Mystery shopping is a job unlike any other. You need very little in the way of training, experience, or even skills to get started. Every day on the job brings new and exciting experiences in different locations, so you will never get bored earning your paychecks. They also give you the ability to work “undercover,” which adds some thrill to your already amazing job. However, what you are missing when you work as a mystery shopper is the ability to interact with co-workers and even management or supervisory staff on a regular basis. The good news is that when you put mystery shopping forums online to use, you can enjoy interacting with those working in your industry on a regular basis.
Why Co-Workers Are Important. For most people working in “regular” jobs, co-workers largely serve to distract them from their job duties and are great for idle chatting in the hallways or around the water cooler. Sometimes they are even the source of workplace drama, too. Yet while co-workers do come with some negatives, there are also some positive aspects of working with co-workers on a daily basis. Co-workers are great for serving as a sounding board for your work-related gripes, for getting advice about work issues, for getting strategies for handling overbearing bosses, and just plain keeping on top of what’s going on in the workplace. As a mystery shopper, because you lack co-workers to provide you with these various benefits, you can truly feel like you are on your own.
Meeting Your Co-Workers. Mystery shopping is a unique industry indeed, and because of this, many mystery shoppers regularly meet online at mystery shopping forums and chat rooms. There, they basically discuss anything and everything job related. They share stories about events that happened on the job. These stories can be both entertaining and educational at the same time. You can talk about various providers, payment issues, reporting questions, and so much more. Clearly there is a lot of benefit that you can get out of visiting these online communities that you simply cannot get anywhere else. As a mystery shopper, you are truly missing out if you aren’t visiting these communities.
Making Regular Visits. To benefit from what co-workers have to offer in the workplace, you wouldn’t drop by the break room once a month but often you would drop by every day. As a mystery shopper, though, you are busy and hopefully are out in the field working rather than tied to your computer. So just how often should you visit the online communities for mystery shoppers? Certainly you want to visit as often as you can to make full use out of them, but visiting even a couple of times per week would give you fabulous benefits.
As a mystery shopper, you may enjoy the unique level of independence that comes with working at this job that you just can’t enjoy from other jobs. While the independence is a positive benefit indeed, there are times when you just need to interact with peers on your level. So make the effort to visit your online mystery shopping communities regularly!