What is a good way to get started? How does one sign up with companies? Directly? Through an outside contractor?

Click the link below to go to a list of reliable mystery shopping companies. Go to the website for each company you want to sign up with. Fill out their online application, provide your personal information and SS#, and sign their confidentiality agreement. Then you will be able to search their job boards for jobs to request. Most reputable companies do not charge anything to sign up.

Can you please re-post the link? Thank you.

It is at the bottom of every page of the forum and is called 'Official List of Mystery Shopping Companies'.

hank you. Here we go.....

delilah if you want to be a serious mystery shopper I would suggest you take a couple of days and sign up for every single company there. That way you will have plenty to choose from and you can be picky about what shops you want to do. A lot of the companies will want writing samples so I would suggest you sit down and write a good size paragraph on a mystery shop. Something like 'I arrived at the location at 6.05 pm and noticed the parking lot was free of trash and appeared to be well-maintained etc....' Good luck with your MS career!

Delilah,

As a newer shopper, I wouldn't recommend signing up for a whole bunch of Mystery Shopping Companies (MSC's) right away. Instead, sign up with a company like MarketForce that works with a lot of first time shoppers. Do a few shops at their drive-in client, do the reports, and upload your receipts. This way you make all your mistakes with one company and client and you won't damage your credibility with multiple MSC's while you're in the learning stage.

If MarketForce doesn't have much in your area, perhaps others on this board can recommend a good "starter" MSC.

At the same time, read the "New Mystery Shoppers" forum at the link at the bottom of this page. There you'll learn lots about how to be objective, what not to do, etc. from veteran shoppers.

As you get more comfortable, sign up with new companies as needed. Keep track of your login info with each one, and move the ones you like the best (pay the best, have shops you like, nearby shops, etc.) to the top of your list.

Before signing up for any company, search the forums for info on that company. Some companies have a reputation for not paying on time or other issues, while others are listed in multiple "my favorite MSC" lists.

If you start to get pretty serious about it, then move on the the strategy jpgilham suggested. The more options you have, the more available shops you'll find, and the pickier you can be.

Hope that helps,

AndrewTX

jpgilham Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> delilah if you want to be a serious mystery
> shopper I would suggest you take a couple of days
> and sign up for every single company there. That
> way you will have plenty to choose from and you
> can be picky about what shops you want to do. A
> lot of the companies will want writing samples so
> I would suggest you sit down and write a good size
> paragraph on a mystery shop. Something like 'I
> arrived at the location at 6.05 pm and noticed the
> parking lot was free of trash and appeared to be
> well-maintained etc....' Good luck with your MS
> career!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/19/2012 01:01PM by AndrewTX.

The one thing that is most important to remember - no reputable company is going to ask you to pay to sign up with them. And the second - no one mystery shops "Western Union" by sending you a big check to deposit and then send somewhere and write a report while keeping half of that check. Good luck!

As a long time shopper, I agree that the best strategy is to sign up for many MSCs to start. If you sign up for one at a time you will be looking at a lot of blank screens. There is no way to guarantee which cos have shops in your area. Remember you are never obligated to take any particular shop, unless you have applied and accepted the shop.

I favor Andrew TX's advice. I think the most important thing to do is to do a few shops to see if this business is for you.

To do this sign, up for a small amount of companies like Marketforce and Corporate Research International (CoRI) and check their job boards regularly. These companies are nationwide and offer lots of shops that are self-assignable. That means you can assign yourself shops from their job boards. For many companies you will submit an application for a shop. Then the scheduler will select a shopper from the submitted applications. Experienced and proven shoppers will be favored over a newbie.

Don't be too picky about the assignments or the fee. Just do some shops to gain some experience.

Treat it like a business from the beginning. You will have to schedule shops, declare income to the IRS, input shops, track payments, and keep paperwork. Create a system for these tasks.

Use the forums to gain information about every aspect about this business. There is so much information out there. However, it is easy to get overwhelmed. If you find that happening, go back to the first point. Do some shops to get experience.

Do not pay to shop! As suzieboz points out the business model for reputable companies is to have shoppers sign up for free. In addition, there are some scams out there. Be aware!

If at some time, you decide this business is for you, I suggest signing up for more companies such as jpgilham suggests to gain a greater selection of opportunities. There are perhaps 500 or 600 MSPs out there and most offer shops in a limited geographic area. For now, I suggest you concentrate on getting a few shops done rather than signing up for scores of companies.

Good luck!



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 06/18/2012 03:52AM by vlade5394.

ok, but how do you propose to tell a shopper which MSCs do or will have work in their area?

That is precisely why we suggest (for US shoppers at least) that they first register with Market Force (blue portal), Corporate Research International, Bare and Maritz. These companies have client locations everywhere in the US, they provide adequate training to do the shops, for the most part their reports are simple (in keeping with their low pay) and they pay on a pretty regular schedule.

It would be sad for someone to spend hours and hours registering when they have no concept even of whether they would be comfortable doing a shop. Far better to register with a few, do a few jobs and then decide whether to go forward or not bother.

With some companies you are more likely to have your registration accepted, see shops and be assigned shops if you already have a couple hundred shops under your belt. You will be a 'newbie' to them, but at least you have some experience already. Not all companies are willig to hand hold newbies.

Well, Flash, while those are good MSCs to start with "we" cannot guarantee that these MSCs will have shops that this shopper can or would want to do in the next few months. There is never any harm in signing up with a lot of MSCs. As I stated you never have to accept an assignment. No harm no foul.

Jobslinger is another good one, because you can look at all the Sassie shops without signing up for all of them. When you find one you think you want to try, then you can sign with that one. As you get more comfortable, you can sign with others. When you're sure you want to put in the time to do more, then you can go with the suggestions to take a couple of days and sign with as many as you can find. Even after I did that, I still learn about new MSCs from reading these posts.

In addition, I started with a company called Shadow Shopper. And don't pay them. I thought about it, then over the next few weeks, they kept sending me offers to sign for less and less money. Finally they offered me an "introductory free trial". I signed. They always give the MSC in the message. I signed with all of them I saw on their posts.

cynb Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Well, Flash, while those are good MSCs to start
> with "we" cannot guarantee that these MSCs will
> have shops that this shopper can or would want to
> do in the next few months. There is never any
> harm in signing up with a lot of MSCs. As I
> stated you never have to accept an assignment. No
> harm no foul.

I am not at all convinced that encouraging someone who is starting to spend a few days registering with every company that exists before they have tried one shop makes sense either. That process does not guarantee that there are any shops that they can or would want to do either. And there actually is potential harm because if you register with honest information that you have never shopped, you are potentially not going to be accepted at all and subsequently when you have experience under your belt you will not be allowed to reapply because your data is already in their system as a denied application.

I started with Shadow shoppers, which was free then, and was lucky, they sent you jobs only in your immediate area. I did no more than 2 a day and took my time, learning what to do in about 4 months, I became a regular with a few companies and learned what I liked, registered with a few more and it took off.
I would go slowly until you learn, as it can be confusing, all companies want
different things, so, slow, then moderate, then full speed ahead!!

OK Flash I did not saydo not just start SHOPPING with a few, I said there is no harm, and I stick to this, with signing up for as many as you have time to do. I have never in 7 years been denied by an MSC. For obvious reasons, they want as many applicants in their data base as possible. By the way, I have not had anything from the MSCs that you listed in over 2 months. Does that mean as a new shopper I should just sit on my butt and wait for them to email me? I think not. Be proactive if you want to make money.

My mailbox is absolutely full of shops from them that I choose not to do. Considering that all four have nationwide clients, if you are in the US you must have some real eager beaver shoppers in your area snatching them all up. Generally MSCs don't send you an email telling you that you can't shop for them, they just ignore you. If you have never run across one of those it would surprise me greatly. Once I had been shopping for a while I needed to go back to a few I evidently registered with too early to make a case why they needed to reconsider my application.

So still do not get the harm in signing up in your spare time. And no, I may have missed a few, but I sign up for like 2 at a time and they always get back to me to confirm.
Yes I am in the US and you cannot reasonably compare your recent experience to anyone else's because as you know, it all depends on what your immediate area is. I get emails from these co;s if they have shops. We are just beating a dead horse here.

Since the companies suggested shop every location of a major shipper, the nation's largest fast food provider and the major gas station chains every month, and often multiple times per month, it is just inconceivable they offer no shops in the area of any US shopper, including you cynb. It is far from a dead horse since your premise for not starting with these is, "By the way, I have not had anything from the MSCs that you listed in over 2 months." Talk about not being able to reasonably compare your recent experience to anyone else's!

I am in the start signing up camp and see what comes your way right away. When I started over 12 years ago I sat up and applied with about twenty companies right away and got calls from two the first week (neither of which are the fab four mentioned above). It will take a long time to sign up with every company (heck are any of us actually signed up with every company out there) and many smaller companies have easy speciality shops that are great for a beginner shopper as well.I too have never had a company deny me and the Sassie list is a great way to sign up sign up sign up and see what types of shops are available in your area. Keep in mind though that this time of month the pickings are going to be much smaller than the what you will see at the beginning of the month.


Once you get a job or two or three do those, see what you think and keep signing up.

I know Market Force and CORI are considered beginner shopper fodder but for me in my market some of my highest paying shops regularly come from them.

Liz

If a newbie registers with the companies frequently discussed on the forum here, they are pretty much guaranteed acceptance. Perhaps that is why they are so frequently discussed here. When they start registering with companies never discussed here, that is when they are more likely to find their registrations ignored. Most shoppers start with a short list, such as the list on this forum, so they will not experience the new shopper shut out. It is rather when you tackle a more extensive list to just sign up with every company you are likely to have newbie issues.

I am not saying that new shoppers should NOT register with, say, 15 or 20 companies, but rather that they should perform a shop or two to see if it works for them before they spend huge amounts of time registering for lots and lots of companies. And a guided registration to make sure they have companies that DO have work in their area is a lot more sensible than just signing up with the first 20 companies on any list and waiting to see what happens. Last count I was registered with close to 300 companies and only about 40 of those have work in my market in any given year and only half of those pay a fee appropriate to the work involved.

I can actually speak to both registering with every company and trying to work for too many companies.

After I discovered forums, and a potential to make more than the typical offering, it was full steam ahead just working my way down the list. Then I found out how few had jobs in my area. That is when I started utilizing Jobslinger. Not to find jobs, but to find out who was offering what in my area. I still registered with other companies and will continue to, but that allowed me a way to target MSCs most likely to give me work.

Hand in hand with the rush to register was the rush to take every job I could get my hands on. The only word to describe the results is disastrous. How I am still in this business after those first few months is beyond me. I was always taking new jobs from new companies and often many of them at once. This was while I was also keeping myself booked from morning to night. Needless to say, there were many unpleasant surprises while doing reports that were taking hours upon hours and getting used to so many different systems. Then came the inevitable clarifications or requests for more information which would eat away at what precious little time I had.

After years in this business I still register with new companies and still take those brand new jobs. The difference is how many new jobs I will take on and when they get scheduled. I also schedule time to have a life.

To me a long-time career in MS is best accomplished by the old "slow and steady wins the race" type of philosophy.