Enjoy shopping, new products and good deals? You may want to try your hand at being a “mystery shopper” for grocery stores.
Mystery shoppers are part-time workers hired by companies to help evaluate their products and services to improve customer service, while posing as customers. In exchange for some form of compensation, mystery shoppers provide a detailed report of their findings to give useful feedback to these companies.
Companies in virtually all segments employ mystery shoppers, including most grocery store chains. However, rather than hiring shoppers directly, they tend to work with mystery shopping agencies who provide a database of potential shoppers. Restaurants, department stores, grocery stores, hotels, cruise lines and clothing stores also hire mystery shoppers.
In terms of compensation, agencies generally pay grocery mystery shoppers a grocery allowance and a per-assignment fee, ranging from a $2 to $8 credit on groceries plus a flat fee of $10 to $15, depending on the company. In exchange for this, mystery shoppers need to observe and answer specific questions provided by the company.
For example, the mystery shopper may time how long it takes an employee in the produce department to offer assistance, how long it takes to wait in the checkout line, whether particular items are in stock, and what the overall cleanliness of the store and its restrooms is. They may need to report whether the cashier asked if they had a store discount card and if employees made eye contact and greeted them as they shopped.
If you are interested in learning more about being a mystery shopper, you should sign up with mystery shopping agencies. As in any business, there are various types of agencies. Reputable agencies will not charge a fee to sign up and be included in their database, although signing up is not a guarantee that you will be selected. Your best bet is to sign up with several agencies to increase your chances of being offered assignments. You can find a comprehensive list of credible agencies from the Mystery Shoppers Providers Association, which is a national organization of mystery shopping agencies and a training and educational organization for mystery shoppers. You can find 150 mystery-shopping agencies listed on their site: http://www.mysteryshop.org.
Mystery shoppers with a good reputation can receive enough assignments to make a modest salary and receive plenty of nice benefits if they want to make a full-time career of mystery shopping. However, most mystery shoppers do the job on a part-time basis for extra spending money. New mystery shoppers may start out getting very few assignments or be offered less desirable assignments, like evaluating the cleanliness of a gas station restroom at midnight.
Take the time to do your very best job filling out the service report after your assignment. Make sure the information is complete and answers the questions accurately. Check for spelling and grammar accuracy. Sloppy reports are not likely to lead to future assignments, and many new shoppers submit sloppy reports. Therefore, your status within an agency will increase immediately if you make sure your work is top-notch.
Consider taking one of the courses offered by the Mystery Shoppers Providers Association (MSPA) to become certified. These courses will teach you the skills you need to be a professional mystery shopper, and agencies look for certified mystery shoppers.
Register with several agencies because no single agency would use the same mystery shopper for the same business over and over again. Increase your odds of getting more assignments by increasing your visibility with more agencies.
The Birmingham News
By Stephanie Nelson
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