Referral fraud prevention mechanisms

Many referral fraud prevention mechanisms come built-in with referral campaigns powered by inviteReferrals. So, you can focus only on conceptualizing the referral campaign and leave the technology to us. Following are various referral fraud prevention mechanisms.

1. Optionally review and approve referrals

You can set the referral conversions of the campaign for manual review and approval process. The referrer is notified about pending approval immediately as soon as referral conversion happens. You can later review and approve each referral. Post approval the referrer receives a second email with the referral reward. This is particularly useful when you are giving away high-value referral incentives or where payment happens through offline mode. More information here

2. Identify suspicious participants

The complete referral profile of each participant can be analyzed. Data includes invites sent through each channel, referral visits, conversions, and rewards issued. Users can also be searched by email. Most influential referrers can be identified based on multiple filters. Suspicious participants can be identified and blocked, leveraging the best AML software for enhanced accuracy.

3. Associate expiry date with coupons

You can prevent coupon misuse by setting an expiry date for your discount coupons. You can then periodically change the coupon codes that are used in your campaigns. Discount coupon amounts should also be set in a way that you still benefit from every purchase made. Following types of limitations may be imposed

1. Discount of $10 on purchases of  $100 and above
2. Coupon valid only up to 31st July
3. Coupons applicable only to new customers
4. Coupons are valid only on a limited category of products. These products may be part of the inventory to be cleared, like a season-end sale.

If your e-commerce platform supports it, you can also prevent coupon misuse by limiting the use of referral coupons to new customers only. This can be done by checking the email address or shipping address of the customer against your database of past customers. If it happens to be an existing customer, display a message on the checkout screen indicating that the referral coupon only applies to new customers only.

This usage restriction should also be stated clearly in the campaign terms and conditions section so that customers are not surprised by it during checkout. This is a very effective referral fraud prevention method.

4. Separate terms and conditions section

Separate terms and conditions section can be added to each campaign to define the rules violating the campaign participation. Clearly defined rules act as a big deterrent for fraudsters and an effective referral fraud prevention mechanism.

5. Email Notification System

A notification system forms an important part of any referral program. A weak notification system may easily be exploited by users and may lead to unwanted spam. This is why InviteReferrals has many strong referral fraud prevention checks as part of its notification system. InviteReferrals sends emails to customers on the following occasions :

• Enrollment Mail – Whenever a customer is enrolled on a referral campaign
• Invitation Mail – Whenever a customer invites his friends to check out the referral campaign through the “Email Invite Option”
• Successful Referral Mail – Mail to referrer for successfully referring his friend, after his friend checks out the referral campaign

Measures are taken to prevent spamming

1. Unsubscribe Link – An unsubscribe link is provided in every email sent to the customer so that he can unsubscribe from the referral campaign’s email notification system rather than marking the mail as spam.
2. Spam Prevention – A customer can send an invite to a particular friend only once. But he can invite as many friends as he wants to. So no one can trick the referral system to spam his network. Ensuring a good user experience is our priority.
3. Multiple Email Prevention – InviteReferrals make sure that the same email is not delivered to the same customer again and again.
4. Email Customization – Any mail template can be completely customized through the WYSIWYG editor to reflect the relevant content.

Referral fraud prevention is effectively dealt with by InviteReferrals referral software. It has industry best practices built right into your referral campaigns.