Spotlight: Populate Anything & Unique ID for Automated Referral Programs

Power tip! Chris Odell built an automated referral and rewards program with the help of Populate Anything and Unique ID. We explore how it works, step by step.

chris odell's gravity forms referral and rewards program

Pro wizard Chris Odell built an epic referral program that allows users to refer new people to a client website, receive follow-ups, and enrolls new users in additional sequences for rewards. And it’s completely automated. 

Among other things, it involves Gravity Forms Populate Anything and Gravity Forms Unique ID

It’s just too cool and we thought we’d take a high level look at each perk’s involvement in case y’all ever wanted to try something similar. Ready?

  1. When a user signs up on this wizard’s client website through Gravity Forms, they are assigned a unique ID (via, duh, Gravity Forms Unique ID) in a custom field on their profile.
  2. When that same person wants to refer someone else (i.e. for rewards), they use a custom referral link. This link contains a “referral code” in the URL parameters, which is really just their unique ID from step one, so: www.website.com/?zon=XYZ — where “XYZ” = their unique ID. 
  3. When that referral link is used for a new sign up, Populate Anything is used to check the URL parameters of the new registration.
  4. If Populate Anything confirms that a new user has the “referral code” (ahem, Unique ID) of the person who referred them, a follow-up email to the original user is sent, thanking them for referring a new user!
  5. This creates a chain reaction of other automations. Notably, a drip email sequence to the email in the Email field from the original form to allocate rewards for creating a new referral.
  6. From here, Unique ID creates a new referral code for the new user, and the process continues… on and on.

See how the backend is configured below. The 4 fields are all included on-screen, where, according to Chris:

The first field captures the ‘ZON’ parameter from the new user, and the second/third fields use Populate Anything to pull the original user’s name/email so we can send them a notification. The fourth field auto generates the new referral ‘ZON’ code for the new user to send to other people.

chris odell's referral program in gravity forms

So simple! And so powerful. If you’re trying to build something similar, don’t hesitate to reach out!

Comments

  1. Dee Kumar
    Dee Kumar February 1, 2024 at 11:01 pm

    Subject: Request for Guidance on Implementing Referral Program with Gravity Forms for Course Registration Discounts

    Dear Support Team,

    I am planning to enhance our course registration process on my WordPress site by integrating an automated referral program using Gravity Forms. The primary goal is to incentivize potential students with a 50% discount for referring a friend to the same course. Upon a successful referral, both the referrer and the referee should receive a 50% discount. I’m considering options for applying this discount directly at registration or issuing a refund after verification.

    Could you provide detailed guidance or point me to resources on how to implement this using “Gravity Forms Unique ID” and “Gravity Forms Populate Anything”? Specifically, I need assistance in setting up the system to track referrals, apply discounts appropriately, and automate the process as much as possible.

    Your expertise and any additional suggestions on managing this referral program effectively would be greatly appreciated.

    I will purchase the professional edition from Gravitywiz as soon as I am confident this can be done with your solutions. :)

    Thank you for your time and assistance.

    Best regards,

    Dee

    Reply
    1. Matt Andrews
      Matt Andrews Staff February 2, 2024 at 11:02 am

      Hi Dee,

      This should be possible using GP Populate Anything, GP Unique ID and GP eCommerce Fields.

      You would generate a Unique ID for each submission, and use this as the referral code. You can then use Populate Anything to populate the appropriate Entry ID into a hidden field, based on the referral code entered. If this is valid, you can then conditionally display a Discount field to apply the 50% discount to the form.

      I have followed up with an email that goes into this in more detail.

      Best,

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