Friend Referral - Best Practices

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Friend Referral - Feature Overview

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Friend Referral - Managing Friend Referral.

What Should I Offer?

Keep the following rules in mind when deciding on your friend referral bonus

Points Usually Don't Work

Unless you have a specific rewards structure, points aren't a great idea for an offer. It doesn't provide a huge reason for your customer to react -- points aren't real and it relies on your customer having a deep understanding with every reward you offer. Why make a customer do the extra work?

Tangible Is Better

To the above's point, if points don't work - offer something customers can grasp. This should be either a direct dollar amount off, or something they can see themselves holding like a free coffee. This makes it much easier for customers to imaging having the offer in their hands.

Don't be Cheap

It sounds harsh, but it's true! Friend Referral is like paying to get new customers, and new customers don't come cheap. But new customers are also NEW customers and pay off in the long run. The offer should be something customers cannot say no to like $5 store credit, a free drink, a free side on their next meal, buy one get one, etc.

How Should I inform customers?

This is heavily dependent on your business type. You know your customers and foot traffic best. These aren't all the ways, but have worked well for existing clients.

Frequent Visitors

Notifying customers based on the number of visits is a great way to keep people informed. This works well for high traffic, low ticket stores where it's not uncommon to see someone once a week or more.

This uses the trigger when customer checks in N time(s). Example: Every 5th Visit.

If you use this type we suggest that you make the number of visits greater, the more often the customer is going to be seen. The idea is to keep your friend referral message in their mind every 3-4 weeks.

After Sign Up

You can also notify customers in the form of a drip campaign and add multiple triggers for after the customer signs up. This works well for low-medium traffic businesses where you get people in the door, but may not have them visiting too frequently.

This uses the trigger N day(s) after customer signs-up. Example: 3 days after customer signs up.

If you use this type we suggest it's used in conjunction with frequent visitors or recurring cycle as a way to jump start the notification early. Such as 2 or 3 days after sign up. Another way to use it is create a train of triggers. Example: 1 day after sign up, 7 days after sign up, 30 days after sign up, 60 days after sign up, etc etc. 

Recurring Cycle

You can schedule a message to be sent on a recurring basis. This will blast all customers and keep repeating. This works well for low traffic businesses where you don't get many sign ups and don't see people back often.

This uses the trigger On Specific date and the repeat option. Ex: On 2019-01-01 and repeat every 35 days.

If you're using this type we suggest you use an odd-interval, so customers don't catch on. Example: Every 47 days. Something spaced out enough so customers aren't spammed and they're not seeing the same message, on the same day every month.

Added Bonus for New Customers

Generally is's a great idea to give your new customer an added bonus that replaces your standard sign up bonus. This way you can have your existing customers gift the new customer too. 

Example: Give your Friends $5 for signing up, and you get $5 off your next purchase!

This is done using the trigger when referred friend enrolls

Additional Questions?

As always, if you have any additional questions that isn't covered in this guide do not hesitate to contact us and we'll be happy to help.