Retention Referral

# 1.5.2 Retention Referral

This skill defines the frameworks for keeping customers longer and turning them into acquisition engines.

1. Churn Prevention (Voluntary)

**Goal:** Rescue customers at the moment of cancellation.

* **Cancel Flow:** Trigger → Exit Survey (Reason) → Dynamic Save Offer → Confirmation.

* **Reason-Offer Mapping:**

* Price → Discount or Downgrade.

* Low Usage → Pause subscription (1-3 months).

* Missing Feature → Roadmap preview or Support intro.

* **Dark Patterns:** Avoid them. Keep the "Cancel" option clear to maintain brand trust.

2. Dunning & Involuntary Churn

**Goal:** Recover failed payments automatically.

* **Retry Logic:** Use "Smart Retries" (e.g., Stripe) to attempt charges on success-prone days.

* **Communication:** 3-4 plain-text emails over 10 days escalating in urgency. Provide a "no-login" link to update payment info.

* **In-App Alerts:** Display a persistent banner for accounts with past-due payments.

3. Referral Program Design

**Goal:** Engineering viral loops within the product.

* **The Loop:** Trigger Moment (Aha moment) → Share Action → Convert Friend → Reward.

* **Incentive Structure:** Double-sided rewards (Referrer gets X, Friend gets Y) are the most effective.

* **Milestones:** Use tiered rewards (e.g., "Refer 5 friends for a t-shirt") to encourage repeat sharing.

4. Affiliate & Partner Programs

**Goal:** Scale reach through external advocates.

* **Recruitment:** Focus on creators whose audience matches your Target Persona (Skill 14).

* **Commissions:** Use recurring percentage-based commissions for SaaS to align long-term incentives.

* **Enablement:** Provide affiliates with pre-made banners, email swipes, and "Vs" pages (Skill 17).

5. User Health Scoring

* **Metrics:** Track login frequency, key feature usage, and support sentiment.

* **Intervention:** For users with dropping health scores, trigger proactive outreach or re-engagement drip sequences.