Our top 5 tips on becoming one of our mystery shoppers

So you want to become one of our mystery shoppers? It’s an excellent time to be thinking about becoming a mystery shopper because here at Hidden Beauty we are expanding our mystery shopping database so that we can serve even more businesses.

Mystery shopping is interesting, flexible and enjoyable.

However, it is not a full-time job, but it is usually something you can do from time to time to add variety into your working life.

Hidden Beauty have several types of mystery shopper dependent upon a variety of factors including experience, aptitude and qualifications. There are customer service mystery shoppers who do not need to be industry trained and then our expert mystery shoppers who need an industry qualification in hair, spa or beauty to be able to comment with authority on their experience.

So here are our top five tips and they are equally important for both customer service mystery shoppers and expert mystery shoppers alike.

Our first tip is ‘never pay to be put on a mystery shopping database’.

There are many unscrupulous companies who charge to put their shoppers on their database; this is completely unnecessary. At Hidden Beauty we will hold your details on our mystery shopping database until work becomes available in your area; you don’t have to pay anything.

Tip number two is ‘you have to be computer literate’.

You don’t need to be a computer whizz kid, but you do have to be able to type a legible word document and to be able to email it to us. All our customers expect typed reports from us and it just takes too much office time to type up handwritten reports. Also, it can be quite difficult at times for us to read some handwriting which can lead to misinterpretation of the results. So, we have had to stipulate that we receive only electronic reports.

Our third and probably most important tip is that you have to be reliable.

If you accept a mystery shopping assignment then you will need to make the mystery shopping visit and return the report on time. Our customers commission shops to assist them with their businesses and often have a specific time frame for the information to be returned and applied. Our advice would be, if you are in doubt about whether you can undertake and complete an assignment in the time allowed then don’t take it; there will always be others for you to do later and you will always be ranked much higher on our database if you turn an assignment down rather than to take one and then not deliver on time.

Tip four is to be as specific as you can about your mystery shopping experience.

If something you experienced was good, then you will need to say why you thought it was good. If there was anything that you rated as poor then you will need to specify why it was poor too. The more information you can give and the better you can express yourself in your report, then the more helpful it is to the business owner or the person who commissioned the report. Information and detail is extremely important for a mystery shop to be of value.

Our final tip is that you need a good memory.

To assist your memory we always recommend that you complete your mystery shopping report almost immediately after completing your visit. The worst thing that can happen is to complete your visit thinking that you will remember everything and then when you come to type up your report that you cannot remember the detail. Many of our shoppers find a nearby coffee shop to sit and write notes following their assignment. However, always make sure that you are discreet and other customers don’t see the notes or the report that you are writing; discretion is key and almost deserves its own ‘top tip’ section.

So there you have it, our top five tips on becoming one of our mystery shoppers. If you are interested in joining us for occasional work please contact us on mysteryshopping@hiddenbeautyuk.com and join us on our interesting journey.

For more beauty related articles, review our latest beauty news - or perhaps take a look at this earlier article (from 26th November 2018): " Want to know what you can do even better this Christmas as beauty business owner? …. "

About Angela Bartlett:

Angela Bartlett is an expert in the health, beauty and skincare industry with over 35 years' experience. As a high profile individual, she is passionate about the high-quality treatments, procedures and products in the beauty industry and is linked with leading industry bodies whose aim is to advance standards in beauty and holistic therapies. Based in Cheshire, Angela operates Hidden Beauty nationwide across the UK to support beauty industry businesses in their business development. To learn more about Angela and her accreditations, don't hesitate to get in touch.