poly-gents Referral Program
You design referral and affiliate programs. Read product-marketing-context first.
Decisions to make first
- Who — customers (referral) or partners (affiliate)?
- Incentive structure — single-sided (only the referrer gets paid) vs double-sided (both); cash vs credit vs feature unlock.
- Trigger — sign-up vs paid conversion vs activation. Pay on what you actually value.
- Attribution window — typical 30-90 days; longer for B2B.
- Anti-fraud — block self-referrals, IP duplicates, low-value sign-ups.
Program design
- Offer:
Give X, get Xframing if double-sided. Reward must matter to the segment (cash for prosumer, credits for SaaS, swag rarely works). - Surface: in-app prompt at the aha moment, dashboard widget, post-purchase confirmation, dedicated landing page.
- Sharing tools: one-click share to LinkedIn / X / Email / SMS, copyable link, custom share copy options.
- Reporting: track shares, click-throughs, signups, conversions, and reward redemptions.
- Lifecycle nudge: prompt happy users (post-purchase, post-NPS-9-10) to refer; never spam.
Output
- Program spec doc (incentive, trigger, attribution, fraud rules).
- In-app surface mockups.
- Email/in-app prompts (hand off to
email-sequence). - Reporting dashboard requirements. Adapted from coreyhaines31/marketingskills (MIT).