Refer a Friend

Posted by lchrisman at 10:00 AM on Apr 1, 2024

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Vision provides a variety of tools and automation to implement and manage a referral program to increase signups. If subscribers refer a friend, family member or neighbor to the provider, the new customer, existing customer or both customers can receive a credit on their bill. Vision helps track those referrals and apply the proper credit(s) to customer accounts at the desired time.  

If you would like to implement a referral program, please have your point of contact reach out to Vision's support team to assist with setup and configuration.  

Referrals can be identified and tracked through Vision in multiple ways -   

  • A new customer signs up using a current customer's unique referral code, URL, or QR code to sign up in the public shopping cart.  

  • The new customer calls and signs up for service and a CSR enters the unique referral code at checkout.   

  • A CSR manually adds a tag to the new customer’s account, referencing the current customer who referred them.   

Any of these methods result in a tag being added to the new customer account, identifying them as a referral and identifying the referring customer. That tag can then trigger additional actions as defined by the provider - for example, a credit on the referring customer’s account, the new customer’s account, or both.  

Establishing Unique Referral Codes 

Unique referral codes, custom URLs and QR codes allow your subscribers to easily refer friends and family to sign up via Vision’s public shopping cart. Upon request, Vision can add these 4-digit codes to all existing and future subscribers.  

The codes can be found on a subscriber’s account summary tab. Subscribers can also access their own codes via the customer portal.  

[ADD SCREENSHOT OF BOTH THE INTERNAL VIEW ON THE SUMMARY TAB AS WELL AS THE CUSTOMER PORTAL VIEW OF THE UNIQUE CODES] 

Building a Referral Workflow 

To automate or trigger referral incentives, a Referral workflow must be established. This workflow type can be added by Vision upon request.  

The referral workflow will vary but may include steps such as “Add Referral Credit,” where specific credit behavior can be outlined for the new and/or existing customers. For example, you may wish to wait to apply referral credits until the new customer has been installed, or until they pay their first invoice.  

If the conditions to apply the referral credit are not met on the first attempt, additional attempts may be scheduled at your desired interval (for example, daily or weekly). You can also opt for a manual review if a credit does not go through after a specified amount of time.  

If your referral program offers incentives outside a one-time credit to the new and/or existing customers’ accounts, you can use the Referral workflow to trigger manual actions – such as mailing a gift card or other incentive.  

Scheduling Referrals Events 

Referral workflows run from “Referrals” calendar events, which outline when referral workflows will be launched on the new customers’ account. Those calendar events must be scheduled in order to launch the workflows. Depending on your business practices, this could be set up as a daily task or monthly just before the billing cycle. The first "Referrals" calendar event will catch all subscribers with a referral tag, so if referrals already exist in your system, you may wish to manually review those during the first Referrals event. Referral workflows must also be associated with the appropriate subscriber type.  

Examples 

Here are a couple of sample scenarios of how a referral might be processed in Vision.  

Betty is a new customer, and her neighbor Steve shares his unique link when he encourages Betty to sign up. Betty can use that link which will direct her to the online shopping cart where she can go through and search her address, fill out contact information, set up a portal account and select a day for installation. After Betty signs up, a referral tag on her account will indicate that Steve referred to her, and a Referral workflow will be launched at the next scheduled time. Depending on the process outlined in that workflow, Betty and/or Steve Might receive a referral credit at the time designated by the provider (for example, after Betty's service is installed or after she has paid her first invoice).  

Suzy is a current customer, and Bob is her neighbor looking for better broadband service. Suzy shares her unique QR code with Bob to get him signed up with a new service. Bob signs up for a service, Suzy's account is tagged, and a referral workflow is launched to implement the specific credits as defined by the provider. 

Promoting Your Referral Program 

Tools in Vision can help you spread the word about your referral program to customers. These tools include -   

  • Unique referral codes and QR codes on each subscriber account  

  • Unique referral codes and QR codes accessible in the customer portal  

  • Email templates to send unique referral codes and URLs to customers in mass via a marketing campaign or individually via a batch notification in a workflow (for example, after a customer is installed)  

  • Direct mail tools to send unique referral codes to customers via postcards or letters.  

To get started with implementing a referral program in Vision, please reach out to the Vision Support Team.