Mystery shopping, also sometimes referred to as secret shopping or covert inspections can take on a variety of forms.  This is because an effective mystery shopping program should mirror how your customers interact with your brand.  Below are the most common types of mystery shopping and which industries tend to benefit most from them.

• In-Person Mystery Shopping
• Telephone Mystery Shopping
• Virtual Mystery Shopping
• Omnichannel Mystery Shopping

In-Person Mystery Shopping

Arguably the most common type and likely what you imagine when you think of mystery shopping, is when a secret shopper visits a location armed with pre-determined criteria which they use to measure the staff and businesses performance. This kind of shop can take anywhere from minutes to hours depending on the nature of what is being measured, the purpose of the shop, and the businesses specific type of industry.

In-person mystery shops are great for businesses where a shopper can resent themselves as a potential customer without causing any suspicion.  As a result, they are mostly used by the following industries:

• Retail
• Restaurant
• Petro-Convenience
• Banking
• Fitness
• Personal Electronics
• Hotel
• Healthcare
• Automotive

Telephone Mystery Shopping

An alternative to physically visiting a location is for secret shoppers to call in to a business.  This kind of mystery shopping is also heavily used to assess call centers, but should not be overlooked by any business who can be reached by phone as it is important that your customers have the same level of experience regardless how they interact with your brand.

Telephone mystery shops can mimic anything from completing a remote purchase to simply calling for additional information.  This type of secret shopping is primarily used by the following industries:

• Call Centers
• Hotel
• Travel
• Tourism
• Information Technology
• Telecommunications
• Health Care