When you make the decision to sign up and become a mystery shopper, you are making the choice to become a vital piece of the feedback and data that we provide our clients. It is essential to understand that the role you play is much more significant than simply filling out a shop report and putting a few extra bucks in your pocket.
Our clients rely on guest feedback through mystery shops as an extremely important part of their culture and mystery shop data directly impacts how they make decisions about products, service standards, promotions, training, and a plethora of other areas of their business. Understanding the role that a mystery shopper plays is critical so that you can understand how the feedback you provide in a mystery shop report directly affects our client’s businesses.
Below are some examples of where your feedback goes, and how it influences and impacts our clients:
Training, Hiring, and Firing:
Many clients use mystery shop reports as a training tool to coach their staff on areas of opportunity. For example, a common point that many clients monitor is their team’s ability to upsell. It’s important to understand what constitutes an upsell and how to properly gauge if the employee is offering it in the proper manner. If an employee regularly fails to promote an upsell to a customer, or if a location consistently fails to do so, it may result in the dismissal of an employee or even a manager who may not be properly training his staff in proper upselling techniques. This may lead to an employee needing to be replaced, resulting in new hires and updated training programs to ensure the issue doesn’t persist.
Bonus Programs:
On the flip side of using mystery shops as a tool to reprimand employees, many clients use their shop program as a piece of their employee bonusing programs. Employees rely heavily on these bonuses. It’s important that the feedback provided is accurate, so the deserving employees are bonused appropriately.
Product Feedback:
Clients will often utilize specific mystery shops to gain insight into new products they are testing and considering putting into rotation. They are looking for honest opinions and insight into their new products as they know that even a small sample will provide them with a base of understanding as to how their new products will fare if released.
Franchise Compliance:
Clients structured in a franchise model will often use their mystery shops to ensure that their franchisees are in compliance with corporate standards. Are their franchisees using company-branded logos? Are they promoting their loyalty program? Clients use this feedback to keep tabs on their franchisees making it vital that the feedback provided is precise.
Your feedback matters and it’s crucial to understand why: your mystery shop reports directly impact the day-to-day operations of our clients which is why your reports must always be factual, accurate, and consistent. Please don’t hesitate to reach out to our shopper help desk or to your scheduler if you ever need clarification on a shop requirement or have a question about the form. We want you to feel confident about your visit and the report you are providing.