Mystery Shopper

A mystery shopper is hired to investigate customer service and employee honesty at a business. Also known as a secret shopper, this investigator poses as a customer or client and tries to find out whether employees at a specific business are honest and helpful.

If you own or manage a business, a mystery shopper can save your profits and your business by giving you a realistic view from a customer’s perspective.

What does a mystery shopper do?

A typical mystery shopper will take a couple of actions depending on the business they are investigating. They will often:

• Purchase something
• Ask questions
• Ask customer service for support
• Note the quality of items post-purchase
• Investigate digital services (including websites and social media)
• Call and test phone services
• Compare the business to its competitors

Secret shoppers will then use the information they’ve gathered to report the reliability of employees and overall success of the business.

Do I need a secret shopper?

If you own or manage a business, the quality of service and product can either cause your business to thrive or suffer. Unfortunately, employees are generally on their best behavior when their employer is present, meaning it could be difficult for you to get a genuine view of how your company operates. A reliable way to know your employees are trustworthy is to get opinions from an unbiased source.

Why should I hire a private investigator as a mystery shopper?

Secret shopping is too important to entrust to just anyone. While many research companies hire freelancers to pose as customers, private investigators can offer your business:

• Legality: In some states, it is simply illegal to hire anyone but a private investigator as a secret shopper. Also, in many states, video secret shoppers must be private investigators. But this is an advantage since investigators are trained in the law and know how to obtain information that can be used in court if necessary.
  
  
• Professionalism: Private investigators are trained to observe. Hiring a private investigator to secret shop at your company ensures that you get the most precise details about your employees and your business’s customer performance.
  
  
• Evidence: Private investigators are allowed by law to gather evidence of employee dishonesty and fraud. They are even trained to do so. When you hire a private investigator as a secret shopper, you will receive, not only a report on your company’s performance, but also the proof you need to confront employees.

Why do you need to hire a private investigator?

There are plenty of reasons why you can't afford not to try mystery shopping:

• One dissatisfied customer is likely to cost you a lot of business--most studies have found that customers not happy with their experience at a business usually will not complain to management. In most cases they will simply not do business with that retailer again and will encourage others not to do business with that retailer as well.
  
  
• Customer surveys and incentive programs have been proven to be less effective. Many customers are simply unwilling to share negative feedback with management or with others. Customers also tend to be biased, whereas professionals involved in mystery shopping exist solely to provide impartial information.

Use the search utility on the top of this page or select from a state listed below to find a mystery shopper, or give us a call at (888) 997-4669.