Create Your Own Referral Reward Program

Any business can create their own referral reward program with just a few minor tweaks to current referral ideas and plans. As with any business plan, creating your own referral reward program should be shared with all of your employees to keep everyone on the same page and working towards similar goals.
What You Will Need
To create your own referral reward program you will need no more than a computer and a spreadsheet program.
How to Create a Referral Reward Program
Gather your employees for a brainstorming session. Determine which types of rewards you want to offer to your referring customers. Types of referral awards can include:
- Cash or Check Rewards
- Discount Rewards
- Store Credit Rewards
- Reward Point Systems
If you are planning to go with a reward points system, create a list of prizes or merchandise you would like to offer at specific point levels.
Tracking and Identification Systems
Make sure you have a plan of action that includes a tracking system for customers who refer others. If your business is a small one a simple spreadsheet may do the trick. Once your business grows you may want to consider a large CMS system that can help you to implement your referral reward program. Add your referrers to the spreadsheet by their last name and then their first. Since you may have referrers who are family and share the last name, be sure to flag or list them as individuals so the program doesn't suffer any setbacks once it comes time for rewards.
Have a whiteboard or poster board created that lists all the rewards of your referral reward program. Make sure you have listed:
- Terms and Conditions
- How Long the Program will Last
- Rewards Offers
- Different Point-Value Systems
- Cash Offerings for Referrals
- Leading Referrers
Not only should you reward your referrers, but it can also be a great idea to show who your top referrers are. Often this can create a competitive atmosphere that will encourage even more referrals.
Share the Program
Make sure any of your employees that have direct customer contact will mention your referral programs as often as possible without overdoing it. If possible, have a punch card for them to share when they successfully refer a new consumer. This will give each referrer a positive reinforcement detail that is hard to ignore. As the card is checked or punched, each referrer receives not only the referral rewards program incentives, but also a hardcopy showing their own progress in your program.
Make sure your referral reward program is generous yet simple enough to easily encourage participation and not overly difficult to understand or expensive enough to result in serious monetary loss for your business. A referral rewards program should increase your business as well as widen your consumer base. If you find your bottom line doing a back peddle, it may be time to review what part of your rewards program seems to be causing the disparity.