eBooks, Guides, and Reports
Playbooks, best practices, and research to help you plan, launch, and grow referral programs.
Playbook
2026 Referral Marketing Playbook
Most brands run one referral program and call it a day. The highest-performing brands run three or more. This playbook shows you exactly how.
Guide
2025 Referral Marketing Best Practices Guide
Your current customers are the key to your growth. Turn them into advocates with enticing rewards and engaging programs.
Online guide
32 Referral Marketing Best Practices for Retailers
Referral is one of the few channels that turns customer engagement into customer acquisition. These 32 best practices show retailers how to build a referral program that advocates and their friends love.
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Online guide
Financial Services Marketing: How To Leverage Referrals
Your clients are your best advocates. These 40 best practices show financial institutions how to build referral programs that win high-quality customers and outperform competitors.
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Online guide
Power Your Credit Union’s Growth with Our Referral Marketing Best Practices
Turn your most valuable members into your greatest ambassadors. These 36 referral marketing best practices show credit unions how to win new members, including younger ones, through digital referral.
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Online guide
Leverage These 30 Referral Best Practices for B2B Companies
Referrals are how most B2B purchases begin. These 30 best practices show B2B companies how to expand their audience, build long-term loyalty, and keep marketing costs low with referral.
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Online guide
Make the Most of Social Media With Your Influencer Program
Identify your most social media-savvy customers with the biggest following, and activate them for your brand. This guide walks through the Extole Influencer Program features, from the application experience to rewards and reporting.
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Online guide
QR Codes for Marketing: The Secret Weapon of Referrals
QR codes are simple to create and work in nearly any environment, physical or digital. They are also easier to share than a typical referral link. Here is how to use them in your referral program.
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Study
Forrester Total Economic Impact™ Study of Extole
Forrester Consulting quantified the opportunity: $19.1M in incremental revenue over 3 years.
Online guide
Buyer’s Guide for Referral Marketing Platforms
Building or upgrading a referral program can be daunting. This guide gives you a smart framework for evaluating referral technology providers.
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Online guide
Financial Services Buyer’s Guide for Referral Marketing Platforms
Building or upgrading a referral program can be daunting. This guide gives financial services marketers a smart framework for evaluating referral technology providers.
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Online guide
How Leading Financial Services Marketers Design Refer-a-Friend
Learn from financial services leaders how to design a referral program that customers find, love, and share, based on Extole's work with marketing and technology teams.
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Online guide
The Essential Referral Email Guide
Email is the most common way for customers to recommend your brand to their friends. See how the best refer-a-friend programs use it, from the first share to the reward.
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Online guide
How to Promote Your Referral Program: A Few Hot Tips
A practical guide to where, when, and how to promote your referral program to scale acquisition, with real-world examples from companies in different industries.
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Online guide
Encyclopedia of Referral Marketing
Master refer-a-friend programs with the definitive source for concepts, terms, acronyms, and use cases. Referrals from A to Z.
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Online guide
Fact vs. Fiction: 5 Referral Marketing Myths
Referrals are the acquisition marketing channel for the next decade. They attract new customers to brands, but many people still don't understand how or why. Here are five common myths and the facts behind them.
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Online guide
Why We Share: How to Tap into the Consumer Psyche
The rise of social media has changed how consumers share content and ideas. Brands need to understand what motivates advocacy.
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Research report
Gigaom Research Report: Workhorses and Dark Horses
Digital tactics for customer acquisition. Gigaom Research surveyed 300 U.S. digital marketers to learn what works.
Online guide
Retail Survey: How Referrals and Other Top Channels Drive Retail Revenue
Retailers' digital marketing budgets are increasing. A nationwide Extole survey of retail marketers shows where the money is going and which channels deliver.
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Report
Internet Retailer Report: Getting Personal
Retailers’ digital marketing budgets are soaring. Get your advocates talking with referrals.
Online guide
Retailers Who Care About Loyalty Choose Referral Marketing
Loyalty plus referrals is a positive connection. Extole surveyed over 300 retail marketers in 2014 to find out why retailers with loyalty programs use referral marketing about twice as much as those without.
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