Controversial? Yes. Annoying? Possibly. Overall score: a darned good read.
The popular Mystery Shopper feature, a section I introduced to the newspaper 20 years ago, is and still going strong. So where did the idea come from and what was its purpose?
To be fair, I nicked it.
I saw a Mystery Shopper-type feature in another magazine, not a financial one, and thought: what a cracking idea.
I had not been editor here for long and was on the lookout for fresh ideas. I knew the column had to be developed for our readers if it was to work, so I set about tailoring and revising the idea, working out a scoring system and making the format relevant to financial advice.
It would be impractical and time wasting to visit the individual offices of every IFAs in the country so I decided a short phone call or even email would be best to assess what actually happens when potential clients initiate contact – a critical part of winning or losing a new customer or ‘shopper’.
I’m glad to say it worked and I hope some of the advisers who were ‘mystery shopped’ found the exercise helpful in sharpening their customer service and benefited from it.
Kevin O’Donnell is a financial journalist and former editor of Financial Adviser
