Shadow Shopper Review: Mystery Shopper Scam?

Companies are always looking for ways to improve their businesses. They may upgrade the products and services being offered or improve customer service.

Their goal in doing this is to enhance the overall customer experience and attract more people to their stores or products and to turn regular customers into loyal ones.

Now, there are several ways companies can go about in improving their respective businesses. One of those ways is through mystery shopping, especially if they own a retail store.

Companies will hire people to be a mystery shopper and visit particular stores to shop, observe, and experience the store. Feedback will be given to the company and they can use that to help them improve the store.

As a mystery shopper, you will basically make money shopping at a particular store and observing it. How do you apply, though, for a mystery shopper position?

Well, one website can help you with that and that is the Shadow Shopper site. It’s a site that helps you connect to companies that are looking for mystery shoppers.

You will be paid by the company that hires you as a mystery shopper and the amount of money you can earn will depend on the job that the company is posting.

But is Shadow Shopper really a legitimate opportunity or is it just a scam to avoid?

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Shadow Shopper Seems Legit, But there are Issues

Shadow Shopper is not really a company that hires mystery shoppers. They are more of a middle man that connects mystery shoppers to companies that are looking for them.

You make money for every mystery shopping assignment that you complete. Your payment will come from the company that hires you to be their mystery shopper.

From what I’ve seen so far, Shadow Shopper seems like a legitimate opportunity, but there are some major issues with it.

The site’s members, especially the paying ones, do really make money as a mystery shopper. The site does connect them to companies that are looking to hire mystery shoppers.

But as I said earlier, there are several issues with this website. The first issue with this site is the monthly membership fee.

Another issue with Shadow Shopper is that their free membership is practically worthless and the income potential on this site is not very high.

I’ll provide more details about these issues as we progress further in this review of Shadow Shopper.

Who Uses Shadow Shopper?

The Shadow Shopper website is designed for two groups of people with one being companies that are looking to hire people to be a mystery shopper for them.

The other group are people who are looking for opportunities to make money as a mystery shopper. For companies, the website can act as a message board where they can post their need for a mystery shopper.

The site acts like Craigslist where they place ads for mystery shopper vacancies and the site’s many members can apply by sending an application.

If you are someone who’s looking for an opportunity to make money, then Shadow Shopper can provide that opportunity.

The site provides an opportunity for people to make money as a mystery shopper. The site won’t hire you, but you will be connected to companies who are hiring.

The money you earn will come from the company that will hire you. To be able to see the available mystery shopping jobs you need to become a member first.

In the next section, I’ll discuss in more detail the registration process, as well as how you can make money with this opportunity.

How Do You Make Money with Shadow Shopper?

Shadow Shopper is not really the site that provides you with an opportunity to make money. They act more as a middleman, connecting you to companies that have mystery shopping assignments.

It’s like a Craigslist site where companies post an ad then people will just respond to the add and submit their pitch or application.

Once you are hired, the company that hires you will be the one to pay you after you complete their mystery shopping assignment.

To be able to see the mystery shopping assignments that are posted on Shadow Shopper, you need to be a member first. Becoming a member is simple, as you just need to provide the required details when you sign up.

You also need to be at least 18 years old and residing in either the U.S., Canada, or Australia. Now, the site has two memberships, the Bronze membership, which is free, and the Gold membership, which is a paid membership.

As a Bronze member, you will be able to apply to select job listings on the job board. Take note, that the listings you will see are those that have been posted more than 7 days ago.

You will also be able to apply for Promoted jobs, which are the ones with the immediate need for shoppers, and your contact details will be searchable in the site’s database. You also get access to all the education articles they have.

As a Gold member, you get all of the benefits of the Bronze member and access to the most recent job posting on the site job board.

You are also a priority when it comes to Shadow Shopper’s database. This means that your details will be on top when companies look for people in the site’s database.To be a Gold member, you will be required to pay $6.95 a month.

Once you are a member, you can start viewing the job listings and apply for the available mystery shopping positions.

If you get accepted, the company that hires you will be the one that pays you. The site says payments are usually made through PayPal.

You can likely negotiate with the company the mode of payment you prefer if you don’t want to use PayPal. The amount of money you can earn will depend greatly on the company that is posting the job.

The site doesn’t set the amount that companies need to pay, so it is really up to them to decide on how much they are willing to pay.

It is important to note, though, that Gold members will have more chances to land a mystery shopping job than Bronze members. This is because they get access to the newest jobs, allowing them to choose first.

This is actually one of the issues with Shadow Shopper, as their Bronze membership seems to be useless. Sure, there might be some jobs still available, but most of them are being scooped up by Gold members.

Speaking of Gold members, there are also some issues with this membership because it is not free. Though the amount you need to pay is really small, it still doesn’t seem right to pay the middle man.

The opportunities they provide can be found for free on the internet if you are willing to search for it. The income potential of Shadow Shopper is also not that high, especially if you just have a free account.

Though the site has a lot of job postings, the fact that you will also compete against other members makes it harder to earn consistently.

What I Like about Shadow Shopper

Now that we know what Shadow Shopper is and what they bring, it’s time to discuss what I like about this opportunity.

  • The first thing that I like about Shadow Shopper is that the mystery shopper assignments that are posted on their site are legit. A lot of members, especially the paying ones, are satisfied with the mystery shopping opportunities that they are getting from the site.
  • Another thing I like about Shadow Shopper is that the fee for the Gold membership is not that high. You are only required to pay $7 a month to maintain your membership and get priority access to the mystery shopping jobs they offer. You won’t really feel that amount and if you will be an active shopper, you will be able to earn back the fee easily to maintain your membership.

What I Dislike about Shadow Shopper

There are, of course, a lot of things about Shadow Shopper that I don’t really like and I’ll discuss them in this section.

  • The first thing that I didn’t like about Shadow Shopper is that you need to pay a fee to really get anything from this site. Yes, the fee is not that high and they do have a free membership. But the free membership is somewhat useless and the cheap fee is still not worth it for the service they are offering. You can find free mystery shopping opportunities online with just a bit of research.
  • I also don’t like that the free Bronze membership of Shadow Stopper doesn’t really help anyone at all. It’s like, the free membership is only available to let people know how useless it is and to entice them more to become Gold members.
  • I’m also not a fan of Shadow Shopper sharing your personal information to whoever they want, which in this case, the people who pay them. If you don’t like getting random messages or emails, then you should not sign up with this website since they are willing to share your information.

Do I Recommend Shadow Shopper?

After learning more about Shadow Shopper and what it can really bring to the table, I say that this is an opportunity that I don’t really recommend.

Yes, the site will really provide opportunities for you to get mystery shopping assignments but you will need to be a paying member to do so.

Their free membership will not really provide a lot of opportunities to be a mystery shopper. It is their paid membership that will have most and the best opportunities.

Even so, I still consider what they provide as not really worth the money that you will pay. You can find mystery shopping opportunities yourself when you search online.

Besides, you will not be the only one trying to get the assignment available on Shadow Shopper, the site also has other members who are trying to get the same assignment.

At least when you do your own search, you won’t be paying anything. So getting beaten out of an assignment won’t sting as much. There are a lot of better opportunities out there to make money than what Shadow Shopper offers.

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Frank

Entrepreneur, Blogger, Affiliate Marketer and webmaster of Stealth Secrets. I have been earning a full-time living as an affiliate marketer since 2004. Want to do the same? Check out what I recommend.

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