How to create a Coupon Reminder Program in Dotdigital (Referrer / Customer)

About this Program

With this program, you can remind existing customers (referrers) to use their new coupon codes they have received from introducing their friend (referee) to your brand. 

By implementing this program, you can encourage existing customers to help:

• Increase Active Customer Revenue
• Increase Premium Customer Revenue
• Increase Retention

The program utilises data sent from Mention Me to Dotdigital through the integration and the Program builder functionality of Dotdigital.

Pre-requisites

1. An active Mention Me powered referral program that rewards prospective new customers with a reward
2. A Mention Me / Dotdigital enabled integration
3. Knowledge of Liquid Scripting 

Supported channels

• Email

Basic workflow

1. An existing customer of your brand gets a coupon when they have successfully introduced a friend to your brand (Email sent by Mention Me).

2. A reminder email (subject to consent) is sent to them to use the coupon if they have not purchased anything yet

3. Further reminders are sent at different times to encourage the customer to use their coupon if they have not purchased

Steps to create the program

• Create Program flow with 3 x reminder emails
  • Tip: You can use the campaign templates that Mention Me created as part of enabling the integration as a base for your email
• Add content to each reminder email
• Test the preview of each email
• Activate the program

Step 1: Create the program flow

1. Create the Start Criteria with the following settings:

• Enrolment schedule: Set it to run daily at 23:00
  • This is so that it picks up customers who have received their reward that day (today)

• Enrolment rule: Base the enrolment rule on a segment and create a new one (called Mention Me Referrer Rewarded today) to look for customers who received their referrer reward today from the insight collection called mm-received_referrer_reward

Enrolment limits: Set to Re-enrol contacts after 1 day

• It is set that way because they could refer more than one friend and therefore you want to remind them about their new coupon

• Add wait delays before or after the email because:

  • Before 1st send:

    • Mention Me will send the first email to the referrer immediately after the reward, so delay the first Dotdigital email slightly.

  • After 1st send:

    • Check to see if the user already purchased to avoid unnecessary reminders.

  • Suggested wait periods:

    • 1st email - 7 days after the segment trigger
    • 2nd email - 14 days after the 1st email is sent
    • 3rd email - 14 days after the 2nd email is sent

If you are unsure of your reward validity period, reach out to your Mention Me CSM or Mention Me support to check the validity period for your campaign.

• Add in a Decision split to check that the referrer has purchased in the last x days
  • This is done to avoid sending a coupon use reminder to a customer who already purchased.
  • Create a decision split for each condition:
    • 1st email - Purchased in last 7 days
    • 2nd email - Purchased in last 14 days
    • 3rd email - Purchased in last 14 days
  • Add an Exit Program node on Yes branch — they’ve already purchased.
  • Referrers who didn’t purchase (No branch) continue to next emails.

• Add an Email campaign and select one of the Pre-configured emails that Mention Me has created (You can customise them in Step 2)

• Add in an Exit Program after the last email send

• Repeat steps 2 - 4 for each email being sent

Step 2: Add content to each email

As part of the setup of the Mention Me Dotdigital integration, we create 3 x pre-configured triggered email campaigns that you can use to build out the Program.

• The templates use data from the Insights collection called mm-received_referrer_reward.
• The Mention Me data is used to create a personalised email experience using Liquid Scripting.
• The 3 x pre-configured emails can be found under Triggered Emails:

Steps to customise templates:

1. Update the emails to include your imagery and styling to suit your brand
2. Change the tone of voice to suit your brand
3. Include product recommendations in your emails to increase conversion

Template content

Each email will have the following components:

1. Liquid markup block:

• This gets the latest insight collection so you can send the newest coupon the referrer received
• Shows a default name placeholder if the customer's first name does not exist

{% assign last_referrer_reward = contact.insight.mm-received_referrer_reward | last %}
{% if contact.data.firstname %}
  {% assign customer_name = contact.data.firstname %}
{% else %}
  {% assign customer_name = "there" %}
{% endif %}

2. Reminder Email Examples using Liquid variables:

Liquid variables used:

Example of emails with and without variable compilation:

Example with variables	Example with compiled data

Step 3: Test the preview of the email

1. Click the Preview button in the email editor

2. Select a customer who meets the trigger segment

3. Previewed email will show relevant data

Step 4: Activate the program

Once you are satisfied with the content and test previews, activate the program.