Here are sample customer-facing emails and pages that are used as part of your referral program, in the order your customers see them. This gallery shows the main referral flow — for the full list of campaign emails and their on/off toggles, see Managing campaign email settings.
Note: The screenshots below are just sample emails and pages. You can fully customize the look and content of your referral communications — see the customizing guides for Shopify and other platforms.
Emails & pages flow
These are the emails and pages your customers receive and see in each phase of your referral program:
Customer makes a purchase — they see the Referral extension (Shopify) or the post-purchase popup (other platforms), then receive the welcome email with their referral link, and later a reminder email.
Advocate shares their referral link — from their advocate portal's Share Page. Referred friends land on the friend offer landing page, or see the friend offer popup on your store.
Advocate makes a referral — when a referred friend purchases, the advocate receives the reward pending email.
Purchase review period ends — the advocate receives the reward success email if the purchase is eligible, or the reward ineligible email if it isn't.
For a visualization of how referral campaigns work end to end, see ReferralCandy 101.
① Customer makes a purchase
Referral extension (Shopify)
The customer sees the referral extension on the "Thank You" page at checkout in Shopify. This block shows customers their referral link and sharing options. New customers can register for your program via a signup form.
Post-purchase popup widget (other platforms)
The customer sees this popup message upon checkout to let them know about your referral program. They can share their invite link and start referring friends.
Post-purchase welcome email
After purchase, the customer receives this email. This email should inform them about your referral program, and encourage them to share their link and refer their friends to your store.
Reminder email
The customer receives this email as a nudge to encourage them to make a referral.
② Customer (Advocate) shares their referral link
Advocate portal — Share Page
Clicking the share button or invite link in the welcome email, reminder email, post-purchase popup (other platforms), or Referral extension (Shopify) takes the advocate to their advocate portal — specifically its Share Page, where they see their referral link, friend discount code, and one-click share buttons, with no sign-in needed. For the full portal tour (including the signed-in rewards dashboard), see What advocates see after signing up.
Friend offer landing page
This is what referred friends see when they open the advocate's referral link.
Note: If the advocate (or a tester on the same network) opens the referral link, the friend-offer code may be hidden and show as “SAMPLE”. Use a different network (such as cellular data, personal hotspot, or another network that uses a different ISP) to test.
Friend offer popup (Shopify)
This is what the referred friends see on your Shopify homepage when they're redirected to your store via the advocate's referral link.
Note: To use this app embed, you must deactivate the friend offer page. Learn more
③ Customer (Advocate) makes a referral
Reward pending email
Once a referred friend makes a purchase using the advocate's referral link, the advocate receives this email.
④ Purchase review period has ended
✅ Reward success email
If the referred friend's purchase meets the eligibility requirements after the review period ends, the advocate receives this email letting them know that they're getting a reward.
❎ Reward ineligible email
If the referred friend's purchase doesn't meet the eligibility requirements, the advocate receives this email letting them know that they will not be rewarded for the referred purchase.
Tracking rewards on the rewards dashboard
At any point, advocates can also track the status of their rewards on their rewards dashboard — the signed-in area of the advocate portal, reached via an emailed one-time sign-in link. It shows their rewards, referral link, and profile details like their PayPal payout email. See What advocates see after signing up for the full advocate experience.
Themes, emails & pages FAQ
Where do I edit each of these emails and pages?
Where do I edit each of these emails and pages?
Most of these surfaces are customized in your campaign's theme editor — open your campaign, go to Themes, and click Customize on your active theme. The full walkthrough lives in the customizing guides for Shopify and other platforms. Surface by surface:
Campaign emails (welcome, reminder, and reward emails) — design and text in the theme editor; to turn each email on or off, see Managing campaign email settings.
Advocate portal (Share Page and rewards dashboard) — theme editor, under Advocate Account Pages. See What advocates see after signing up.
Friend offer landing page and popup — theme editor; on Shopify, both surfaces (and the popup's app-embed toggle) are covered in [Shopify] Friend offer landing page and popup.
Referral extension (Shopify) — the exception: it's not in the theme editor. Its text (header, body, and button) is edited from the campaign's Widgets page, and Shopify's checkout editor handles design-only settings like colors and sharing icons. See [Shopify] Referral extension.
Post-purchase popup (other platforms) — enabled and customized from the campaign's Widgets page. See [Other Platforms] Showing a post-purchase popup to customers.
Can I disable the friend offer page? (Shopify)
Can I disable the friend offer page? (Shopify)
Yes. Disabling the friend offer page takes the referred friend straight to your store's homepage when they click the advocate or affiliate's referral link.
To disable the friend offer page for Shopify merchants:
In Shopify admin, go to Campaigns > Select your campaign. In the Promote campaign section, click Widgets.
Find the Friend offer page section and click Turn off.
Wait for the changes to save.
Important: Regardless of whether this feature is toggled on or off, ReferralCandy passes the discount code to your Shopify store via UTM parameters. However, if you run a headless setup (or any non-Shopify landing page), the discount code will unlikely be passed to the platform. This affects referral detection and the performance of your referral or affiliate program.
Does ReferralCandy have social media integration?
Does ReferralCandy have social media integration?
Yes. Advocates and affiliates get one-click share buttons on their Share Page, in campaign emails, and in the post-purchase widgets — for channels like WhatsApp, Facebook, Facebook Messenger, X (formerly Twitter), Telegram, Threads, and Email (the exact set varies by surface). For X, Facebook, and WhatsApp, you can set the default sharing message and image, and your contacts can personalize the message before sharing — see Editing the default X, Facebook and WhatsApp sharing message. You can also choose which share icons appear in each marketing email — covered in the customizing guides for Shopify and other platforms.
Here is an example of what the referral email looks like with the social media sharing buttons at the bottom:
How do the emails and pages look for advocates who are enrolled in multiple campaigns?
How do the emails and pages look for advocates who are enrolled in multiple campaigns?
Because campaigns are independent of each other, enrollment in one campaign doesn't affect your customers' experience with another campaign.
If you run multiple campaigns at the same time, and an advocate or affiliate is enrolled in both, they see separate pages and receive separate emails for each campaign.
Each campaign has its own advocate or affiliate portal — an advocate enrolled in two campaigns has a separate portal (and referral link) for each. Invite, reminder, and reward emails are also sent separately for each campaign.
Shopify widgets
If you're using the customer referral details extension for Shopify, a contact enrolled in multiple campaigns can click the Campaign dropdown to select the campaign they want to view their referral details for.
What is the ReferralCandy Advocate Portal?
What is the ReferralCandy Advocate Portal?
The Advocate Portal serves as the central hub where enrolled contacts can view and share their referral link, track their reward status, and update their referral link or account information.
Each ReferralCandy account comes with the Advocate Portal hosted by ReferralCandy. View the pages that your contacts see in the portal.