be a balancing act to provide enough information so it’s clear who you’re talking about, but no so much that you’re bordering on offence.

Weight is probably the most contentious issue.  Some companies don’t want you to comment on it at all.  Other companies are okay with it in which case, to avoid offence, use terms like ‘solid build’, ‘medium build’ or ‘slim build’.

Don’t describe height, just try to estimate it.  ‘Around 1.5m’ or ‘approximately 6 foot’ is better than (what you perceive to be) ‘short’ or ‘tall’.  Forget about describing skin complexion (like bad acne) and unless you receive advice to the contrary, leave alone terms like ‘bald’.

Ethnicity and skin colour are another potentially touchy area.  Use terms like ‘male of Indian origin’ rather than ‘the Indian guy’ or ‘the dark-skinned guy’.  Describing skin colour as part of a broader description is usually okay (‘fair skin’, ‘dark skin’).  In all things, think of how you would feel if your description of someone was applied to you.

‘i’

Every time you write something like “then i went up to the counter” someone at a mystery shopping company has to change it to “then I went up to the counter”.  Do you really want to draw attention to yourself for the wrong reasons?  Your reports are seen by a lot of people – keep that in mind when you prepare your responses and capitalise your ‘i’s.

Registering More Than Once

Some shoppers register several times in the hope that they will get more assignments. Duplicates can cause problems, usually to the mystery shopper. Shoppers with duplicate accounts often can’t find their assignments, and contact the mystery shopping company advising that something is wrong with the system. Companies will delete duplicate accounts when they find them so don’t go down that path.

Similarly, be careful about the email address you use to register.  As an employer, how confident would you feel about someone whose email address is Im2sexy4u@gmail.com?

Contradictions

Mystery shopping companies will check your reports for internal consistency, which means that an answer in one place shouldn’t contradict an answer in another place. Eg. ticking the box that the service was friendly, then commenting that it was unfriendly.

Similarly, it’s not unheard of for people to tick the box that the staff did not wear a name tag, and then comment that the name on the name badge was hard to read.

Abbreviations

When texting to friends, you might write “it was gr8 m8, LOL” but definitely DON’T write like this when completing mystery shopping assignments.  You don’t need to write Shakespeare but let your ‘English class English’ influence you more here than your ‘mobile phone English’.

If you write “v g food assistant v friendly in uniform tables needed cleaning enjoyed coffee” somebody has to change it to “It was very good food, and I enjoyed my coffee. The assistant who served me was very friendly, and wearing the uniform. I noticed that some tables needed cleaning”. This is not the way to get points as a preferred shopper.

Speling

Need I say more?  Fortunately, if you’re not a great speller, some companies have a spell checker built into their system (although typically with American spelling).  If you’re uncertain, look it up before you submit it.  Let www.macquariedictionary.com.au (Australian spelling) be your new best friend!

One Word Answers

Answering ‘OK’ or ‘Good’ to a question like “Please describe your overall customer experience” does not give the client any real information. Aim for at least 3-line answers to all text questions.  Remember you are being the eyes and ears of the customer.  They don’t see what you see, and they only have what you write to go on.

Not Updating Details

If you change your address or phone number or email, make sure you let the mystery shopping company know. If the mystery shopping company can’t contact you, you will be removed from their database.

Cancelling a job

We will talk more about this one in a later post, but if you do need to cancel a job, do it early and follow the company protocols for doing so.  This may require a phone call, an email, or going onto the company website to reject the job offer.

Summary

Given that your mystery shopper bosses don’t get to see you face to face, how you interact with them, in every other way, is how they form an opinion of you.  What sort of an opinion would you like them to have?

A good opinion will lead to more work; a bad opinion will lead to less work.  Avoid the above mistakes and you’ll be a long way towards maximizing your success as a mystery shopper.

Angus

The post The 10 biggest mistakes you can make as a mystery shopper appeared first on mysteryshoppingguide.com.au.

As a mystery shopper, life can be like a box of chocolates – you never know what you’re going to get (thanks Forrest Gump).  In this article, we’ll have a look at the different types of assignments and compare them to different types of chocolate. : )

Homebrand Chocolate

For your ‘homebrand’ mystery shopper experience, these are the most common and easiest to get.  As you might imagine, the assignments relate to the businesses that have LOTS of outlets – scarce as hen’s teeth does not apply here.

Curiously, the mystery shopping job that I’ve found easiest to get is Liquorland via RMSA.  Owned by Coles, Liquorland seems to have an insatiable appetite for mystery shopper feedback.  During the day, in the evening, on the weekend, the jobs are all there.  The pay is usually $10 and they’re typically available all over Australia.

The assignment involves going into the store, hovering around a particular area (eg. red wine) for 5 minutes, waiting for someone to approach you.  You ask for a recommendation for particular type of drink (eg. Shiraz) and make a note of what’s recommended.  You must buy something and you can be reimbursed for up $13.

I’ve done heaps of these and have a great wine collection (albeit cheaper bottles) as a result.

Cadbury Chocolate

The ‘Cadbury Chocolate’ mystery shopper assignment is probably where you’re paid for $30 and up and usually takes upward of 30 minutes.  Some of the jobs that might fall into this category include:

• test driving cars.  These are usually paying $40-$50 but be prepared to be badgered for a sale.  If you have a marketing or sales background, these can be quite interesting just to have a look at the sale process the car sellers use

• dining out.  Usually these jobs are either paying $40-$50 (I’ve seen up to $80) but with no reimbursement for what you spend.  Soup of the day all round!  Alternatively, they will  pay nothing but reimburse you for what you spent.  My daughter got an $80 job reimbursement job recently and her and one other struggled to spend the $80!

Haighs Chocolate

Before we get into the mystery shopper part, I should mention if you’ve never tried Haighs Chocolate, you really should.  As far as I can tell, this is the best chocolate in Australia.

So what is the ‘bees knees’ when it comes to mystery shopper assignments?  That’s depends on whether you’re looking for money or fringe benefits or both.

• If you’re just interested in the highest paying jobs, then the most I think I’ve ever seen was $250.  That involved visiting a number of branches of a jewellery chain in the one day.  It would be the equivalent of a full day’s work and these jobs are few and far between.

• The other category that may float your boat is not the pay but the experience you get.   A free night’s accommodation, such as in a holiday park, is reasonably common but typically outside metro areas.  I’ve also seen several jobs which involve attending the Sydney Entertainment Centre to see a concert – anywhere from Fleetwood Mac to Nicki Minaj.  Neither job paid anything.

Conclusion

There really are the full range of mystery shopper assignments out there.  Not surprisingly, the more attractive they are, the harder they are to come by.  But they can be worth the wait.  The ‘homebrand’ mystery shopper assignments are common but don’t pay as well. Fortunately, they’re quick so you can potentially do more of these.

How would you like a FREE copy of the /Australian Mystery Shopping Guide?

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Angus

The post What are the typical or best mystery shopper assignments? appeared first on mysteryshoppingguide.com.au.

Just because you need to earn some money as a mystery guest / mystery shopper, doesn’t mean it can’t be fun.  Life’s too short not to have fun.  In this blog, we discuss some of the ways to make being a mystery guest fun.

Do it with friends/family

Any mystery guest assignment that involves food can always involve another person.  I’ve eaten kebabs, chicken parmies, and soup, all in the name of being a mystery guest.  But what I’ve also done is to take along my wife or my kids to make the experience more enjoyable.

One Saturday night, I had two mystery guest jobs at two different clubs within 15 minutes driving of each other.  Each job paid $50.  Rather than just go and do it myself and order the cheapest item on the menu, I involved the whole family.

We went and had mains at one club and dessert at the other – kind of like a progressive dinner (where you eat a different course at each person’s house).  The whole evening was a lot of fun and we managed to have a good meal for four of us at practically no cost.

Who could you share a mystery guest meal with?

Do two things at once

If a particular mystery guest assignment feels like a chore, like ‘work’, combine it with an outing you enjoy.  My son is almost at the age where society will let him loose on the roads without someone responsible next to him (he’s on his Ls).  Scary!

What this has meant is the need to get up an enormous amount of driving (120 hours in his case) over a one year period.  To make the mystery guest job more fun, I’ve had Luke drive me (building his experience) to and from the job.  In fact, I’ve even taken to bidding for jobs some distance from our home just to get his hours up.

Other combinations we’ve done have been bidding for jobs that are near the beach or near somewhere else that you can do something fun.  Get the mystery guest job done first then enjoy yourself.

What are the things in your life you can coincide with your mystery guest assignments?

Choose jobs that you have an interest in

With the broad range of mystery guest jobs out there, it shouldn’t be too hard to find something that you actually like doing.  Like sitting in cafes drinking coffee (or tea in my case)?  There are mystery guest jobs that involve calling on cafes?

Like driving nice cars? I’ve test driven brand new BMWs and been paid for it!  Like drinking wine?  Yup, you can even get mystery guest jobs that pay you to buy wine (or other drinks) and reimburse you for your time and for the wine itself up to a limit.

These days, I have one of the best wine collections I’ve ever had as a result to doing mystery guest jobs.  What are your interests?

Conclusion

Why wouldn’t you have fun doing something if you can?  Use these guidelines to turn up the fun in your mystery guest jobs, because at MysteryShoppingGuide.com.au, we take having fun seriously!

How would you like a FREE copy of the Mystery Shopping Guide?

We are looking for people to review the product and provide a testimonial.  In exchange for doing so, we’ll give you free access to the product.

Just enter your details below and the Mystery Shopping Guide is coming your way.

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