| |
| |
|
Careers & Employment Information |
|
|
|
Mystery Shopping
Mystery shopping is an excellent way to make extra money. In fact, some people make a full time living doing it. There are many mystery shopping companies that will pay you to shop, eat at restaurants and take part in focus groups. A mystery shop consists of getting paid to go into a business without the employee's knowledge and reporting back to the mystery shopping company. A focus group is when you get paid to sit down with other people who are also getting paid and discuss new products or services. Mystery shopping jobs and focus groups are easier to find if you live in or near a large metropolitan area. After you do a mystery shop you answer some questions and file your report with the mystery shopping company. These reports are usually set up as a series of questions and often can be completed quickly. The reason they have mystery shops and focus groups is so that companies can get feedback on their employees, products and services. That way they can see where there might be problems and make the necessary changes to improve things. A few years ago I had some free time and I wanted to make some extra money. I took a course, How to Become a Mystery Shopper, at a local community college. After completing the course I registered with a few mystery shopping companies online. You can do a search on Google for "mystery shopping." Bypass the mystery shopping websites that are trying to sell something. You want to find the mystery shopping websites for the actual mystery shopping companies. These mystery shopping companies will never charge you any type of fee to register or to do mystery shops or focus groups. Be sure to read all the free mystery shopping information you come across. There is an art to being a good mystery shopper. Basically you are like a reporter. You will never add your feelings or what you think to a mystery shopping report. Your job is to just answer the questions, report the facts and describe what actually happened during your shop. You never want to give your own recommendations. That is not why you are hired. If the mystery shopping company wants a consultant, they will hire one. All they want you to do is to answer questions with just the facts of your mystery shopping assignment. Once you find a few mystery shopping companies you can then register with them. They'll contact you by email whenever they have a mystery shopping job in your area. You'll only respond to the emails when you want to do the shop. Otherwise you can just delete the email. You get to pick and choose the shops you want to do. A couple of years ago I did some apartment shops for the Jancyn Evaluation Company that took me about half an hour to complete. Since they paid $25, I was basically being paid $50 an hour. You can register with the Jancyn Evaluation Shops Company. They may pay more than $25 today for apartment shops since it has been about two years since I've done an apartment shop for them. Jancyn also does a lot of shops and surveys for the Ross Dress for Less retail stores. I'm not sure if Jancyn still has a business relationship with Ross, but I once handed out survey forms in one of the local Ross stores here in the Seattle area and made $500 for about 30 hours of work. Here's the URL for Jancyn if you'd like to register with them to do some shops. http://www.jancyn.com/ Another mystery shopping company that I get a lot of email requests for shops for is the Secret Shopper Company. They seem to specialize in shops for Veterinary Clinics. They pay $15 plus up to $100 payment NOT including tip + $10. The only catch is that you have to own a cat or dog, which I don't, but maybe you do. Here's their URL http://www.secretshopper.com OK, I've saved the best for last. Fieldwork specializes in setting up focus groups for some of the biggest companies in the US. They pay $50 to $75 for a focus group meeting that usually lasts about an hour. The last one I did with them was for some research for eBay. They were trying to come up with a name for a new category on their website. Fieldwork is located throughout the US in major metropolitan areas. You'll have to visit their website to see if they are located near where you live. It's great if you have children since Fieldwork does a lot of focus groups involving children. Perhaps you can talk your kids into splitting the fee with you. Again, the pay usually works out to be about $50 to $75 an hour. Unfortunately I have no children, but the next time I get an email for a focus group for children I'll borrow a couple of my neighbor's children. Here's the link for Fieldwork. http://www.fieldwork.com/ Now you have a basic idea of how the mystery shopping and focus groups work. Start searching for more mystery shopping websites and get paid to shop, eat and taking part in focus groups. It's easy money! Barry Stein is the owner of aWebBiz.com where he offers cutting-edge tips on all aspects of business. To find more advice, tools and resources to help you succeed in your business, visit: http://www.aWebBiz.com Barry's Internet Marketing Blog: http://awebbiz.com/blog ------------------------------------------------------------- You have permission to publish this article electronically, in print, in your e-book or on your web site, free of charge, as long as the author bylines are included with an active hyperlink to the aWebBiz.com website.
MORE RESOURCES:
Careers-Employment - Google News |
|
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
Job or Career At this present time I have a job. It pays some of my bills, and again I have a job. "How to Look Your Best in a Down Economy" As you know too well ~ many jobs have been lost during the turn down in our economy over the last several years. Important sectors as well as entire industries have felt the challenges of lost profits and reduced staff. Stacking The Deck In Your Favor Many people do not bother to look at their own magnificence and without that view it is not likely that we will recognize the need for strategies to maximize our strengths. When we buy an outfit for a special affair, we automatically try to coordinate each piece so that they enhance one another and amplify our sense of "looking good" from head to toe. The Perils Of Employment: Are You About To Be Let Go? From the moment you are born and you take your first breath, you begin to die.It's just a fact of life. What is Contract Programming? An Alternative to the Conformity of Everyday Employment What is contract programming, you ask? Well, when companies need specific computer programming expertise, for temporary periods of time, they generally hire a contract programmer or an employee of a consulting firm. Contractors almost always have a higher hourly wage than a salaried employee and are often paid for overtime. How To Write A Resume Cover Letter That Will Get Your Resume Read A Resume Cover Letter has only one purpose - to stimulate the recipient of your resume to review your resume. This free resume cover letter tutorial assumes that you will be sending your resume and resume cover letter by email. How Much Can You Earn Working As A Proofreader? Thinking of a career as a proofreader? Then you will most likely want to know about salaries. Are you hoping to hear that you will make thousands and thousands of dollars a month in this field? It is very possible that you will barely make a few hundred when you are first starting out. How To Find Your Dream Job Here's the bottom line: many people work in jobs that aren't what they want or are less than they deserve.It's partly the pull of inertia (better the devil you know. Where Did All The Farmers Go? Several times a year, I hear someone complain about the development of farm land in our area. These complainers consider it a crime that so much of our farm land has been converted to housing, business, shopping, etc. Taking Job Loss Seriously Anyone reading this article and hassuffered a job loss recently IStaking the job loss seriously. Thestages often are: 1. Prepare for Your Performance Review Before You Start the Job When you start a new job, you probably realize the first three months are critical to your long-term success. Everybody's eye is on the "newbie" as you learn the ropes. It Takes Time The story goes that after one of Ludwig van Beethoven's performances, several people were offering him their congratulations, when one woman commented, "I wish God had bestowed me with such genius." "It isn't genius, madam, nor is it magic. Vocational Experts 7 Proposals to Solve the Unemployment Problem The subject is constantly in the news and may decide the next national elections - the infamous jobless recovery. More than 8 million Americans are out of work with another 4 million underemployed or no longer looking for work. How To REALLY Look For A Job Are you looking for a job -- really looking? Or are you simply waiting for employment to fall into your lap?If you're like about 75% of the job seekers I've met over the past nine years, you're probably doing too much waiting and not enough searching.Stop. How To Conduct A Successful Job Search Campaign 1.Define your objective: Know what kind of work you most enjoy and perform the best. 5 Interviewing Tips To Get That Job! Anyone who is a jobseeker knows that looking for a new job or career is a job in itself. Once you have completed the laborious task of writing your resume and submitting it to various companies, you now have to pass the screen test to get the job. 10 Tips For Writing A Professional Résumé 1. Start with an attractive layout. Why One Word Answers are Bad News at Job Interviews It takes a lot of time and effort to get invited to a job interview. Don't blow your chances by being misunderstood by the interviewer. Have Enough Money to Change Careers - Five Key Steps At every talk I give, I ask the audience to tell me the reasons why people don't change careers. The most common answer given each time is "lack of money. Ask the Recruiter We all have career goals, big or small. Here are some questions I have recieved over the last month from those actively seeking new employment.
|
| home | site map |
| © 2006 |