Get Paid
to Shop And Keep Everything You Buy - Without Having to
Pay!
by: Avril Harper
Can You Tell Good Service From Bad; Recognise Value For
Money; Compare Prices, Staff Efficiency, Product Range,
Customer Service Between Rival Firms?
If so you might easily
find work as a ‘Mystery Shopper’ and be paid to comment
on service in shops, banks and building societies,
hotels, cinemas, veterinary surgeries, restaurants, even
on long distance flights and holidays.
Poor service is the
number one reason customers turn their back on a
business and start shopping elsewhere. Worse still, one
dissatisfied customer tells on average sixteen more
people about their experience, meaning even greater loss
of customers and profits for business owners.
Even taking too long to
answer the telephone or replenish the shelves,
inadequate parking facilities, crowded toilets and poor
staff-customer relations can alienate customers quickly.
No company can afford to
be complacent or fail to check its own operating
standards for long.
Companies need to know
how they are perceived by customers and if rival firms
are setting higher standards and attracting custom from
them. Hence the need for regular checks to be made on
all aspects of the business from product range and
quality of choice, to staff attitudes, customer care,
after sales service, and so on.
But there’s no easy way
for firms to investigate themselves.
Staff who know they are
being watched work harder, giving a false impression or,
worse still, they consider their employers are spying on
them, intent on catching them out and threatening
dismissal.
So, mystery shoppers go
undetected into a business, seeing things as they really
are, through the eyes of people who really matter -
customers! What they see and the service they receive
will not be affected by who they are and what influence
they have over staff!
As one leading mystery
shopping agency puts it:
"Mystery shoppers serve
as the eyes and ears of clients in retail and service
outlets."
As competition grows,
especially in a recession, and pressure increases on
companies to maintain or better still improve their own
market share, more and more openings will appear for
mystery shoppers in all areas of commerce, including
banks and building societies, shops and supermarkets,
hotels and garages, and more.
So a cinema wanting to
improve attendance figures might hire regular
cinema-goers to view the same film at all local outlets
to investigate prices, noise levels, staff efficiency,
car parking, toilets and amenities, and so on.
People of all ages can
apply to become mystery shoppers, even children with
their parents' consent. Special opportunities exist for
representatives of particular groups, such as the
elderly, disabled, housebound, or of specific ethnic or
religious persuasion. You can even be a mystery shopper
working entirely by telephone or on the Internet,
without ever leaving home and still claim a handsome fee
and valuable freebie incentives.
Not All 'Shopping'
Involves Buying Something
For example, you might
be asked to telephone a company service hotline, posing
as a customer with a problem to see how well your case
is handled and how long it takes.
The manager of a high
street supermarket might commission you to stand outside
another firm's store to count the number of customers
entering the premises and determine which are the
busiest times, what complimentary transport is offered,
how many packages are carried out, whether staff help
customers to their vehicles, and so on.
Most tasks are simple
and quick and involve little more than shopping, making
a mental note of the event, and later submitting a
written or telephone report to the employing company.
Marguerite Hegley who
was instrumental in writing Get Paid to Shop has several
years experience as a mystery shopper.
She says:
"I first mystery shopped
a supermarket. It was a lot of fun being asked to spend
a specific sum of money on goods which I kept, and I
also received expenses and a tidy fee for my work.
The pubs were fun too
and I was asked to order a meal and a drink in some and
just a drink in others. The eight pubs I had to visit
over a ten day period were in a twelve mile radius of my
home.
I particularly liked
working with a chemist chain, checking their photo
service and make-up counters. The girl on the make-up
counter gave me some good advice about my skin type and
a useful range of freebies testers which I am still
using three months later. And I got paid of course!"
No Better Time to Become
a Mystery Shopper ….. No Better Time to Start Your Own
Mystery Shopping Business
The business is pretty
new in most countries but catching on fast, and as talk
of recession grows opportunities will grow for people to
work as mystery shoppers for established hiring
companies or even start their own business in this
fascinating field.
Avril Harper is the
author of Get Paid to Shop and The Ultimate Guide to
Starting Your Own Mystery Shopping Business
www.castleedenbooks.com
