Mystery shopping is a technique that allows businesses to evaluate the quality of their products, services and customer experience by hiring trained shoppers to act as real customers and report their findings. Mystery shopping can help businesses identify strengths and weaknesses, benchmark against competitors, monitor compliance, reward excellence, and improve customer satisfaction and loyalty.
Cambodia is a fast-growing market with many opportunities and challenges for businesses across various sectors. To succeed in this competitive environment, businesses need to understand and meet the expectations of their customers, as well as differentiate themselves from their rivals. Mystery shopping can be a valuable tool for achieving these goals, but it requires careful planning and execution to ensure its effectiveness and reliability.
Here are some steps to follow when conducting a mystery shopping project in Cambodia:
- Define the objectives and scope of the project
The first step is to clearly define what you want to achieve with your mystery shopping project. What are the key aspects of your customer experience that you want to measure and improve? What are the specific standards and criteria that you want to evaluate? How many locations, channels and scenarios do you want to cover? How often do you want to conduct the visits? How will you use the results and feedback?
Having clear objectives and scope will help you design a more focused and relevant questionnaire and scenario for your mystery shoppers, as well as select the most suitable shoppers for your project.
- Hire a professional mystery shopping company
The next step is to find a reliable and experienced mystery shopping company that can help you implement your project in Cambodia. A professional mystery shopping company will have access to a pool of qualified and trained shoppers who match the profile of your target audience. They will also have the expertise and technology to ensure accuracy and consistency of data collection, analysis and reporting.
One of the leading mystery shopping companies in Cambodia is MRTS Consulting Ltd which has almost 20 years of experience in conducting and managing mystery shopping projects across various industries such as banking, insurance, retail and food & beverage. They use cutting-edge technology to provide real-time feedback and insights, as well as offer additional services such as customer satisfaction surveys, price and promotion audits, employee performance audits, and customer experience audits.
- Prepare the questionnaire and scenario
The questionnaire and scenario are the core elements of your mystery shopping project. They determine what information you will collect from your shoppers and how they will interact with your staff and environment.
The questionnaire should include both quantitative and qualitative questions that cover all the aspects of your customer experience that you want to measure, such as ambience, facilities, product quality, staff behavior, communication skills, selling skills, problem-solving skills, etc.
The scenario should be realistic and specific enough to guide your shoppers on how to act as real customers, what tasks to perform, what questions to ask, what problems to encounter, etc.
The questionnaire and scenario should be agreed upon with your mystery shopping company before launching the project. They should also be tested with a few shoppers before conducting the actual visits to ensure their validity and clarity.
- Conduct the visits and collect the data
Once the questionnaire and scenario are ready, your mystery shopping company will assign the shoppers to visit your selected locations or channels according to your schedule. The shoppers will act as real customers following the scenario and complete the questionnaire after each visit. They will also provide any additional feedback or comments that they may have about their experience.
Your mystery shopping company will ensure that the data collection process is done in a discreet and professional manner, without revealing the identity or purpose of the shoppers. They will also monitor the quality and reliability of the data collected by checking for any inconsistencies or errors.
- Analyze the data and report the results
The final step is to analyze the data collected from your mystery shoppers and report the results to you. Your mystery shopping company will use various statistical methods and tools to process the data and generate meaningful insights and recommendations for your business. They will also provide you with visual aids such as charts, graphs, tables, etc., to help you understand the findings better.
The report should include both quantitative and qualitative feedback that highlight the strengths and weaknesses of your customer experience, as well as any areas for improvement or action points. The report should also benchmark your performance against your competitors or industry standards if applicable.
Depending on your needs, your mystery shopping company can also help you define an action plan for performance improvement based on the results of your project. They can also offer assistance and tools for implementing the action plan or evaluating its impact.