How do I get a Silver Certificate?

What do you like about Coyle? Please provide details.

Are Certificates really necessary/helpful???? Thanks. I have just never wanted one or seemed to need one, but if they're necessary I'll consider it.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/06/2016 02:11AM by interested.

I first learned about mystery shopping back in the late 1990's. I had been reading some online articles about market research, and it was mentioned. I thought it sounded interesting but had no clue how to get started.

So, I started my own research on the Internet. Not too long after that, I found a couple of companies. One of them had a bank shop in the area I lived (at the time). I signed up, passed their certification test, studied the guidelines, did the shop, entered in the results on their website, etc.

I found that I enjoyed the experience, and wanted to do more. So, I kept refining my search and came up with more companies. Kept signing up with them and it kind of took off from there.

The Coyle shops are fun and very straight forward. I like writing the reports. I enjoy the hotels (and cities they are in), restaurants, etc. I like the hotel rewards points, which I quickly convert to free nights.

I started in 1992 when I saw an advertisement in the classified ads for a company who needed someone to cover my general area. I called them up and they did an interview over the phone, it was back in the day when they had to mail you the forms, you wrote them out in longhand and mailed them back. Ironically the shops back then paid about the same as they do now.

20 years ago I read an article in "Cheapskate Gazette" it was about saving money and eating out for free. The gave the web address for a. Mystery shopping company. I signed up and starting doing reveal Mc Donald's shops. They would win a tee shirt and a certificate if they asked if I wanted to supersize my value meal

In the late 1980's the ex was "prolly" fooling around; late hours, always tired, started thinking he didn't have to cook, clean, take the girls to the dentist and left it up to me. I hired a P.I., got divorced and the P.I. hired the accounting firm I was working for. I became friends with the owner and did some assignments for them; they were doing "bank manager is harassing secretary" and secretary needs proof to sue and get a settlement type of jobs or bank manager is approving loans to women who don't qualify in exchange for favors and they were all video, no paperwork to complete. The P.I. company owner told me they, as a company, take on mystery assignments and there's some minor ones if I'd be interested. It's been a slow roll down hill for mystery shopping since those days. Someone today offered me $7 to drive to a movie theater 20 minutes away, grab a ladder or a 'lift' (omg) and hang the banner up and suggested I bring someone with me to assist! But, on the bright side, they said if I could do it tomorrow they would give me $3 extra! I could buy a pack of pens and a ream of paper, argh.

Hello AZwolfman, Your post was inspiring. I can't imagine doing 85 shops per month. How many companies do you shop for?
I am a newbee shopper. I've only been doing shops for a couple of months and I had begun to back away from mystery shopping due to the low pay. Your post has motivated me to keep working at it.
If you have any advice to pass on to a newbee, please do so. I'm sure that lots of other new bees will appreciate your advice as much as I would.
Thank You,
Bobbishopper girl.

I used to work at Blockbuster (pause in memory of Blockbuster :0(

While I was there, we got shopped, and the shopper used questions that were obviously word-for-word from the mystery shopping guidelines, because they weren't natural questions (!).

I was fascinated, and decided I wanted to try being on the other side of things, and see if I could do it withOUT giving myself away...of course, when I searched online for MSCs, everything that came up was obviously a scam. Two years later, I was at work (different job at this point) and the subject of mshopping came up. One of my co-workers said she'd been shopping since the days before internet (!) so schedulers used to call her (on a landline!) to tell her about available shops.

She was more than happy to give me a list of the MSCs she likes, and excitedly told me the different places I would get to shop if I signed up for those MSCs.

It's been about 6 years (of almost full-time shopping!) and the novelty has yet to wear off. I'm SO grateful! Free gym memberships, pedicures, groceries, gas, oil changes, shoes, clothes, gifts, massages, etc.! Long live mystery shopping! Merry Christmas everyone!

well i started with Mann Thearters (at that time their mysteru shopper
was in house) and we would be able chose with thearter we went to
and filed forms and havinh to mail ticket stubs and reci[ets

A friend mentioned that she had to work a route on the day I asked her to meet me for a play date. I asked - what route? what do you do? - and she told me. I was interested because I was homeschooling my kids (as she was) and being able to earn a little money with the kids along seemed like a great idea. She suggested that I sign up with a couple of MSCs that she knew had shops in the area, and I did. My first shop an audit for a sandwich shop. My second was a fast food drive-in. I'm still doing the fast food shops, fifteen years later! I fed my kids many a meal from those shops.

I answered an ad for Dominos pizza in the local paper. It was delicious & fun except filing reports was hard. You had to fill them out by hand & mail them in! Then companies went to faxed in reports & now they're filed online! So much easier! That was over 30 years ago & I found other companies by networking at focus groups & I've been at it ever since!

Their editors are very critical & hard to please!

I replied to a newspaper ad in the late 80's. Forms were mailed to me and I would mail them back. Later on there was faxing, as some have mentioned and I still had companies that would have me mail in receipts as recently as 2009. I got started with it and it was always a way to make some extra money, has come in really handy when times have been tight.

I started in 1998 with SI and my first shop was McDonald. Then I was referred to an Toronto, Ontario company and I was doing integrity shops for them . From then I was hooked and never stopped. It helped me to pay for my 2 kids university and now because I am retired, it gives me more money beside the old age pension. I know I will have to stop eventually because some companies have age limits but I will do it until I am told I am to old. The best part of being older is nobody suspect you are a mystery shopper.

I have been mystery shopping since the early 1990's. I saw a sign in a movie theater asking if anyone would like to be a mystery shopper to contact a certain website. I signed up with the company to shop a certain coffee shop. I loved the meals, but my companion would get sick every time he ate at this certain restaurant. I did not get sick though. I think he was nervous about my doing the shop. Evidently both of us stopped going to that particular coffee shop since I was employed full time.

When I retired, I started doing more shops and mostly prefer upscale restaurants.

I always buy something when I shop a retail store. I lose money on retail stores as I am an impulse buyer.

Sometimes I do not get paid for a shop because the report will not submit for some unknown reason or a picture will not turn out right, but shopping is fun and I plan to continue doing it to keep busy.

I had a weekend job as a vendor's rep demonstrating ink jet and laser printers. The company that hired me for that job offered me my first mystery shop. All I had to do was park my car and pick it up 45 minutes later. Easy enough! I did some sandwich shops, too. As Irene mentioned earlier, the fees are a lot less now than they were in the 90s when I started. I only MSed for about a year. I totally forgot about it until a year ago when I read the Forbes article and started back up. [www.forbes.com]

I have begin again in July. I had done so shopping before I fall and hurt my back so badly, I had to have a back opertion. In July my family need me to go back to work after beening off since my fall in 2007 . I know a job in my odd line of work manging store was out of the question my back would not hold up to several hours on a sale floor. I know I could use my past work experience both as a shopper and in retail to shop and I would not place myself in a job that would cause more harm to my back. The first shop I did in Jluy was for a Pizza place. Since then I have done over 100 shops and love the work.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/06/2016 06:13AM by Alieda.

I got started last year in March. My SO got a scam text message for mystery shopping. I looked into that, but I did know that MSing was real because I used to work in a department store that got shopped occasionally. So I googled it, because I am a SAHM and was looking for a little extra money to make. I first found BestMark and did phone shops first, and Service Sleuths shortly after that with cell phones and grocery credit cards.

Now I do make enough to be equivalent to a regular part-time job, but half the work or more is done from home.

I had a very stressful but successful job. Then my husband was diagnosed with serious illness but refused a brain surgery. I was at my wit's end. While I waited for him to change his mind, I received an email to do evaluation of some of the malls around Toronto, after I was asked to write about my recent shopping experience. That was more than 13 years ago.

I actually responded to that email because, ok, I did not know what I was thinking. I was just going crazy and had to do something, and mostly out of my comfort zone. Nothing really was in my comfort zone. I was out of my mind. Mystery shopping saved my sanity. It did not save my husband's life, but to date, mshopping is part of me.

I just read and read about it and there was no Mystery Shopping Forum to help me. Somehow I did not have any rejected shop and I did those mall shops quarterly. At that time, I became involved with upscale shops, especially restaurants. Then I woke up! This is business, I said.
Lay low on the restaurants and get something with more meat on them. So I ventured into more specialized upscale shops but not restaurants, with few exceptions. After my husband's funeral and while doing a rescheduled purchase and return at a very upscale shop, I commented that my husband just passed away and did not need the item anymore. Suddenly, the atmosphere was so different. It dawned on me that they thought I was a grieving rich widow. They could still milk me. At times I played that scenario to successfully complete a shop. The scheduler used to tell me, "You are not lying. You are playing a scenario."

I did a similar shop - lol!!

I started shopping because it was a possibility to get a hot meal...

The first shops I did was for Mac Donalds. I was just divorced and had to make a new start. I did those visits at the moment that my kids were with their father, so that I have to cook. I found the anouncment in a magazine.
It is somewhat like 16 years ago. Thinks changed a lot ever since. I now have my own company who provides mystery shopping and coaching...;.

I got my start from my Credit Union a year ago, when they contacted me and asked me if I would mystery my credit union once a month for them. I just started getting serious about taking on more companies a month ago. My first one was a single service at a car dealership. I was nervous and still get nervous a little bit but I also find it fun.

I saw an ad in the paper. I was hooked!!!

I started about 2 1/2 years after I retired and got bored. Searched the Internet and read an article on Secret Shopping. I jumped right in and signed up with RGB, Trendsoure & Intelli-Shop. Since then I know am signed up with about a dozen different MSP. I also learned how to video shop to make more income. Over time I have learned what type of shops I enjoy. It's as great way to work when you want and make some good money and use your writing skills. Also if you enjoy traveling or are a snow bird, there are jobs all through the USA. I have a winter home in Vegas and I shop there for 3-4 months during the winter. That experience has taught me all the short cuts to get to the strip as well as learning and seeing the complete city.
Also worth noting is that getting free meals, groceries, etc is a big money saver!

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/06/2016 02:04PM by tobiz777.

In 2003, my husband was in the tech industry and was laid off. We cut out all unnecessary expenses such as shopping and eating out. I saw an ad in a local paper for a company that is now defunct. I did several upscale chain restaurants and retail and was hooked.

One night my 20-year old daughter came home from her restaurant job, raving about a bonus she had received. I asked why and she said she had been "spied" on by a couple of mystery shoppers. She had me at the word "spy". When I was 12 - 14 years of age, I imagined myself to be a spy and carried on like an obsessed young teen would. Many years later, contemplating semi-retirement, she presented me with a perfect way to make some sideline cash and have some fun at the same time. I researched it all through the night. I did spend $40 to join some company but truthfully, it was the best $40 I ever spent. It opened up the doors to so many more companies and fully informed me about the business. That was in April of this year. Since then? Probably close to 200 mystery shops. Still loving' it but wow, it can be addictive! Retirement should be a blast!

I was a little sceptical at first with Mystery Shops, but tried to think of it as a fun experience and a little extra income to my self employment jobs I had back in 2007. I enjoyed the first MS because it included buying a lunch so it was not out of my way and I like eating out sometimes.

How and when I started is not as important to me as how much I have changed because of this type of work. Every year, I am new in MSing, merchandising, and auditing. Every year is a new experience in all jobs. This is because clients may move around between MSCs, MSCs may merge or close, or I may have time or inclination to do something new, different, or differently.