Has anyone done a *revealed* cell phone audit? I have a chance to sign up for at least two of these at $18 each, but the description of the shop doesn't tell too much about exactly what I have to do. I've never done a reveal shop of any kind, so that makes me a little nervous. Any ideas on how these cell phone shop reveals go? Thanks in advance!

The ones I did were dead easy. You have a list of questions to go over with the manager. You take about 20 or 30 pictures. I suggest going in exact order of the report to take the pictures, it will be easier to match them up to the report if they're in order. I've done five or six of these. $18 is reasonable. I did my first two for $10 each and wouldn't do them that cheap again.

If you do any at a mall, BE CAREFUL. There can be several of any given brand (Verizon, Sprint, whatever) at the same mall, some in kiosks and some in stores. Make sure you're at the right one!!! Get their business card up front and compare the address before you start the shop.

it really depends if these are your style...I personally wouldn't do them
for 18 dollars not worth the time or the money. I can make more doing
less work in less time.

These were never offered at 10 dollars so you are referring to different
ones at that price...

Different ones than what? No brand was specified. I responded to her what a revealed photo audit was like and gave helpful tips on doing it.

I'm sure she appreciated your telling her she would be wasting her time to do them. How is she going to know if they are "her style" until she has done one?

I took my first two locally for $10 to see what they were like and the next two I made $40 each in a town 100 miles from here. Doing the first two taught me what I needed to know to judge how much time they would take and how hard they would be. My third pair I did for $14 each in my own town again (same two stores) and had no regrets about doing them for that price because they took half the time of the first ones. The typical $5 fast food shop takes longer than those audits.

I don't think I've ever seen you comment on the price of a shop where you weren't telling us you wouldn't do the shop for that price because you can make more for less effort elsewhere. We can only take the jobs we know about, not the ones that are offered to you.

Techman is correct about them not ever being listed at $10.00. They were $18 from the beginning.

Although, techman, I must disagree with you about them "not being worth it." The audit takes 30 minutes once you've mastered it.

I performed 11 of those in a single day - $198 for 82 miles of driving and 7 hours of my time.

Works for me!

I agree with you coolkate...being worth it will depend on how
many msc's one is signed up with and what shops are available to them.

itsasecret...in 7 hours time I make more
then that. However, it depends on alot of factors. If you are in
an area that suffers from intense competition or lack of shops,
then they could be worth it for someone to do.

I rarely shop on the west coast but would think the shop mix
and competition mix is the same as the eastern states relative
to the type of town/city.

Biggest problem I find is most people are not signed up with enough
msc's and get tunnel vision and complete most of their shops from
the bigger msc's. Everyone should have botique msc's are their anchor
msc's and then fill out those routes with the bigger "job board" companies
in order to maxmize return.

It's not something that will happen overnight for those starting out as it
takes leg work and being proactive and not just signing up for companies
and saying "oh, no jobs on the board so they must not have shops in my area."

ColoKate, I appreciate your affirming Techman's completely irrelevant comment about the price of the shop that OP is doing. I gave the prices I was paid for the similar shops I did for another project.

I just love it when I say the grass is green, and someone decides to tell me, "No, you're wrong, the sky is blue."

"My shop was $10," "No, you're wrong, this shop is $18."

Whatever floats your boat.

Since it has only been about 10 says since the initial release of cell phone audits paying $18 and no mention was made of a bonus, I would do the same as techman and ColoKate and assume the OP is asking about those. I also think the statement, "it depends on your style" is self-explanatory and doesn't imply anything more, and telling someone it is not worth it to me or to techman is just an opinion, not an admonishment of "you are wasting your time."

girlsecret, my comment and coolkate's was relevant since your response
was for a different a shop that she is not talking about. We must know
which specific shop she is referring to which wont have the same requirements
as the shop you did which paid less and was for a different msc...

OP asked what revealed photo audit shops were like. Not whether they were worth the price offered or whether other people liked them. She wanted to know what to expect.

If the question had been, "Has anyone done a fast food shop before? I don't know what to expect" would anyone have been jumping to conclusions or arguing about the fees? No, likely she would have been given advice about timings, remembering to check the restroom, and don't forget the receipts. GENERICALLY.

Gah.

Seriously. I've got better stuff to do today, like finish uploading yesterday's videos, go work out and then get a tan by the neighborhood pool, than spar on an anonymous message board with someone whose post-to-actual-completed shop ratio is probably 10:1. Not worth it.

And, yes, the sun is yellow, the grass is green, sky blue, and it's a beautiful day in my neighborhood.

Peace out.
.

I appreciate everyone's comments. I've only been mystery shopping since January of this year and have done one cell phone shop, but it was not a revealed audit. The ones I am referring to now pay $18 as a base pay, no bonus.

Vicky, here is a link to a previous thread about these audits in particular. There should be enough to help you make up your mind. Honestly, if you have only mystery shopped, trying a few audits is something you should do. They have advantages and disadvantages, but adding to your repertoire can only increase your income.


[www.mysteryshopforum.com]

techman wrote:

"It's not something that will happen overnight for those starting out as it
takes leg work and being proactive and not just signing up for companies
and saying "oh, no jobs on the board so they must not have shops in my area.""

Can you elaborate? If I sign up and see they have not jobs in my area, what should I do to be more "proactive?" I'm on their email list so if they have anything nearby according to my profile, I should get an alert, right? What's the secret to getting non-posted jobs or finding jobs when we don't see any on the boards?

Perhaps this is the start of a new topic.

Andrew - One of the oldtimers on the board (back when I first started posting) said that she had a lot of companies who had no work available so she would go in periodically and update her profile, changing something as small as her weight from say 150 to 148. That kept her profile current and you just never know when that company may get an account with shops in your area.

Personally, I am finding that after 2 yrs. of really "working" the registration process with various companies is finally starting to pay off. Initially, I did at least one of each type of job, often for too small a compensation. After finding this board, I've learned NOT to accept those little paying jobs. I've found that I am working less and making the same amount of money I made last year - probably more by the end of the year, because I've learned to cherry pick the assignments I take. I like to think I am working smarter!

One thing I did this morning was to start cleaning up my email. I had companies I had started registration with and never completed, probably because I had to wait for a confirming email from the company and got busy with something else. So as I was deleting old emails I found several where I needed to complete my registration and I did that.

When registering with some of the MSC's, they have a question asking whether you mind if they shared your info. with other schedulers - I always say "yes." I've gotten job offers that way and also from joining MSPA.

I just finished orientation yesterday for a company that merged with an MSC that had an occasional $10 assignment for a thrift store. I always did the thrift shop for them because they could not get another shopper and I happened to like the scheduler. I know for a fact that they have only a couple active shoppers in their database for my area. Well, that particular little 'ol MSC merged with another company that does audits and business verifications which resulted in the invitation to work for them. The audits start at $50 and I think the bv's will run $20. That's an opportunity that I would not have had if I had not pulled the list from this board and just started signing up.

This reply is a little scattered but maybe it will give you food for thought. Keep in mind that Techman, for instance, lives in an area where it is comparatively easy to set up a route shop. Here in NM where I live, a route is not that easy because of the wide open spaces we have.

plamccut and Andrew,

I started a brand-spanking new thread to address "off the board" shops about 10 minutes ago...

Plm, if you could reprise your reply above on this thread, it would be terrific for the discussion.

Here's the thread: [www.mysteryshopforum.com]

Good idea BTW. Sometimes I think it might also be good to have something which might address expectations from a business side of things. I had occasion to go back through my spreadsheet this morning and see where I started, how long it took to build up and where I am now. Despite all of our reference to the business side of mystery shopping, people forget that we all weren't born knowing how to mystery shop and our businesses have grown due to constant nurturing. There is a reason the IRS allows businesses to "lose" money for a few years since few are overnight successes.

Just my 5 cents...who gives a rats how much you big boys make? How you can say if a job is worth it or not if you have not spent one day in my market? $18 dollars for a job that took me 20 minutes and I do not remember how long the report, but not very long at all.
Before spitting sentences on what is worth according to your wallet think if you are actually giving a good advice or just bragging about your income! The question was how do they go, not if any of you Donal Ducks will do them again.
Again....look at who replies usually to your bragging...always the same old shopper of the forums. Meaning we new shoppers stop reading our arguing about what is worth to you. MEANING...you just kill a thread without the OP getting the answer.


Just my 5 cents...

o·pin·ion [uh-pin-yuhn]
a personal view, attitude, or appraisal.

Colokate: I appreciate your level head and calm attitude.

italiano Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Just my 5 cents...who gives a rats
<yada yada yada snip snip>
> Just my 5 cents...

italiano,

I feel like you may be shouting too loudly to be heard.

I think you might have a good point and that your desire is to steer the conversation back to OP's original question. However, I'm having a hard time hearing it because of phrases like, "who gives a rats...", "Before spitting sentences...", "any of you Donal Ducks...", "...your bragging."

Could you rephrase?

Italiano - I've worked darn hard at getting my little business going. I actually wish I had kept a record of the hours I've spent on this. As a result, I think I've earned the opportunity to brag a little about the fact that I have learned through trial and error what works for me and how to earn more by doing less.

In cleaning out the inbox of my email account this morning I saw where I was doing apartment shops for $20 and remember how thrilled I was to get that $20 two years ago. When I did those, I discovered that apartments were not my favorite shops so now unless they pay twice that, I won't do them.

Make a note on your calendar to post a year or so from now to tell us how you are thinking after you have a little more experience under your belt.

And, BTW, I am not working in a market that pays big fees for shops but if I don't jump on the $10 shops right away eventually they double. So instead of working my butt off to do 8 of those shops at $10 I wait until it's down to 4 at twice the pay. And I turn up my nose at doing the $2-5 phone shops and instead I search around till I find an MSC that's paying $10.

jwolpert Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Colokate: I appreciate your level head and calm
> attitude.


I just showed this to my husband, and he laughed until something came out of his nose. But thank you, I appreciate it.

They are back for October. If you pick a route that has one of the previous stores you audited in September you can't request that route. Oh and they changed stores on each route, so it might be difficult to find a good route that is not far away.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/02/2013 04:15PM by JXL0.

O...these are self-assigned shops? I applied like 1/4 a day ago & was assigned to someone else.

Then I applied other that a little far away like more than 2 hours ago but haven't heard back yet. I guess they are waiting for others to apply...

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/02/2013 03:49PM by nanakomaki.

nanakomaki Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> O...these are self-assigned shops? I applied like
> 1/4 a day ago & was assigned to someone else.
>
> Then I applied other that a little far away like
> more than 2 hours ago but haven't heard back yet.
> I guess they are waiting for others to apply...



Sorry meant the system won't allow you to request it.

O...IC.