How to Become a Secret Shopper
If you watch the news often, you may believe that every offer and e-mail telling you how to become a secret shopper is a scam. I am here to tell you differently.
I can tell that you are serious about learning about how to become a legitimate secret shopper because you have started to do your research. The number one thing that you want to do before you begin your secret shopper career is research. I’m here to get you started on that journey, one step at a time.
What is a Secret Shopper
A secret shopper is an “undercover customer”. When you are undercover as a secret shopper, you will gather information about quality, service, cleanliness, and other types of issues on behalf of the clients, the business owners. When you become a secret shopper you will go into restaurants, banks, apartment and condo complexes, and all kinds of other business as an “undercover customer.”
After you complete your secret shopper visit, you will complete a mystery shopping report.
You are not being paid to give your opinion
This is one of the biggest misconceptions about secret shopping. You not being paid as a secret shopper to report on what you thought about the visit, you must report on the facts. Here is an example:
How you thought or felt about the visit:
The restroom was disgusting and gross.
Facts about the visit:
The restroom had toilet paper and towels on the floor. Some of the toilets had not been flushed. The floor was sticky and had puddles of liquid in the stalls.
Who pays Secret Shoppers? Why?
Secret shopping companies are hired by businesses that want to learn about their customer experiences. The secret shopping companies are then in charge of finding and scheduling the secret shoppers to visit the businesses.
Secret Shopper Payment Flow Chart
How to Become a Secret Shopper
As you can see from the flowchart, you need to work with a secret shopping companies. These are the places that hire secret shoppers and pay them to visit the business and restaurants.
Contacting the business to find out how to be their secret shopper is usually not very productive. Many times they don’t know (it is supposed to be a secret.) They may tell you they don’t have a secret shopper program, and that may be true. Many times you will visit an establishment on behalf of a competitor, or on behalf of a vendor that sells their product at that business. As you begin to become a secret shopper, you will find the secret shops at the places you enjoy visiting.
Secret Shopping is legitimate, not a scam?
Like all things, there are people out there who want to take advantage of people. There are definitely secret shopping scams out there. One way to spot a secret shopping scam is that they offer to pay you up front. That should raise a red flag right away.
Signing up from my list of secret shopping companies is the best way to know that you are working with legitimate businesses. These are companies that I have worked with and can confirm to be legitimate.
A word of warning, scammers can access this list as well. A scammer may pose as a representative of a legitimate secret shopping company and try to con you. These scams will usually offer to pay you a large sum of money, up-front, before you do any work. They will usually also want you to cash the check and mail a portion of it back to them. This doesn’t happen in a legitimate secret shop.
If you receive an offer from a company that is on my legitimate secret shopping companies list and you are in doubt – contact the company using the information from their official website. These are reputable businesses and they will gladly speak with you to confirm that it is a scam or real shop that was offered to you.
How to Become a Secret Shopper – step by step
- Do your research. Learn how to recognize secret shopping scams.
- Register using my list of legitimate secret shopping companies.
- Watch your email – secret shopping job notices are usually sent by email
- If you are in doubt about the legitimacy of a job offer – contact the company immediately. As you get a little experience receiving the “real” job notices, the scams will stick out like a sore thumb.
- Enjoy the extra income and fun you get from becoming a secret shopper!
Resources to help you find out how to become a secret shopper:
What to learn more about telephone mystery shoppers?
Would you like to increase your mystery shopping income?
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