Some of the most effective rewards you can use for your referral program are physical items. Like branded clothing, mugs, accessories... or even something a little crazier.
But — unlike digital rewards (which you can send via email) — physical rewards require more work to fulfil.
First, you need to collect the shipping address (and any sizing/variant details) from the winner. Second, you need to get this data to whoever is responsible for shipping the reward.
With other referral solutions, fulfilling physical rewards like this requires a huge amount of custom technical implementation (or just a lot of ongoing manual work).
But, with SparkLoop, you have not one, not two, but three really easy ways to automate your physical reward fulfilment:
If you have an ecommerce store set up already → use our coupon codes feature
If you don't have a merch provider yet and want the easiest option → use our 2-click Printful integration
If neither of the first two options work for you → read on to learn about how you can use our collection pages to easily automate fulfilment of any physical reward
How to automate physical reward fulfilment using SparkLoop collection pages
After you've created your milestone reward in SparkLoop, you'll be asked to choose a fulfilment method.
Choose the last option: Custom/Zapier (collect shipping address)
Add reward variants
You'll then see an option to add any sizing or variant options for your reward item.
For example if you have different sizes of t-shirt, or different mug designs, you would create a different variant for each one you have available.
(If you're going to automate fulfilment via a third party platform such as Shipstation or Shopify, you might also want to add the variant-specific SKU to make it easier to identify)
Customize your collection page
One you've added the correct variants, you'll see instructions on how to customise your collection page.
Your collection page is like a checkout. It's a custom-branded page where the reward winner can enter their sizing/styling and shipping details, so you can send them the reward.
Sending an automated reward email to the winner
When one of your subscribers wins the reward, you should send them an automated reward email.
In this email, you congratulate them for winning the reward, thank them for sharing, and include a unique link to their collection page.
This unique reward link only works for that subscriber. And only allows for one reward to be redeemed. So you can be sure they won't share it with friends.
You can choose to send this reward email through your ESP or through SparkLoop:
How to handle the fulfilment process
When a reward winner has entered their shipping details on the collection page, it's time to ship the reward.
To fulfil the reward, choose from three options:
Manual fulfilment
Automate fulfilment using Zapier
Automate fulfilment using Webhooks
Manual reward fulfilment
If you plan on shipping the rewards yourself, SparkLoop makes this easy.
You'll receive an email notification with the winner's shipping address and variant details.
And you can find a record of each reward won, the shipping/variant details and fulfilment status in your Reward Logs:
Automate fulfilment using Zapier
Working with a third-party distribution centre for your rewards, or have fulfilment set up through a provider like Swag.com, SwagUp, Shopify, Woocommerce, Shipstation etc?
You can easily use our Zapier integration to pass the required data through to your fulfilment provider (or wherever you want), each time someone new wins a reward.
Here's a video walkthrough explaining how:
Automate fulfilment using Webhooks
⚠️ requires technical skills
Want to build a completely custom, automated fulfilment flow each time a subscriber unlocks a reward?
Advanced users with technical knowledge can do so using our webhooks: