Complete Measurement Tools

• Product/Employee Reveal Shops
• Direct Mail Campaigns
• SCI Proprietary Industry Research
• SCI Custom Research
• Bundled Packaging

40 years and three company acquisitions/consolidations have yielded present management of Shoppers’ Critique International with a treasure full of experience and wisdom regarding the measurement and performance of businesses across a wide array of industries.  One constant lesson learned has always been that the companies that measure from multiple perspectives on an on-going basis are the ones who realize the most value in their consumer intelligence program, and therefore are adaptive to environmental changes which result is maximum sales and revenue efficiencies on a regular basis.

During the span of that four decade history, Shoppers’ Critique International, and its ancestors, have been consulted and hired to conduct numerous customized research projects. We are proud of the fact that to this day, we remain nimble and customer-focused, so that we can listen to your concerns and advise you on the proper mix of measurement tools to capture the data you need secure, in order to understand the current state of affairs, and to make informed decisions about the next steps for your business.

We are experts in measurement! That is what we do. Over the years, we’ve honed our skills throughout the various tools we use to get you the information that you require for success! Sometimes it comes in the form of one or more of our standard requested tools, like Mystery Shops, Online Surveys, Social Media Monitoring or Focus Groups. More often it is through a uniquely cobbled package of systemic tools and specific research. Whatever your need is, Shoppers’ Critique has proven over the years to be adaptable, reliable and successful at delivering quality data results to hundred’s of America’s top brands for the last 40 years!

Internet/Phone Shops

• See/Hear Actual Employee Responses!
• Measure Timely Responsiveness!
• Track Lead Conversions!
• Collect Data Backup for Training!

Is your sales staff staying on top of phone leads and/or returning calls on a timely basis? Are they creating a sales environment over the phone, and making appropriate and responsive sales suggestions? Are they asking the prospect to come to the store, the apartment or the showroom to close the sale?

What are Internet / Phone Shops?

Internet Shops measure the responsiveness of a company’s employees, both in terms of timeliness and effectiveness, in replying to product or service inquiries being placed to a business via website (typically through a “Contact Us” page on the site) by potential customers. The sophisticated proprietary software of Shoppers’ Critique International tracks date and time placed and responded to, automatically adjusting for time zone variations. Screen captures also allow the client to see exactly how the employee responded to the inquiry.

On-line retailers also use Internet Shops to measure the consumer impressions, and the ease of use of, the website, sales process and delivery flow of product to the end-user. This measurement platform is a great tool for understanding the neuro-economic strengths and weaknesses of a given retail website.

Online Surveys / IVR Surveys

• Gather Data Quickly, Easily, Cost-Effectively!
• On-Site Entry, or From Anywhere!
  
• Open Access or Validated Entry/Authorization Codes!
• Real Time Access to Results!
• Measure Customers, Clients, Employees, Members or any Grouping!

What do our customers like or dislike about their experience with us? What attributes of our business do our clients most value and where can we improve? What is the climate of workplace attitudes by our employees, and what adjustments in the workplace can we make that will create better job satisfaction, leading to increased worker productivity and greater profits? Which member benefits impact loyalty and longevity and which are a waste of money?

What are Online Surveys and IVR Surveys?

A quick and cost-efficient way to measure a limited amount of data from a targeted group on individuals is to use an Online Survey. This easy-to-implement data tool provides a branded URL to gather specific feedback from the targeted pool of respondents.

Online Surveys can be administered through an open terminal on-site, or through any Internet access point around the world. Some companies tend to use the survey on-site to gain immediate feedback: What was the patient’s wait time? How satisfied was the customer with today’s visit? Would the customer return? Would the customer recommend the dealership? How do employees feel about proposed new corporate initiatives? What factors contribute to company loyalty and long-term tenure?

Receipt-Based Web Surveys

• Mass Random Sample!
• Current Customer Base!
• Continuous Feedback/Data Mining!
• Extremely Cost-Effective!

Were hot foods served hot, and cold foods served cold? Did my customer service experience meet or exceed my expectations? Would I recommend this place to others? How would I rate the value of my experience?

What are Receipt-Based Web Surveys?

Internet Web Surveys are one of the fastest growing methodologies of conducting immediate point of contact market research studies within all different types of industries. This is not surprising given the tremendous growth in the reach of the Internet, and the huge cost-efficiencies of delivering a point-of-sale (POS) survey invitation with each receipt handed out to current customers. The receipt contains a URL unique to the client, which is then accessed by the customer who answers questions with fresh recollections as they are entered within a defined period of time from the actual sale.

Social Media Monitoring

• Proactively Manage Your Social Media Image!
• Monitor Facebook, Twitter and Others in Summary or Detail!
• See Specifically What is Being Said About Your Company!
• Measure Specific Campaigns, Brands or Locations on Social Media Sites!

How often are you being mentioned on Facebook? What percentage of your Tweets positive, neutral and negative? What specifically is being said about you on social media networks that you don’t know about? How are customer service experiences, both positive and negative, being relayed to the world, ultimately impacting your future sales? Are customers spreading positive halo and word of mouth, or are they unhappy and telling the world about a problem that you could easily fix? Are you simply flying blind into the dark, and have no idea what is being said about your company in social media circles?

What is  Social Media Monitoring?

Facebook alone has over 750 million active users. If Facebook’s users were citizen’s of a country, they would make Facebook the 3rd most populous country on the planet, with more than twice as many users than residents in the US alone! The customer postings on Facebook and other social media platforms now reach far too many people in today’s real world to be ignored by America’s most successful businesses.

A seismic change in messaging power occurred with the mainstream use of the Internet, that has been greatly accelerated through social media networks. In the old days, the company mostly controlled the messages and consumer paradigms of its business…in other words, consumers knew what they knew of a business mostly through advertising, and via personal experience.

Now every Internet poster is a world-wide correspondent, reaching potentially hundred of thousands or even millions of people with a message about YOUR company. You need to know what those messages are.

Mobile marketing Services

• Reach a Targeted Base of Smart Phone Users!
• Immediate, Specific, Targeted, Real Time!
• Use for Promotions, Polling, Surveys, Affinity Programs, Rewards!
• Drive Incremental Impulse Traffic via Date Specific Offers!

Welcome customers back on-property with a brief message and coupon automatically as the GPS detects their phone entering your location! Blast out a one-day BOGO lunch or dinner offer to your customer base to drive impulse traffic and incremental revenue for pennies! Keep customers up to date on hours of operation, store sales, seasonal or weekly specials, or any other strategic message! Remind drivers that their 3 month oil change is due, or that dental patients are due for their next cleaning!

What are Mobile Marketing Services?

Marketing on a mobile phone (also known as SMS Marketing) has become increasingly popular and successful vehicle since the widespread rise of SMS (Short Message Service), or “texts” in recent years.

Neuro-Economic Profiling

• Understand Your Customer!
• Grasp the Hot Buttons that Drive Customer Behaviors!
• Predict Future Consumer Behavior Patterns!
• Adjust Operations to Maximize Consumer Expectations!
• Limit Bad Halos/Maximize Positive Halos!

Was the car-buying process a positive experience for the buyer, such that he or she will recommend the dealership on Facebook? How did hotel guests feel about any on-site amenities that you have invested in to enhance their experience? Did the customer feel like they were treated with respect as an individual, or processed through like a number? How did they feel about the integrity of the process and your staff?

What is Neuro-Economic Profiling?

What happens to your customers is important, but so is the paradigm of how each customer felt about their visit. These feelings become indicators of predictive future consumer behaviors, including the depth of their loyalty to your brand, the frequency of repeat business and the way in which they will communicate messages about your company throughout their network, both directly and through social media.

Simply put, Neuro-Economic Profiling is the study of how the retail impressions made on a customer now impact their view of your business, such that it gives us an indication as to whether they will generate positive word of mouth for your company and become a repeat buyer, or whether they are more likely to create a storm of bad karma for your business by ending their own relationship with your company, and trying to take as many of your customers with them as they can! An average dissatisfied customer will tell a minimum of 6-10 people about the service problem. 20% of dissatisfied customers with a legitimate customer service complaint will tell 20 people or more.

Focus Groups / Guest Intercepts

• Live!
• Fresh Impressions!
• Immediate Feedback!
• Optimized for Followup Studies!

Will we hit our sales numbers if we roll out this new product? How do our customers feel about our new logo prototypes? Why do our non-customers choose our competitor over us? Which changes in internal policy would truly enhance job satisfaction and employee retention? Why are year-after-year unit sales down at this location?

What are Focus Groups and Guest Intercepts? How can they help my business?

Focus Groups and Guest Intercepts both involve capturing  qualitative data in-person in a controlled environment.

Specifically, Focus Groups are  a form of qualitative measurement in which a specific group of people are asked about their perceptions, opinions, beliefs and attitudes towards a product, service, concept, advertisement, idea or packaging.  The questions are asked in an interactive group setting wherein participants are free to talk with other group members. Focus Groups are conducted at a pre-arranged time and place with an invited list of participants. They can be observed in person or through a two-way mirror by the client. Audio, video and/or written transcripts may be made of the sessions for further study.

Price Audits / Competitor Shops

• Know what the Competition is Charging!
  
• Get a Snapshot of their Inventory and Placement!
• Learn how your Operations Compare with Competitors!
• Increase Market Share by Analyzing  Market Dynamics!

What is our competition doing better than us? How does our pricing, product selection and inventory stack up against our competitors? What great revenue/traffic-driving ideas do they already have in place that we could easily adopt and increase our market share? Apples to apples, how does the customer interaction experience compare between our operations and our competitors’ operations? In what areas are our competitors winning over the consumer, versus our company? How does the customer feel about our brand and retail experience vs. our competitors?

What are Price Audits / Competitor Shops?

Price Audits are exactly what they sound like: a specific listing of products and/or SKU numbers and the associated retail prices being displayed for consumer purchase as of the date of the audit. Price Audits allow companies to see a snap shot of how their present pricing compares with that of their identified competitors. This data can then be used to make adjustments to, or affirmations of, the company’s current pricing structure, as well as develop pricing strategies, promotions and sales for upcoming quarters.

On-Site Mystery Shopping

• Objective, Controlled Data Capture!
• Detailed and Focused on What Matters to You!
• Anonymous and Authentic!
• Perfect for Comparison with Competitors!
• Audio and Video Shops Too!

Are the parking lot, front end and rest rooms clean and giving good impressions? Are customers being greeted upon entry, and with a genuine smile? Are your policies and procedures being implemented in the manner that you have trained your employees to do so? What does the on-site experience look like from the prospective of an average shopper? Are your sales and customer service protocols being put in place effectively? Is that sales environment being created that you have worked hard to create and trained your employees for? What is the experience like for a customer when you are not there to supervise?

What is Mystery Shopping?

On-site Mystery Shopping is the perfect tool to obtain an honest, objective assessment of the overall operation of each one of your locations.

This methodology incorporates the use of our 200,000+ trained “shoppers” who anonymously enter your locations and follow the observation and interaction guidelines that you compose in consultation with our experienced staff. Posing as ordinary customers, and maintaining anonymity at all times, our shoppers discreetly take note of the variables important to you as the client, and enter the data on-line immediately after collection. After going through a two-step quality control process, the results are then published to our exclusive ShopMAX(R) system and made available to your designated and approved executives.