Financial Institutions Often Use Mystery Shoppers
You may not necessarily associate mystery shopping with banking, but banking and other non-traditional clients are partly responsible for the growth in opportunities for mystery shoppers.
Customers are becoming more comfortable with shopping online for financial products, and having a website that they find easy to navigate is a must. Many people will gather information about a bank or other type of businesses’ services online before they ever visit a brick and mortar location. The “feel” that the website gives is that person’s first impression about what kind of business they are considering and if they don’t like what they see online, then they are not likely to decide to make a personal visit.
When people are looking for information online, they want to find what they are looking for quickly. Product descriptions need to be clear and easy to understand, and the site visitor needs to be able to see how to contact a customer service representative to get more information. If the Web surfer has to look too hard to get the necessary information or doesn’t understand what they are reading, then they will simply click on to the next site.
Web mystery shopping can help the banks by giving them feedback from the customer’s point of view. Either the report will confirm they are on the right track, or they will have specific feedback to make changes that will help the website become more user-friendly.
Another way that banks and mystery shopping are related is that industry watchdogs are asking mystery shoppers to pay visits to these institutions to make sure they are complying with the appropriate regulations. This trend is expected to continue, which is great news for mystery shopping companies and the people who employ them.