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Getting Started

July 01, 2024 01:34AM
Hello. I am not sure if I am posting this in the right place. I’m new to mystery shopping and I have signed up for several companies. I work full time and am looking to make additional income. Would you be able to recommend easier types of shops to start with? Thank you.
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July 01, 2024 06:25AM
There is a section for New Mystery shoppers.. there are lots of helpful hints and information there.
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July 01, 2024 02:38PM
Hello and welcome.

1. Avoid shops that require extensive narratives.
2. Check out the CX Group. The shops are generally easy and you should have access to the shop guidelines and report forms before you accept a shop.
3. Check out Ipsos. They have many shops, many of which are easy and you can see the guidelines for some of them before you accept a shop.
4. You signed up here a long time ago. I hope you have been reading the threads. Benefit from other shoppers' experiences and judge for yourself which MSCs and assignments to avoid. For example, if multiple shoppers posted about payment issues with an MSC, perhaps avoid shopping for that MSC. OTOH, do sign up with MSCs that have mostly positive feedback on this forum, e.g. Servimer.
5. Don't sign up with GigSpot.
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July 01, 2024 10:51PM
Never pay to mystery shop. That includes Ipsos' webinars and such.
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July 02, 2024 02:48AM
Fast food shops typically are the easiest (but lowest-paying), so those are good to get your feet wet. The "electronics mystery shopping" shops are fairly quick and easy, but you must take a selfie photo in front of the store, and not everybody likes that. Avoid the "1p tech" shops like the plague; the pay doesn't reflect the fact that they have many stupid narrative questions.

When you progress to shops with narratives, avoid using AI. Your words should be just that - your words.

If your path dictates you walk through hell, do it as though you own the place. -unknown
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July 02, 2024 03:42AM
My very first shop, 11 years ago, was Arby's. I don't think they are shopped anymore. I had to buy a meal. If they did well, I revealed myself and gave them a certificate. If they did not do well, I gave them a sheet of paper with what needed improvement. I got to give out the certificate. While most mystery shops are not revealed, this was straight forward and easy. While I concur with @drdoggie00 that fast food shops are easier in general, I would avoid anywhere you have to keep track of time. This would rule out Sonic for now. If I could recommend a mystery shop to start with, I would sign up with the company named after the Latin word for high while making a full circle. (It's up to you to figure that out.) They have a straight-forward shop for a company that is named after the captain of a Boeing. (You must also figure that out.) It's simple and only 5 questions. You won't make much, but it gives you a good practice run and it isn't too involved. Hopefully you'll have one in your area.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/02/2024 05:43AM by ServiceAward.
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July 02, 2024 05:17AM
@ServiceAward wrote:

I would sign up with the company named after the Latin word for high while making a full circle. (It's up to you to figure that out). They have a straight-forward shop for a company that is named after the captain of a Boeing. (You must also figure that out.)
Stop making me have to use the google machine. -lol-

I disagree about Sonic, especially if it's a drive-in stall scenario. I feel like the timings on that one aren't quite as "fast and furious" as they are on the drive-thru, and wouldn't be so overwhelming to a newbie.

If your path dictates you walk through hell, do it as though you own the place. -unknown
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July 02, 2024 02:24PM
This shop keeps my kids supplied with Prime for baseball/ softball season... and the schedulers at this company are my favorite.


@ServiceAward wrote:

My very first shop, 11 years ago, was Arby's. I don't think they are shopped anymore. I had to buy a meal. If they did well, I revealed myself and gave them a certificate. If they did not do well, I gave them a sheet of paper with what needed improvement. I got to give out the certificate. While most mystery shops are not revealed, this was straight forward and easy. While I concur with @drdoggie00 that fast food shops are easier in general, I would avoid anywhere you have to keep track of time. This would rule out Sonic for now. If I could recommend a mystery shop to start with, I would sign up with the company named after the Latin word for high while making a full circle. (It's up to you to figure that out.) They have a straight-forward shop for a company that is named after the captain of a Boeing. (You must also figure that out.) It's simple and only 5 questions. You won't make much, but it gives you a good practice run and it isn't too involved. Hopefully you'll have one in your area.
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July 05, 2024 06:01AM
Thank you.
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July 05, 2024 06:08AM
Thank you. I tried to search but could not find any information. May I ask why I should avoid Gig Spot?

@BusyBeeBuzzBuzzBuzz wrote:

Hello and welcome.

1. Avoid shops that require extensive narratives.
2. Check out the CX Group. The shops are generally easy and you should have access to the shop guidelines and report forms before you accept a shop.
3. Check out Ipsos. They have many shops, many of which are easy and you can see the guidelines for some of them before you accept a shop.
4. You signed up here a long time ago. I hope you have been reading the threads. Benefit from other shoppers' experiences and judge for yourself which MSCs and assignments to avoid. For example, if multiple shoppers posted about payment issues with an MSC, perhaps avoid shopping for that MSC. OTOH, do sign up with MSCs that have mostly positive feedback on this forum, e.g. Servimer.
5. Don't sign up with GigSpot.
Reply
July 05, 2024 06:39AM
@drdoggie00 wrote:

When you progress to shops with narratives, avoid using AI. Your words should be just that - your words.
I echo this, as well. I haven't used AI to formulate narratives, but some of my reports early on had been very similar. It's strange because the narrative-intensive MSC gave me chances to redeem myself. But some MSC that are light on the narratives banned me for this without any notice. With the narratives, be sure to write a report that is unique to that specific experience.
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July 05, 2024 02:32PM
You're welcome. Thanks for trying to search first but the search function is wonky sometimes. I just tried to find one of the old Gig Spot threads for you and it took multiple tries before the right search results came back.

[www.mysteryshopforum.com]
@joyce79 wrote:

Thank you. I tried to search but could not find any information. May I ask why I should avoid Gig Spot?
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July 07, 2024 04:12PM
Joyce: If you sign up for a company through GigSpot you may only interact with them through that app. Some of the companies do not post all their listings on GigSpot and thus you are prevented from seeing them. It is also difficult to disassociate from them if you decide to do so. That said the advantages are having dozens of companies in one form and one site.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/07/2024 04:14PM by Msilk.
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July 07, 2024 06:46PM
Also, to piggyback on what others said, I would pick up some of the easier shops that have a rating/score system. This will be a good way to build your reputation and rating for future shops on their platform. Early on, too many negative scores can be hard to recover from.

When I first signed up on the iSecretShop platform, I had a falling out with one of the MSC, and I cancelled all of the future shops I had with them. Little did I know, I would be spending a good amount of time digging myself out of that hole. The platform penalizes you for manually cancelling a shop.
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August 06, 2024 01:36AM
@joyce79 In response to your question about not using Gigspot...

It's buggy as hell. I used to get random error messages when applying for jobs from various MSCs. It was very annoying and there were a lot of jobs that I was just not able to apply for, due to random error messages.

It was a quick and easy way for me to find MSCs that had decent jobs available in my area though. As soon as I figured out which MSCs those were, I abandoned GigSpot. I will admit it's a bit more cumbersome to search for jobs without GigSpot, but I really have less frustration than I did before.

***Someone made a brilliant suggestion on a post a while back that I need to take advantage of. Their recommendation was to sign up with GigSpot using a different email address, just so you can easily peruse their job listings, but use your other email address to actually sign into those Shopmetrics MSC sites to actually apply for them.

***Bottom line is GigSpot is buggy as hell.*** (I also seem to get a higher acceptance rate on jobs that I apply for when I go straight to the particular MSC)
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