How Evolve Skateboards Turns Customers Into Influencers With ReferralCandy

Referral program top line results

• Referral sales totaling over AUD 1 million AUD
• Referrals were responsible for 5% of all monthly transactions
• Evolve Skateboards achieved its goal of growing word-of-mouth on social channels

"Word-of-mouth marketing is important for our brand. ReferralCandy helped us maximize its effectiveness."

‍Fleur Anning
‍Co-founder, Evolve Skateboards

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About Evolve Skateboards

Evolve Skateboards is the industry leader for electric skateboards and has been designing and manufacturing high-performance electric skateboards and accessories for 12 years.

Started in Australia, Evolve Skateboards has expanded into service centers and distributors serving over 40 countries.

With its award-winning product and dedication to excellent customer service, Evolve Skateboards has earned the trust and confidence of its customers - and gotten excellent word of mouth.

Building on community word of mouth to stand out

“We have always sold boards through word of mouth, as our customers are skating billboards for us,” notes Fleur Anning, co-founder.

But the Evolve Skateboard team knew that having an excellent product was not enough. They were aware of the immense competition they faced, both online and from the competition. They needed something to stand out.

They decided to use ReferralCandy to turn their customers’ word-of-mouth into a powerful message to drive sales. “ReferralCandy takes the word-of-mouth concept and digitalizes it amongst friendship groups and social media.”

“As so many things are vying for people’s attention, it’s hard to get people to stop and look at what you’re offering. ReferralCandy works so well because people are seeing a friend’s recommendation, so they’re less likely to dismiss it straight away."

Word-of-mouth results

Evolve Skateboards Australia has been using ReferralCandy and achieved some truly radical results:

• Over $1M in referral sales
• 28X Return-on-Investment on their referral program
• Referrals contributed to 5% of all transactions
• Close to 20,000 customers enrolled in the referral program
• Over 1,000 social media shares, with over 10 clicks per share. Evolve Skateboards has run a successful referral program, driving both direct sales to customers and boosting its word-of-mouth presence.

"Referrals have been an important driver of revenue and branding."

‍Fleur Anning
‍Co-founder, Evolve Skateboards

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Let’s look at three things the Evolve Skateboard team used to make their program a success.

1. Creating an irresistible referral offer (that fit the brand and customers)

Instead of offering cash discounts, Evolve Skateboards selected the perfect referral incentives for its community:

• New referred customers got a starter pack with useful essentials like an LED skate light and a vertical rack mount for their new skateboard - perfect for someone purchasing their first electric skateboard
• Referring friends received a 20% off voucher that could be used for accessories - which deepened their relationship with the brand.

Evolve Skateboards picked referral rewards that appealed to their customers and would deepen their brand loyalty. The referral link also appears on numerous YouTube Channels featuring Evolve Skateboards:

2. Promoting their referral program to their customers

After every purchase from Evolve Skateboard, each customer received a post-purchase email, telling them about their referral program.

The Evolve team made use of the custom theme editor to brand the post-purchase email:

The team also made sure that customers knew about the referral program by placing a prominent link on their website.

3. Making it easy for customers to share the referral program

The team also made it easy for customers to share the program by adding a default sharing message and an eye-catching social sharing image. Here’s what sharing your referral link looks like on Facebook:

The beautiful image (featuring the Evolve Skateboard) was exactly what was needed to get people to stop and look at the offer — and turn customers into online influencers for the brand as well.

Evolve Skateboards: A successful referral program

Evolve Skateboard’s referral program succeeded on two counts - by driving significant sales and by growing the brand through organic word-of-mouth.

The success of the referral program led to Evolve Skateboards expanding to two more markets - New Zealand and the USA, in addition to Australia.

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