Why mystery shopping is a challenge for many companies?

Companies often hire their employees to go mystery shopping and pretend like customers to check the service quality. The prime intention is to check the level of customer experience and satisfaction delivered at the brick-and-mortar business points.

It so happens that employees cannot deliver unbiased reports related to the motive all the time. This is where a service provider is hired for the job. It develops a mystery shopping solution based on the specific requirement of a client by considering all the decided parameters. Proficient mystery shoppers are incorporated into the program by focusing on their industry experience.

Challenges with mystery shoppers

Despite the smooth process, there are challenges that a company has to face when 3^rd-party mystery shoppers are included. Here is a list of challenges that should be kept in mind.

1. They are not customers

Mystery shoppers pretend like customers but they are actually not the consumers of a service or product. It means they can only review the service quality and check whether a business point touches all the expected benchmarks or not. It is close to approximation but the experience is not absolute. Mystery shoppers are the undercover foot soldiers but the results are somewhat limited to certain restrictions for a handful of industrial segments.

Experienced service providers handpick mystery shoppers for a program designed specifically to meet the expectations of a client. They ensure that the mystery shoppers have the right professional attitude and can get deeper into the service segment for proper evaluation. Only those service providers should be hired.

2. Biased data

Another drawback of a mystery shopping program is the bias of mystery shoppers. They are told to ask questions based on a questionnaire. As they are not shoppers, the experience is limited to the tailored situation. The realistic approach is somewhat not possible as proper customer interaction is not going to happen. In some cases, all questions are not asked and are filled in as per the experience of a mystery shopper.

Biased data can be omitted by simply following a solid scientifically-proven approach designed by experienced service providers. They ensure that all the questions are asked or the process is repeated by another shopper resulting in an unbiased and close-to-real experience.

3. Home-grown processes

It so happens that most mystery shopping ventures are based on home-grown methods even though the service types vary from industry to industry. It causes a lot of challenges and companies spend a fortune for nothing.

This is why top service providers tailor scientific approaches by researching the market and service types of a client. They develop a mystery shopping platform specific to the client’s requirements and focus on evaluating customer experience on a real-time basis.

Verdict

These challenges hamper the qualitative analysis of mystery shopping resulting in improper results. Actionable insights need a proper evaluation of customer service and experience. only experienced and reputed service providers are hired who are aware of these challenges and will take necessary steps to omit them. It is then the results will be up to the mark.