Tag: mystery shopping

Over the years, we’ve been asked to conduct research with some very specific and interesting requirements.   For example, Confero recruited smokers with specific types of health insurance policies in order to test and compare the effectiveness of public quit smoking hotlines.  Often times, it’s not the project itself that is the most difficult for us, but the tight time frame that is the most challenging.  Here are some examples:

Many people, both shoppers and clients alike, tend to make assumptions about the mystery shopping industry. We are not sure how some of these myths began, but we hope to clarify some of them. In this issue, we expose the following three myths:

Sometimes the simplest task is the hardest to do. Through our decades of experience and knowledge measuring the customer experience, five key areas stand out when thinking about areas employees frequently miss. These five may seem simple, but they can be difficult to execute consistently across an organization. Consider these areas within your own organization to see if your company is where it should be:

In this economy, companies are working to keep loyal customers and increase sales. A new study by Accenture finds that firms are responding to the economic recovery by channeling resources to improve service and training. These efforts are focused not only on keeping current customers happy and loyal for the long term, but also on gaining market share from companies who are not focusing effectively on customer service.

Confero is excited to introduce guest blogger, Cathy Stucker. Cathy is the author of The Mystery Shopper’s Manual, the best selling guide to being a successful professional mystery shopper and blogs about the mystery shopping industry on her blog, The Mystery Shopper's Manual.  Confero President, Elaine Buxton first met Cathy several years ago during a Gold Shopper Certification seminar held by the MSPA when Cathy was working as a trainer for the Gold Certification program.    

 by Cathy Stucker, MysteryShoppersManual.com

You just got back from shopping three locations of the same client. Each assignment used the same scenario, and they all went pretty much the same way. The temptation is to write the comments and narrative for the first shop, then copy and paste your words into the other two reports. A few changes of names and other details and you’re done, right?

Wrong! Although recycling is a good thing, recycling comments and narratives in your mystery shop reports is not. Not only do some shoppers do this when they shop multiple locations of a company in the same day, they may copy and paste comments from shops done for the same client in previous months, or even shops done for competing businesses in the same industry. I even heard about one shopper who copied and pasted comments from the sample report provided by the mystery shopping company.