What’s hot in mystery shopping: It’s not all shopping and eating!

by | May 2, 2012 | Businesses | 0 comments

You probably haven’t ever heard ‘hot’ and ‘mystery shopping’ in the same sentence.  But, according to Jane Edwards-Hall, the world of mystery shopping is spicing up as more traditional researchers deploy mystery shopping programs in ways you would least expect.

Ms. Edwards-Hall notes that government agencies, hospitals, healthcare providers and even schools are using mystery shoppers to ensure their service delivery chains are functioning within required operating procedures.  As panels become more specialized, more and more professional and B2B services are employing mystery shopping solutions as well.

This may be surprising.  Mystery shopping has been traditionally viewed as the quick and relatively cheap “child” of the Operations team – used just to know if Frank smiled and Jenny acknowledged you within 30 seconds.  While these measures are still important, the world of mystery shopping has become more strategic, allowing insightful use of the data and feedback.

How is the insight gleaned from mystery shopping turned into action?  How do you overcome inertia?  The approach is similar to other market research Customer Experience programs.  Understanding the objectives, building an appropriate questionnaire and creating the right scenario design from the start are critical components to success.  Participating in interactive insights workshops, rather than just listening to data presentations, is another key to creating actionable initiatives.

Here are a few brief examples:

  1. A wireless provider was able to increase sales scores in their mystery shopping program from 35% to 89% over 5 years, leading to a real improvement in ROI.
  2. A drug store saw a dramatic reduction in the number of complaints to their customer care line over 2 years, plus proven performance improvement in their front-line staff behaviors.  All of this was aided through a dedicated mystery shopping program in every store on a weekly basis which provided an enterprise-wide full-loop feedback solution that made a difference.
  3. An express courier and shipment organization was able to understand the value of lost sales and revenue through poor sales experiences, and dramatically improve performance via a mystery shopping program, leading to a real uptake in revenue and sales in the markets under examination.

Do you have a mystery shopping program?  Have you ever been involved in mystery shopping?  What’s your opinion?