What is Mystery Shopping? It has been around for awhile but more companies have recently taken customer service as a serious consideration in attracting and maintaining satisfied customers. A Mystery Shopper or Secret Shopper is usually an independent contractor/consultant who visits target businesses anonymously with the goal of evaluating services, products, etc. and reports her findings to the company seeking the evaluations.

Mystery shopping can be suitable for almost anyone. You can be young, old, male, female, various ethnicities, etc., as long as you fit the hiring companies’ desired profiles for their shopping demographics, you can be a secret shopper. Larger cities, for obvious reasons, generally provide more opportunities for finding this kind of work.

Mystery Shopping is not a get rich quick proposition, but with conscientious effort on your part, it is a neat way of making extra money. As with any work opportunity, you must investigate the mystery shopping company offering the assignment and decide for yourself whether it’s good for you. If you have questions about a particular company, you should check them out with the Better Business Bureau, the local Chamber of Commerce, etc. Best of luck and happy shopping!

Here are some Mystery Shopper resources

  

Here are a few websites that offers pretty comprehensive information including how to start mystery shopping:

  • Elite Mystery Shopper. This gives you information on starting out and tips to get jobs.
  • A List Mystery Shopper. This gives you strategies to stay on top of the game as well as learning what it takes to get repeat offers.