Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Free mystery shopping companies list!

Hey there mystery shoppers and potential mystery shoppers. Have you looked into doing mystery shopping yet? Are you still kind of wondering whether it is something you want to do? Well, I want to make it as easy as possible for you. I want to give you a list of companies in a chart to start you off. All you have to do is go to the website and sign up. You probably won't get a whole lot of work if you only sign up with two or three companies. But if you sign up to a minimum of 15 your chances of getting to choose the jobs you are really interested in and potential to make good money increase. But as we say in the south, I'll do ya one better. I'll send you a list of twenty companies all ready for you to sign up to.

Let me tell you why you need to jump on this offer now. I could be charging for this info! A lot of other sites do charge you, like this one here or shadow shopper. By the way, I did try shadow shopper and they seem to be very reputable if a membership site is the way you want to go. If you want to pay for that information, then feel free to. You can save money and headaches by getting this list of free, up-to-date companies. I personally checked the links of the companies that I'm not signed up for although many of them I am a shopper for.

This list has links that you can click on to go directly to the site where you sign up to be a shopper for the particular company. As you sign up simply add your username and password to the chart beside the website. Then when you want to look for jobs, all you have to do is open that document and click on the company that you want to look at and you password and user name are READY for you. I really should be charging for this now that I think about it. It is so convenient you just should not pass up the opportunity to get in on this offer. But I can guarantee I won't have it around forever.

You have to pay money on other sites to get a free list of mystery shopping companies or you can sign up to one of the sites that has a monthly fee. I did a trial of one of those companies- so that I could blog about my experiences. I only found two sites that I didn't already know about. Literally, I'm not exaggerating. Big whoop... Needless to say, I was not impressed, but maybe that is just one of my things. I don't think you should have to pay to get a job.

Here's how you get your hands on a list if you are not interested in subscribing. Pick any one of my blog posts and stumble it. Post a reply on the blog post that you stumbled (or use digg if you like) and send me an email at mysteryshoppingteacher@yahoo.com telling me about the the post that you placed. I'll email your list back to you in my reply.

If you want to subscribe to my blog then all you have to do put in your email address to the right of this post, pick out your fave post to stumble or digg, and put your link in a comment on the post. When your subscription goes through send me an email, and I'll send your list.

If you already subscribe to my post, stumble or digg a post, put a comment, and drop me a line via email using the email address you subscribed to my blog with. I'll send you the goods.

Easy as pie. You can't get any easier than that. Got questions? Let me know. Three, two, one...do it!

Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Ten Freebies- Grab em while they last!

If you like free stuff as much as I do, you might want to check out the following sites to make your request while supplies last. I know this blog is mostly about mystery shopping, but whenever I come across goodies like this, I want to share the love with my readers. Get an autofill tool like on the Google toolbar, and fill it in. Then whenever you come across a website that asks for your information, you can click autofill and it fills in the form for you. Couldn't be easier. Plus, no long surveys to fill out with a credit card- I despise those.

1. There is a free sample of FiberOne cereal. Looks pretty good to me! I know the cereal bars are good as well as the pop tarts.

2. Here is a free sample of head and shoulders shampoo. You have two choices to pick from.

3. Now that cold and flu season is here, try a free sample of Airborne zesty orange.

4. & 5. Who doesn't like a glass of tea? Well, Sundance wants to send you some. Or, let Yogi send you one of their samples. Better yet, get both!

6. Jump on this one right away while supplies last: a free sample of Original Pho soup. Warm yourself up on a cold day!

7. Al's pistachios is sending out free pistachio samples- a big 12 oz. sample. Click here to sign up before supplies run out.

8. Get a free tote bag here while supplies last.

9. Free Pond's clean sweep facial towelettes here.

10. Here is your chance to get a free sample of Aveeno Skin Care.

Enjoy these goodies! I did the research for you and you can reap all the benefits. If I get a favorable response to this, it might become a more regular part of this little blog. Stumble this blog and leave me a comment if you like this!

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

How to Get Mystery Shopping Jobs Repeatedly

So by now, if you are a regular reader of this blog, you have already compiled a list of companies that you can do mystery shopping jobs for. If you are a new reader you should definitely get started on that.

What is important as a new mystery shopper is getting jobs. You might start off doing any job you can get your hands on at first. As a new mystery shopper, you probably get the jobs that aren't the best. You'll probably start with the low paying jobs or the ones that have longer reports. You may even end up doing the shops that have the super long reports just because you don't realize how long the reports will actually take you.

Let me clue you in on how to get some of the better jobs. You won't get the great jobs right away, but you can start to make your mark on the company by doing something you have to do anyway. You have to write reports for companies when you do shops so you should make your reports the best that you can. Be super descriptive when it comes to describing employees, the atmosphere, food, service, etc. For example, instead of saying that your hamburger was hot and delicious say, "The hamburger was cooked to perfection. The meat had the coloring of a burger cooked medium well, just as I had ordered. The lettuce was cool and crisp. The tomatoes were perfectly ripe and fresh. The bacon was crispy and sizzling. The temperature was just right as well." Instead of saying that the fries are good you can say, "The french fries were firm, crispy, and well seasoned."

I tested out this theory of mine as I was filling out the report for a casual dining shop.
I teach writing so I used some of the tricks that I use as a teacher to help get more opportunities as a shopper. The shop was for a dinner for two including soup, appetizer, drinks, two entrees, and desert- all reimbursed might I add. Even the tip was covered. Anyway, I felt particularly creative that night for some reason. I decided that I would try out my theory of being super descriptive in the reporting section. It probably only took me ten minutes more than it would have taken me otherwise to write a less descriptive report. I have done shops for the company before and I had even filled out this report before in the past, (read more about it here) but was just less descriptive.

What happened to me was that I got a personal email from the scheduler thanking me for the outstandingly written report the very next morning. I got the opportunity to do new shops on my log. I'm not a scheduler or anything but I know that schedulers do not necessarily show ALL available shops to everyone that signs up for their company. From what I have heard, but am unable to verify for myself, you have the opportunity to do more mystery shops if you are certified. It appears that evidently if you do a really good job on your report, the scheduler might think you are worthy of doing more shops too. This is a company that I had been scoping out for months to see what shops were available and then the day after I did a great job on my report all of a sudden there were more opportunities for me. Another thing that happened was I got a 10 on my report for my shopper rating. Finally, I have been getting emails about job opportunities from this company and even phone calls. All of this for just spending time being a little more descriptive.

When you think about it, doesn't it make sense? If a scheduler has to choose between two people to do a shop, wouldn't they choose the one that has the best feedback? Companies read the feedback from the mystery shopper and I'm sure they are thrilled to see reports of the shoppers that are thorough and descriptive.

So, what do you think? Does anyone have anything to add about this? Personal experiences that affirm this theory? Leave me some feedback on what you think about this theory of mine.

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

Alcohol Compliance Shops- Easy Money

If you like to have a beer every now and then, this is good news for you. Check this company out right away. If you do an alcohol compliance shop you can get a beer for free. I did one of these shops and it was very simple to do. The tasks were to check out the bathrooms, food court, pricing, signage, and of course purchase the beer. Not to mention the pay was $20 just for about 10 minutes of my time...shops like that always make me do a little woo hoo in my mind. I mean there is like a big song and dance to go with it and everything. Song 2., Blur, to be exact.

I went into the store which had just opened about two weeks before I stopped in. I walked to the bathroom immediately to check out what that was like. It was in fairly good condition. It didn't smell terribly awful or anything. So I took a mental note of that and went back out into the store to check the other necessary things.

When I looked at the coolers they were almost empty. I opened the cooler up to look at the beers that were available and most of the drinks were warm. I didn't know if they had just been put into the cooler or if the cooler just wasn't working correctly. I noticed that price tags were not in the cooler consistently either. It was kind of haphazardly done. I tried to pick out a beer that I knew my husband would like since I don't drink any kind of beer at all, I'm more of a super sweet margarita drinker. I can't drink anything that you can taste the liquor in...anyway, I digress...so I was picking out the drink while trying to spend as little as possible to make sure I came in under budget.

I picked a drink and walked around the store looking at other things on my checklist. I looked at the food court. I looked for signs that said something about the age of alcohol purchase. I looked for the price tags (or lack thereof) of some other items throughout the store. After spending a few minutes looking around, I went to the checkout. I put my beer on the counter to checkout. The cashier asked for my birthday but never asked to see my driver's license so I could have told her anything really. The cashier said that there was no price on the beer so she couldn't ring it up. I silently went back to the cooler and put my 1st choice away and picked another. I went to check out once again. She couldn't remember my birthday and evidently didn't want to ask me again, so she must have just put in her birthday. The entire time she never asked for my drivers license. I almost left without my receipt because she didn't give it to me right away.

This is one of those companies that pays you right into your paypal account. If you don't have a paypal account you should sign up for one immediately. You will have to sign up with a bank account, but it is so convenient to have a paypal account in case you want to buy anything online. Also, a lot of mystery shopping companies pay this way. I've received my payment and already invested that money into making money with other shops. If you are interested in getting a beer for free, click here to sign up with this company. Also interesting about this company, if you get your friends to sign up and complete shops you can get paid for that too. I think they have to sign up with your email address as the referrer to do that though. In my opinion this is one of those companies that you shouldn't dawdle on...go ahead and sign up for. Do it, do it now.

I'm outtie.

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