💥3 Real-Life Referral Programs That Went Viral

Steal Their Playbook...Drive Referrals On A Budget

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Welcome back to another edition of Bootstrapped Growth. 👋

Today, we break down viral referral programs that drives huge growth. Learn from the best on a budget and nail the referral game.

Table of Contents

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🚀 Boost Growth With Best Practice Referral Program Examples

Great referral programs incentivize existing customers to recommend your product or service to others. People are more likely to trust recommendations through ‘word-of-mouth’ versus traditional marketing.

1) Robinhood's Waitlist Explosion (3m+ Users Pre-Launch)

Robinhood's (investing app) famous viral referral program was simple but exploded in growth. It commenced with 10,000 signups then hit 3 million before launch. Its elements:

  1. Join the waitlist (limited early access driving FOMO)

  2. Get a unique referral link

  3. Move up the list for each friend who joins (clear reward, skip the queue)

  4. See your exact position change in real-time (instant gratification)

Takeaway ➡️ Show real-time progress and waitlist position improvement

2) Harry's Pre-Launch Campaign (100k Email Signups in 1 Week)

Harry's (consumer razor business) had a simple tiered product-based (vs discount) reward system for encouraging signups. 77% of pre-launch signups came from referrals:

  • 5 friends = Free shaving cream (an achievable first tier)

  • 10 friends = Free razor

  • 25 friends = Free premium razor

  • 50 friends = Free year of blades (high-value final tier)

Takeaway ➡️ Use your product as currency. It appears more valuable to the consumer and costs less than discounts.

3) Dropbox's Double-Sided Reward Program (3900% Growth)

Dropbox (file hosting) gave 500MB free space of storage to both the referrer and the referred. Both sides got equal value and the product-based reward was instantly useful. This program saw an explosion of user growth from 100k to 4mil users in 15 months.

Takeaway ➡️ Simple, equal rewards drive faster sharing and therefore more exponential signup growth

⭐️ Handy Tips For Implementing Referral Programs

✓ Build progress tracking (e.g. basic spreadsheets)

✓ Create sharing assets (templates, buttons, links). Write compelling referral email copy like the template below:

Subject: Skip the 1,234 person waitlist
Body: Hey! I thought you'd like [product]. Use my link to jump ahead of [X] people in line: [link]
PS: I move up too when you join 😊

✓ Set up conversion tracking

✓ Launch to small test group first

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