How to mystery shop your contact center on a budget

When you want an unbiased opinion of agents’ performance and service levels, you can’t beat mystery shopping. Here’s how to do it on any budget.

The Mystery Shopping Providers Association offers these best-practices:

1. Set goals early. Only have mystery shoppers question and gauge things you can change or improve. For instance, if you can’t afford to hire more people, you probably don’t shouldn’t have speed to answer rated by mystery shoppers.
2. Shop a few months, not a year. Hire mystery shoppers during steady – not slow or busy – times.
3. Be ready for results early. Know how you’ll reward good work – and have those rewards ready. Prepare an outline of group training on the skills you assess, and know when and how you’ll coach to help agents improve skills.
4. Follow a ‘skip pattern.’ After you’re shopped a few times and see the strengths and weaknesses, have the mystery shoppers focus on the weak areas next time. Skip testing the stronger areas for some time to stay focused on the areas that need the most attention.