Referral Reward & Friend Offer FAQ
Adam avatar
Written by Adam
Updated over a week ago

Referral Reward

Are successful referrals detected automatically?

Yes. Once set up, the ReferralCandy app monitors and detects* successful referrals automatically.

However, it may take a couple of hours after a purchase has taken place for the platform to run through all the necessary verification checks, so it isn't instantaneous.

Each Advocate receives a unique referral link that they can share with their friends. The clicking of this referral link by a friend, combined with the JavaScript tracking code placed on your purchase completed page, and the purchase information sent to us enables the tracking of successful referrals*.

*Note: For eCommerce platforms with specific integration plugins (E.g. Shopify, BigCommerce, WooCommerce), the ReferralCandy app obtains information directly from the platform. The unique referral link together with the information obtained from the platform enables the app to track sales that come from referrals.

Can I reward Advocates if their friends refer someone else (i.e. tiered rewards)?

At the moment, ReferralCandy is only able to assist with 1 tier referral programs.

You can reward the original Advocate for their direct referral to a friend, but won't be able to reward the original Advocate when their friend refers someone else.

For example, if A refers B, and then B refers C:

  • A will be rewarded for referring B

  • B will be rewarded for referring C

  • A will NOT be rewarded when B refers C

Can referral rewards be accumulated before being sent to Advocates?

Yes, but in a fixed manner. Referral rewards from ReferralCandy are typically sent to Advocates once they have referred enough rewardable referred purchases to be eligible for a reward. Learn more

How are cash rewards paid out?

ReferralCandy will handle the payment of cash rewards to customers via PayPal. Learn more

What happens if my Advocate does not have a PayPal account (to send cash rewards to)?

ReferralCandy sends cash referral rewards to your Advocates through PayPal. In the event that your Advocate does not have a PayPal account, they will still be able to claim the cash reward in the following manner:

  1. ReferralCandy sends cash to the Advocate's email address

  2. Advocate gets an email from PayPal letting them know they have received funds

  3. If the Advocate does not have a PayPal account, the email will instruct them to open a PayPal account to receive funds into their PayPal balance.

You can also refer to the How to receive money article on PayPal's help center site.

Important: PayPal has restrictions on sending cash to specific accounts. Read this article to see what account types are restricted.

What is a referral link?

A referral link is a link that is given out to each customer who is invited to participate in your referral program.

ReferralCandy generates unique referral links for each Advocate which they can share through their Sharing Page. With unique links, our app is able to detect when your Advocates share the links through email or social networking sites.

A unique referral link looks like this: http://yourstore.refr.cc/johnsmith

  • The first part of the referral link (i.e. http://yourstore.refr.cc/) is derived from your account's Store URL. The subdomain (i.e. yourstore) can be edited.

  • The last part of the link (i.e johnsmith) is derived automatically from the customer's name. The customer may choose to update this from their Rewards Page at any time.

You can customize the referral link subdomain in your Store Settings. Learn more

Why did my Advocate not get their reward?

There are conditions that need to be met first before an Advocate receives their referral reward. Learn more

Why can't my Advocate use their Referral Reward coupon at checkout?

There are a couple of potential reasons why. Read more to see how you can troubleshoot coupon issues at checkout.

How do I filter ReferralCandy coupons on my Discounts page (Shopify)?

As you promote your referral program and generate more referrals, you will see more coupons generated by ReferralCandy on your Discounts page. This may make it difficult for you to manage and view all available coupons in your store, including discount codes you created yourself.

You can create filtered views to organize your discounts on your Shopify Admin page. Learn how

Friend Offer

Are coupon codes in friend offers linked to Advocates?

It depends on the platform you are on. If you are a Shopify or BigCommerce retailer, an Advocate gets a unique, multi-use friend offer coupon code generated by ReferralCandy. This coupon code is linked to the Advocate.

For other platforms, coupon codes in friend offers are not linked or unique to the Advocates. Each store's referral program uses the same coupon code in all friend offers made by Advocates.

Regardless of the platform you are using, ReferralCandy will be able to detect referred purchases and identify the Advocates that made those referrals.

Can friends use their offers without logging into their user account in a Shopify store?

This is possible depending on how your Shopify store is set up and is not dependent on ReferralCandy. ReferralCandy does not control the behavior or workflow of the checkout process of any store.

Additionally, ReferralCandy does not require a store’s checkout process to be modified in order to run a referral program. Hence, if you want Referred Friends to log in (or not) in order to use their offers, change your Shopify store’s setup accordingly.

What happens when the friend offer expires? (For non-Shopify merchants)

When the friend offer expires, the campaign will stop automatically, thus preventing Advocates from sharing their referral links and Referred Friends from seeing the friend offer landing page to apply the discount code at your store. Learn more

Why aren't my customers able to use the friend offer coupon at checkout?

Read this article to see how you can troubleshoot checkout issues with friend offers.

Why does the friend landing page show "SAMPLE" in place of the discount code?

The ReferralCandy app has automated mechanisms to mitigate discount code misuse. To prevent existing Advocates from misusing their own coupon codes that are meant for referring their friends, the app hides the friend offer discount code when they attempt to view the friend landing page via their own referral link.

However, the correct discount code will appear when friends of the Advocate view the friend landing page when the referral link is viewed from a different device/browser.

When an Advocate opens their own referral link, they will see:

  • A note at the top saying that the actual coupon code will appear when their referred friends view the page

  • Instead of the friend offer coupon code, they will see SAMPLE

Why isn't there an option for single-use coupon codes for the friend offer?

We understand that most merchants would like the Friend Offer to be available to new customers only for one-time use to prevent coupon code misuse.

However, we don't offer the single-use coupon code as an option for the Friend Offer simply because it does not actually address the concern around coupon code misuse while increasing the administrative burden on retailers. Learn more

Will I have to create the friend offer coupon code or will ReferralCandy create them for me?

Unfortunately, many eCommerce platforms don't provide us with sufficient access to their coupon generation feature to allow us to automate this for you so you will have to create the referral reward coupon codes manually.

Creating the coupon codes yourself through your store's admin panel is the best way to ensure that the coupon codes will work with your store's checkout process, giving you greater control over the coupon code conditions and functionality that are ultimately defined by your eCommerce platform.

ReferralCandy then helps you distribute these codes to your customers after specific triggers. We do not affect the functionality of these pre-set coupon codes. Find out more about How to Create Coupon Codes.

Note: If you're a Shopify or BigCommerce user, ReferralCandy is able to automate the coupon generation for your referral program.


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