Have you ever looked at something on a mystery shop report form and wondered, “Who comes up with this stuff?” Most of us have, at one time or another, seen report questions, scenarios and other shop requirements that seemed unrealistic or just plain weird.Remembering a Mystery Shopper Scenario
Most of the time mystery shoppers enter businesses as themselves. They use their real names (if any name at all) and they just act like normal customers. However, there are times when, as a mystery shopper, you may have to pretend to be someone you are not. It might mean posing as the mother of a toddler for whom you need daycare, a parent who needs an assisted living facility, as a bride-to-be, someone looking for an apartment or a new bank, a pet owner or any number of possible situations.
Although it can be fun to act the part of someone else, it can also be a little scary. What if they ask a question and you are unsure how to answer? Or what if you forget what you told them earlier and give inconsistent information? …continue reading Remembering a Mystery Shopper Scenario
Question from a mystery shopper:
A new year (or any time) is a good time to organize the paperwork, computer files and workflow for your mystery shopping business. Being better organized means you spend less time seeking assignments, doing shop visits, completing reports, and calculating taxes. Most importantly, you will not risk forgetting to do shops, or waste time trying to track down your notes to answer editor questions about your reports.
A mystery shopper asks:
Most shops require that you get the names of the employees you observed or with whom you interacted. That can be easy if they are wearing name tags. 
Suggestive selling, or upselling, involves suggesting additional items when a customer makes a purchase, or encouraging a customer to upgrade to a more expensive option. Perhaps the best-known example of an upsell is when the order taker at a fast food restaurant asks, “Do you want fries with that?” However, upselling is used in almost every kind of business.
Most mystery shopper assignments require that you submit a receipt in order to be paid. Most often you are instructed to upload a scanned image or digital photo of the receipt. You may be allowed to fax or mail the receipt instead. In some cases, you may be asked to mail the original receipt, and in others you may only have to enter information from the receipt when you submit the report from your secret shop.
There are lots of things to remember during a mystery shopping assignment. Remembering to get names, take timings, ask the right questions, etc. can be difficult enough, but we also have to do these things in a natural way that doesn’t draw attention to us, and without influencing how the employees do their jobs.
Question from a mystery shopper: