What is Mystery Shopping?

Here I want to give a quick overview of the mystery shopping concept.

Companies want to know what a customer's experience is like. The best way to do this is through mystery shoppers.

Mystery (or secret) shoppers visit a location and report back to the business everything they would want to know from a customer's point of view. With this information the company can improve it's policies, reward or correct employees, and hopefully provide a better customer service experience.

The process

1. A company (for purposes of illustration, lets say...) Spacely Space Sprockets is interested in how customers preceive the company.


2. Mr. Spacely, the CEO of Spacely Space Sprockets, contacts (for the purposes of illustration, lets say...) 007 Secret Shop Co. to conduct mystery shops at Spacely Space Sprockets.


3. Mr. Spacely and 007 sit down and decide the criteria for the mystery shop.


4. 007 tells their schedulers that they want to do a shop at Spacely Space Sprockets.


5. The schedulers send out emails to mystery shoppers and put the shop on the job board at the 007 Secret Shop C0 website.


6. A secret shopper (lets say me) finds out that a shop is available and applies for it.


7. The scheduler schedules me to complete the shop by a given due date.


8. I read the guidelines and look at the form I will have to fill in when I am done and familiarize myself with the requested information.


9. I go to Spacely Space Sprockets and shop there according to Mr. Spacely's instructions which I received from 007 Secret Shop Co.


10. I type in my information into the internet form at 007 Secret Shop Co.'s website, and upload my receipts.


11. A reviewer/grader looks at my report, makes any changes, and gives me a grade.


12. The report goes back to Mr. Spacely. I get reimbursed and paid.

So, to clarifiy: Businesses contract with mystery shopping companies to conduct mystery shops for them. The mystery shop companies subcontract the work to mystery shoppers.