Referral marketing

Referral marketing is a word-of-mouth initiative designed by a company to incentivize existing customers to introduce their family, friends, and contacts to become new customers. Unlike pure word-of-mouth strategies—where customers independently share information without company involvement or ability to track—referral marketing actively incentivizes and rewards existing customers for referring new ones, allowing the company to influence, track, and measure the referral process.

The process is distinct from multi-level marketing, in that there is no incentive for the original existing customer to drive or influence the subsequent referrals of the new customer^{[clarification needed]} – only the conversion of the initial, primary customer is rewarded.^[1]