• ... Mystery shopping,
• ... Mystery calling,
• ... mystery e-mailing project.

What happens with your order at our institutes in Munich and Berlin?

We have established the following standard procedure:

You will receive a confirmation of order for each project. At this stage we will assign two contact persons to you (company management and project management) and provide you with these staff members’ contact details right away.

The project manager who has been assigned to the project will check that the project documentation is complete and comprehensible and that the project specifications are clear, confer with the client if necessary and carry out a feasibility assessment. Based on this, the project manager will produce a project plan (capacity requirements, time schedule, and so on).

Next, we select…

• … the recruitment methods
Internal interviewer/tester pool
In-house telephone studio
Databases with subsequent telephone screening
Multipliers
Micro-selection

• … the recruitment team, according to
expert knowledge of the methods
expert knowledge of the subject area
social competence

During the tester briefing (in writing or in person, according to requirements), the tester is provided with relevant information on the objectives and background of the project, as well as on the rules of conduct for testers.

While the test is in progress, the testers have a telephone and email hotline at their disposal, so that any urgent questions they may have can be answered quickly and without delay. This ensures they receive a rapid response and that solutions are sought quickly should any difficulties arise.

During the field phase, the progress of the project is actively communicated to the client.

Following conclusion of the field phase, the tester documents are returned and are checked for completeness, anonymized and prepared before being dispatched to the client.

An insight into market research practice Carrying out of a mystery shopping exercise in the finance sector (wealth management)

The renowned private bank KRÖSUS is planning to carry out a mystery shopping project. As part of the study, 20 tests are to be carried out across 7 cities in Germany. Each test will essentially consist of two personal visits with a duration
of approx. 60 minutes each. Each tester will carry out two tests (one at a branch of the private bank KRÖSUS and one at a branch of a competitor bank).


The mystery shoppers deployed must meet the following tester profile criteria:

- Gender: male/female
- Age: approx. 40-60 years
- All should have experience in the area of investments
- Based on their professional and social standing and outward appearance, all   testers should appear authentic compared to a real customer with an investment   sum of €1.5m.
- Testers should not be customers of KRÖSUS, the private bank that is to be    tested
- No professional testers, industry exclusion

How and where do we find approx. 50-year-old private investors who have at least €1.5m freely at their disposal and who are willing to participate in an extensive mystery shopping project in the wealth management sector?

In order to recruit the testers, we generate addresses which are potentially relevant to the target group…

• … from Schmiedl Marktforschung’s in-house address pools
- Range of approx. 25,000 current and active proband data sets (nationwide)
- Qualified as using important socio-demographic and psychographic variables
- Recruited offline
- For example, consumer
            Cars in the top segment
            Luxury goods (jewellery, designer clothing and furniture)
            Capital investments
- For example, B-to-B
            Address pools for particular professional groups, tiers of management,             freelancers

• … using multipliers

• … through recommendation by other probands
   - For example, recommendation by persons whose trust has already been won

• … through micro-selection
   - Various commercial and in-house databases link relevant information,
      for example…
           Private households scored according to relevant classes of variables
           Number of cars, indexed against Federal Motor Transport Authority            (Kraftfahrtbundesamt) figures
           List-broking (use of media, brand preferences, leisure time, etc.)

Based on the addresses generated, we carry out an efficient screening process…

• … using our professional in-house telephone studio
• … by compiling suitable addresses according to availability
• … by providing appropriate incentives to the participants
• … by over-recruiting participants

Outcome of the recruitment phase:

On his 79th call, on his third call-back attempt, our account executive, K, reached Dr Christian S, who would like to participate in the mystery shopper study. Here is an excerpt from his profile:

• 45 years old, university degree, doctorate studies
• Self-employed, owner of a consulting firm
• Has an investment capital of between €1.5m and €2m at his disposal
• Married, 1 daughter
• Lives in an affluent area in Munich-Harlaching
• Detached house
• Likes to read the business publications Handelsblatt and Wirtschaftswoche
• Wife keeps two riding horses

Summary:

Although this outcome was acceptable, account executive K may have to spend a little longer making calls to ensure that a sufficient number of testers are available for the mystery shopping project.