Your advocates share an incentive with their referred friends to encourage them to make a purchase at your store. The friend offer types available to you depend on your platform.
An amount off coupon
By default, the friend offer coupon is a multi-use coupon code that's associated with the advocate who referred the friend. Why can't my friend offer be a single-use coupon?
Shopify or BigCommerce
On Shopify or BigCommerce, ReferralCandy automatically generates the friend offer coupon code the advocate shares. You choose a percentage or a fixed amount off the friend's purchase. Setting up a coupon reward.
Friend offer coupon expiry options on Shopify:
No expiry — codes don't expire and stay the same for advocates and affiliates enrolled in the campaign.
Expires after X days from issue — a friend offer code expires a set number of days after it's issued.
Expires at a specific date — every code expires on the date you choose; best for limited-time campaigns. See the Friend offers FAQ below for how expiry and code regeneration work.
Tip: To identify who a ReferralCandy-generated friend offer code belongs to, see [Shopify] Find who a ReferralCandy discount code belongs to.
Other platforms
On other platforms, you create and provide the friend coupon codes yourself, since the codes may be tied into your store's checkout process. How to create coupon codes.
Coupon conditions — such as limiting a code to new customers only, or setting a minimum purchase amount — are configured in your eCommerce platform, not in ReferralCandy.
Note: If you set a coupon expiry date for the friend offer, you must manually create new coupons in your platform's admin panel, or your campaign automatically stops.
Buy X Get Y coupon (Shopify)
On Shopify, you can set a purchase condition ("Buy X") before a referred friend earns a specific reward ("Get Y") — for example, buy 2 items and get a third free. To learn more, see [Shopify] Buy X Get Y coupon.
Promo (Non-Shopify)
The Promo option lets you give referred friends a custom offer — for example cash, loyalty points, gift certificates, gifts, memberships, subscriptions, free shipping, or another incentive. It's available for non-Shopify campaigns only; if your store is on Shopify, you won't see Promo in your friend offer settings.
With Promo, you enter a URL that advocates share with their referred friends to reach a landing page on your website. You can also set the URL to apply a discount code automatically when the friend reaches your checkout. How to set up the promo link.
Note: Selecting Promo disables the ReferralCandy friend landing page for your campaign. You set up and host the landing page the promo URL points to.
Common use cases for the Promo reward
Common use cases for the Promo reward
Automatically applying a discount during checkout when a referred friend who visits the landing page makes a purchase.
Dynamically displaying a single-use-per-customer coupon code the referred friend can use at checkout.
Giving instructions on the landing page for how the referred friend redeems the offer (for example, enter their email, answer a question, etc.).
Showing a unique friend offer code per referral link, so all of one advocate's referred friends use the same code.
Letting mobile users tap a button that applies the promo link's coupon automatically. For this, your platform needs to support a link that auto-applies a discount at checkout.
Whatever your use case, make sure the promo link and its landing page work in sync with your checkout. ReferralCandy doesn't provide after-sales support beyond checkout.
Nothing
You can choose not to give a friend offer. If you select Nothing, the friend offer landing page for your campaign is disabled. When an advocate shares their referral link and a friend clicks it, the friend is redirected to the Store URL set on the Store details page — in the ReferralCandy web app or Shopify app.
Friend offers FAQ
Are coupon codes in friend offers linked to advocates?
Are coupon codes in friend offers linked to advocates?
It depends on your platform.
Shopify or BigCommerce
On Shopify or BigCommerce, the advocate gets a unique, multi-use friend offer coupon code auto-generated by ReferralCandy. This code is linked to the advocate.
Other platforms
On other platforms, friend offer coupon codes are not linked or unique to advocates. Every advocate's friend offer uses the same code.
Either way, ReferralCandy still detects referred purchases and identifies the advocate who made the referral.
Can friends use their offers without logging into their account in a Shopify store?
Can friends use their offers without logging into their account in a Shopify store?
This depends on how your Shopify store is set up — it's not controlled by ReferralCandy. ReferralCandy doesn't control your checkout process, and doesn't require any checkout changes to run a referral or affiliate program. If you want referred friends to log in (or not) to use their offers, adjust your Shopify store's setup accordingly.
Why does the friend landing page show "SAMPLE" in place of the discount code?
Why does the friend landing page show "SAMPLE" in place of the discount code?
Advocates who click their own referral link won't see the friend offer code — they see SAMPLE on the friend offer landing page and the friend offer popup (Shopify).
This is an anti-misuse mechanism. To stop advocates from using their own friend-offer codes — which are meant for the people they refer — ReferralCandy hides the code when an advocate opens their own referral link. The real code appears when the advocate's friends open the link on a different browser or device.
When an advocate opens their own referral link, they see a note at the top saying the real code will appear when their referred friends view the page, and SAMPLE in place of the code.
During testing: if you shared the link with someone on the same Wi-Fi / network as you, they may also see SAMPLE. Have them open the link on a different network (for example cellular data, a hotspot, or another ISP) to see the real code.
Will I have to create the friend offer coupon code, or will ReferralCandy create it for me?
Will I have to create the friend offer coupon code, or will ReferralCandy create it for me?
Many eCommerce platforms don't give ReferralCandy enough access to automate coupon generation, so on those platforms you create the codes manually. Creating the codes yourself in your store's admin panel is the best way to make sure they work with your checkout, and gives you control over the conditions your platform defines. ReferralCandy then distributes those codes to your customers after the right triggers, without changing how the codes work. How to create coupon codes.
Note: On Shopify and BigCommerce, ReferralCandy automates coupon generation for you.
Should my customers share their referral link or the friend offer code?
Should my customers share their referral link or the friend offer code?
It depends on how you want to run your campaign. Here's the difference:
Referral link (recommended) — always associated with the advocate or affiliate, as long as they keep their eligibility to be enrolled in a campaign. Use this if you want referred friends to always get a working friend offer code, and you want to capture more data in your referral reports.
Friend offer code — the code assigned to an advocate that their referred friends use to buy from your store, which counts toward the advocate's referrals. You can set it to expire. Use this if you want a usage and time limit on the friend offer.
When does a friend offer coupon expire or regenerate? (Shopify)
When does a friend offer coupon expire or regenerate? (Shopify)
On Shopify, ReferralCandy creates a friend offer code when an advocate is enrolled in your campaign. What happens at expiry depends on the option you choose:
No expiry — the code keeps working indefinitely.
Expires after X days from issue — when a code expires, ReferralCandy doesn't replace it right away. The next time someone opens that advocate's referral link after the code has expired, the system generates a fresh code — so the referral link always delivers a working offer to new friends. (We wait for the link to be used instead of regenerating every code in the background.) A code that a friend let expire isn't revived.
Expires at a specific date — every code stops working on the date you set, even for advocates who are still referring. Because of that, it isn't recommended for an ongoing program. Use it only when you want a hard stop — for example, a limited-time or seasonal campaign (ideally aligned with the end date you set on the Campaign details page), or when you want to stop the current friend offer before switching to a different one.
What happens to existing friend offer codes when I change my friend offer?
What happens to existing friend offer codes when I change my friend offer?
When you update and save your friend offer, your advocates' referral links automatically start delivering the new offer — there's nothing advocates need to do, and newly referred friends see the new offer.
Coupon codes already issued under your previous offer keep working with the settings they were created with — they aren't automatically changed or expired, so a friend who already has an earlier code can still use it.
If you'd like the previous codes to stop, you can remove or expire them in your store's admin. On Shopify, ReferralCandy groups the codes it creates (for example, by day), so they're easy to find and manage.