Your best customers are already selling for you.
Give every customer a link to share with friends. The friends they bring in cost you less than an ad, and they stick around longer.
Share with a friend
Give $10, get $10
Friend’s first order
Why referred customers are worth more
Not just cheaper. Worth more.
People trust their friends more than they trust ads. In one of the biggest surveys ever done on it, 84% of people said a recommendation from someone they know is the most believable advertising there is.
That trust shows up later, in the money. A study that followed about 10,000 customers for three years found the ones who came in through a referral were worth at least 16% more over their lifetime than customers from other channels, and they stayed longer, for years, not just for a first order.
You only pay when it works. The reward comes out of a real order that's been paid for, not a click and not a visit. And it gets better if you pay in points: a discount code gets used once and forgotten, but points go into the same balance that moves customers up your VIP tiers.
Nielsen (2013) and Schmitt, Skiera & Van den Bulte (2011). Both are referral-program research generally, not Essential-specific figures.
How it works
Your customers do all the work.
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01
Your customer shares their link
Everyone gets one automatically. Nothing for you to set up per person.
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02
Their friend claims the reward
In a popup. No sign-up form first: claiming it creates the account.
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03
The friend places an order
A real order, on your store.
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04
Your customer gets their reward
Once that order is paid, and not before.
Example: a customer shares her link. Her friend claims 10% off in the popup, then orders a $50 cart. As soon as that order is paid, she gets her 10% too. Reward options: a set amount, a percentage, a free product, free shipping, or points. Pick one for each side: it starts at 10% off for both.
Fraud protection
People will try to cheat it. They won't get far.
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Only new customers can claim
Someone already shopping with you can't grab a welcome reward with a second email.
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No reward for a click
Your customer gets paid when their friend's order is paid, not for sharing, not for a visit.
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Once per pair of people, ever
Two friends can't keep referring each other back and forth.
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Invites are capped at 10 at a time
It stays word of mouth instead of a spam blast.
FAQ
Questions merchants actually ask
Anything else? The support team answers every message, on every plan, including free.
- A way for your existing customers to send new customers your way, in exchange for a reward. Essential gives every customer a personal link; sharing it and getting a friend to order is the whole mechanic.
- There's real research behind it. A 2011 study in the Journal of Marketing followed about 10,000 customers for three years and found the referred ones were worth at least 16% more over their lifetime. Both that and the Nielsen trust figure are studies of referrals in general, not numbers from Essential.
- No. There are no commissions and no payouts to track. Each side gets one reward, once: it's not an ongoing arrangement.
- Yes. Referrals work on every plan, including Free. Nothing to unlock.
- When their friend's order is paid. A click or a sign-up on its own doesn't count.
- From the link itself. The friend has to arrive through that link and claim their reward. There's no cookie or background tracking involved.
- It's hard to. The friend has to be a genuinely new customer, the reward only pays out on a real paid order, and the same two people can only do it once.
- In their account on your store. Everyone gets one automatically.
Let your customers do the selling.
Install free. Every customer gets a link to share from day one.