Fashion eCommerce is a fiercely competitive space in India where businesses strive hard to acquire and retain users. With better network connectivity and access to low-cost data, Indian consumers are increasingly buying products online, and more predominantly on mobile than ever before. This calls for eCommerce retail businesses to have immersive experiences on desktop as well as mobile platforms. However, having a product with great user experience means nothing without users, and acquiring users on mobile is significantly more difficult compared to the desktop web; especially in the early stages and without a hefty marketing budget.
Fynd, an online fashion discovery and eCommerce store, had already built a great user experience and gained almost 100k app downloads in a short time period and they decided to leverage their existing user base to bring them the next 100k users. Coupled with lucrative brand sales on its platform, Fynd introduced a refer and earn scheme for its app users. For every new referral, the referring and referred user would get INR 200 cashback that they could use on the platform for future purchases. The results of this well-crafted referral program were extremely rewarding.
Within a period of 30 days, Fynd organically acquired the next 900k app users and brought their cost of acquiring (CAC) down tremendously. To add to that, the percentage of users who were acquired via the referral program and completed a purchase, was 2x that of users acquired via inorganic/paid channels. Because of this, the cost per user, one of the most important metrics for eCommerce companies, was significantly reduced.
One key element of Fynd’s in-app referral program was the personalized onboarding for new users. By using deep links that ensured that the first screen that a new user sees after downloading and installing the app is customized to their journey (i.e the referral link the user was coming in from). It also removed the hassles of using referral codes as it was embedded in the referral deep link, taking away the barrier of finding and adding referral codes. Similarly, inviting friends to download the app was made easier using referral links that worked seamlessly across all channels.
“At the center of any good referral program is a seamless user experience that is highly contextual and that helps new users unlock platform’s value as quickly as possible.”
-Ronak Modi, Product Growth Manager at Fynd
Users could see the referral scheme up front on the home feed. The messaging and call-to-action was clear.
Having successfully built a virality engine in-app, Fynd is now working to re-introduce the referral program in the next season of brand sales and to increase web to app conversion organically by meaningfully nudging the mobile web users to the mobile app.
It’s important to remember, that early on in the mobile growth journey, it’s imperative that content sharing and referrals are built into the DNA of the app experience to organically increase app downloads and acquire high-quality users.