Voucherify Complete User Guide

This is the perfect place to start your journey with Voucherify and prepare your account for the first campaign. We will cover the key concepts of Voucherify that will let you build attractive & effective promo campaigns. 

1. How does it work?
2. Step 1: Sign up (it’s free)
3. Step 2: Plan your integration
4. Step 3: Set up your account:
• Customers
• Products
• Metadata Schema
• Event Schema
• Integrations
5. Step 4: Launch the first campaign:
   • Campaign workflow
   • Rules Builder
   • Campaign Manager
   • Step-by-step tutorials
6. Step 5: Share codes:
   • Publications
   • Distributions
   • Landing Pages
7. Step 6: Manage redemptions
8. Step 7: Track campaigns
9. Help and support
10. Pricing glossary

How does Voucherify work?

Voucherify is an all-in-one platform that helps companies launch customized coupons, gift cards, auto-applied promotions, loyalty programs, referral campaigns, giveaways, and dynamic discounts.

A Voucherify account gives you access to API and Dashboard. This means that marketing teams and developers can create and manage Voucherify promotions. In this guide, we will focus on the Dashboard and mention a few crucial API functions. 

Step 1: Sign up (it’s free)

Voucherify gives you 30 days to play and test the platform for free. You can access a Sandbox project after creating the account and logging in. If you upgrade from the trial to a paid plan, the Sandbox project will be visible in your projects list but will not be counted toward your project limit. If you decide to use a free plan, you cannot create an additional project (besides Sandbox). Learn more about the Sandbox mode.

Projects enable you to organize different workspaces within a single account. You can separate your production and testing environments or create separate projects for different markets or time zones. Here are some project-specific settings:

• Unique API keys
• Currency & time zone
• Team structure
• Email domain & webhooks
• Metadata & Event Schema

Project currency

Setting up currency in the project enables you to display values in the desired format. Our API is currency-agnostic, so changes in project currency don't impact how the API calculates amounts.

Step 2: Plan your integration

Building the integration involves connecting with the Voucherify API. The integration connects your Voucherify account to your toolkit and customer touchpoints. Thanks to that, you can synchronize your data and validate/redeem Voucherify incentives in your system. When building the integration, you can connect only the API parts that you currently need and extend integration over time.  

Integration requirements

Here is a quick summary of points you need to consider while defining your integration requirements:

Promotional scenarios 

Which types of campaigns you want to run with Voucherify, including coupons, loyalty programs, referrals, cart-level discounts, gift cards, giveaways, and dynamic discounts.

Redemption touchpoints 

A deep dive into your customer journey and the technology supporting it. The aim is to discover how to apply Voucherify promotions to your e-commerce and CRM software.

User roles & budget 

Mapping how various departments can collaborate to create and maintain successful campaigns. Estimate how many users you will need and what access control is required to manage users’ data access.

Customer data 

An analysis of what customer attributes should feed Voucherify and how frequently to synchronize them to get the timing right.

Product catalog 

A plan to integrate Voucherify with your inventory to enable product-specific discounts.

Distribution 

Designing how to connect marketing channels with Voucherify distribution triggers.

Reporting 

An overview of Voucherify data export capabilities for business intelligence and data integrity purposes.

Migrations from legacy systems 

Planning how to transition your legacy campaigns without causing harm to the customer experience.

Data volume estimation 

Depending on the traffic and data volume, the integration might require additional activities like setting up a dedicated cluster or splitting campaigns into several Voucherify projects. Try to estimate your traffic that refers directly to the limit of API calls, which will provide seamless communication with our API.

Security requirements management 

Consider several security-sensitive inputs like PII data policy, GDPR requirements, history of fraud incidents, and organization access policy to design and set up a secure account compliant with international standards.

Integration time

The more campaign types, customer touchpoints, and 3rd party systems you want to integrate with Voucherify, the more developer effort is required. Once you have Voucherify integrated, adding new campaign types takes less and less time.

Here are some Integration time benchmarks:

• Lean startup – a day or two, our record is one-hour front-end and one-hour back-end to accept coupon redemptions in the production environment. 
• Small and medium-sized brands – on average, a week to launch the first campaign and a couple of weeks for more advanced scenarios.
• Enterprise brands with many dependencies – from a couple of weeks to several months, including securing the development team, going through security checks, and onboarding the marketing team.

Voucherify is API-first and headless, so you can implement Voucherify one step at a time. You can switch to Voucherify only for a part of the promotional stack and expand to the others in the future. 

Step 3: Set up your account 

The customization of your Voucherify account comes down to the following:

• Adding/syncing customers.
• Adding a product catalog.
• Customizing objects (vouchers, customers, etc.) with metadata.
• Integrating with your favorite tools.

Customers

The point of adding customers to Voucherify is segmentation and targeting. Your audience can be divided into segments based on behavior, order history, geographical attributes, and more. Segments can be used to create promotion rules and trigger auto-messages with promo codes. 

Adding customers

Before you explore segments, you need to decide how to synchronize customers. Here are your options:

• CRM integrations:
  • Batch
  • Intercom
  • ZOHO CRM
  • Segment.io
  • Salesforce
  • MailChimp
• Customers API
• CSV import

If you are not interested in uploading your customer data, you can operate on the source ID property, a unique customer identifier in Voucherify. To help you identify and update customer profiles, you can pass your CRM unique ID in the source ID field. It can be an email, phone number, or other characteristic of your choice.

Products

You can add your inventory to the Products section in the Dashboard. Syncing products enables you to create product-specific promotion rules straight from the Dashboard. However, if you don’t want to add a product catalog, you can use product metadata and execute product-related limits. 

• Read more about adding products to the Dashboard.
• Read more about product-specific campaigns without adding products to the Dashboard. 

Each product can have many variants called SKUs (stock-keeping units). Voucherify validates all items from the customer's cart, including products and SKUs, when executing product-specific limits.

Metadata Schema

Metadata enables you to add custom data to Voucherify. You can use metadata for building validation rules and reporting/tracking. Each metadata attribute is a key/value pair with custom information about Voucherify objects. You can assign metadata to the following object types:

For example, you can add custom customer attributes, like "group: VIP" and "source: AdWords," and segment them accordingly.

Metadata schema

The app provides Metadata Schema in your Project settings to provide data integrity and manage metadata across the Project. You can choose a particular schema and add new metadata definitions. The schema supports many data formats, including text, numbers, images, etc. You can create a new metadata definition, decide if it’s mandatory when adding a new object, and list accepted values. 

There are plenty of use cases for metadata, and each of them is unique. They offer you extreme flexibility and freedom in creating rules and limits for promotions and the segmentation of your customers. 

If you prefer watching over reading, learn more about metadata with our webinar.

Event Schema

Custom Events are your customers' actions that you track in your application/website. They’re best suited for tracking high-value customer interactions with your brand. You can pass those actions to Voucherify in real time by calling our Events API. Logging a custom event can trigger any number of distributions and enable customer segmentation around that event's recency and frequency.

The Custom Events are directly linked to the customers' resources from Voucherify, which means that each event is connected to a customer.

To use Custom Events, you need to follow the steps below:

1. Create an event definition in the Project Settings > Event Schema.
2. Use the Track Custom Event method to log the event in Voucherify every time a customer performs the desired action in your system.
3. Create workflow around the custom event:    
   • You can automatically send incentives to customers who performed an event, keeping in mind its recency and frequency.
   • Custom events can also be used to build earning rules. In response to these events, customers are rewarded with a predefined number of loyalty points. 

Read more about Custom Events.

Integrations

Voucherify lets you connect your favorite tools using API and built-in integrations. Visit our Integration Catalog to see what integrations we offer out-of-the-box:

• CRM integrations
• E-commerce integrations
• Messaging
• Marketing Automation
• Analytics

Step 4: Launch the first campaign

Campaigns can be created using the Dashboard or API. In the Dashboard, a Campaign Manager guides you through creating discount coupons, gift cards, loyalty programs, auto-applied promotions, referral campaigns, and giveaways.

Let’s use a typical campaign workflow to understand the key concepts better. Note that this is just an example; API and the Dashboard give you many ways to customize your campaigns. 

* Not recommended. We highly encourage you to create campaigns and validation rules using the Dashboard. 

Before we go through the Campaign Manager to create your first campaign, you must learn more about Voucherify Rules Builder. It creates validation rules – optional limits that must be met to redeem a promo code.

Rules Builder

You can access Rules Builder when creating a campaign in the Manager and add new rules on the spot (recommended solution for all users). You can also open the Rules Builder in the Validation Rules section (recommended for advanced users only). This section enables you to prepare and use rules in future campaigns beforehand. The Builder supports the following groups of rules:

• Audience-related rules define customers eligible for redemption or earning loyalty points.
• Order-related rules refer to order structure and order volume. You can specify the required cart structure and volume.
• Budget rules define redemption limits and campaign budget.
• Many advanced limits, including restricting redemption to a code owner and internal redemption limits related to data access.

Campaign Manager

Campaign Manager lets you create all promotion types supported by Voucherify. Creating a new campaign comes down to the following steps:

• Log into your account and click the plus in the Main view.
• Click Create next to the desired campaign type.
• Go through the Campaign Manager and configure campaign details.
• Review a campaign summary and confirm with Save.

Some settings are standard for all campaign types:

• Time limits, including the campaign timeframe.
• The number of incentives and optional validation rules.
• Campaign name and optional description.
• Campaign metadata for reporting and tracking purposes (optional).

Moreover, each campaign type has some specific settings related to its workflow.

Step-by-step tutorials

Visit our dedicated tutorials that will lead you through the Campaign Manager to create your first campaign:

• Fixed (standalone) public code
• Unique coupon campaign
• Gift cards campaign
• Referral program
• Loyalty program
• Cart-level promotion
• Giveaways
• Dynamic discounts

Step 5: Share codes

When the campaign is ready, you can share your incentives with customers. Two main concepts in Voucherify allow you to personalize and track incentive delivery. First, you can  publish each unique code (coupon, referral code, loyalty card, gift card) to a particular customer. Second, you can use landing pages and distributions that publish and send unique codes to customers or third-party applications.

Publication

Publication means assigning a code to a customer. As a result, the customer becomes a code owner. Publications are required for loyalty cards and referral codes to work correctly and are optional for coupons and gift cards. Regarding referral codes, publications enable Voucherify to count referred customers. Loyalty cards need to be assigned to collect points. Unique coupons and gift cards can also be published to particular customers to secure your incentives from misuse. Thanks to this mechanism, you can use the following campaign rules:

• Customer can join the campaign only once – optional campaign mode ensuring that each customer can own only one code from the given campaign. You can enable this campaign mode in the Campaign Manager > Program Size.
• Only for a customer who is a holder of the code – validation rule that limits code redemptions to a customer who has the code published to their account. Only the code owner can use the code. You can find this rule in the Advanced validation rules category. 
• Keep valid for a specific amount of time after publishing – allows you to define how long the code is valid after it was published to the customer. You can find this limit in the Campaign Manager > Timeframe.

There are many ways of publishing codes. Using a dedicated API method, manually in the Dashboard, or via distributions and landing pages, which we will cover in the following parts of this guide. 

Distributions

Distribution is a workflow set up in the Distribution Manager that sends messages from the Dashboard. Messages can be sent to customers or third-party applications of your choice. You can use distribution to send plain messages, inform customers about new promotions, and send(publish) unique codes. There are two distribution modes:

• Manual messages are a one-time action. Messages are sent after you confirm distribution in the Manager, and then the distribution is completed.
• Automatic distribution triggers messages in response to a predefined action like a customer’s birthday.

Every time you send a message with a unique code, the code is published to the message receiver. The Distribution Manager supports many channels like emails, SMS, webhooks, MailChimp, Braze, ActiveCampaign, and more. 

Landing Pages

Landing pages are automatically connected to your account. You can use them to collect subscribers, publish, and redeem codes. Voucherify validates incentives that your customers will use on the landing page, and thanks to real-time tracking, everything is noted in the Dashboard. Landing page templates are fully customizable to let you design and publish landing pages consistent with your branding and promotion needs. 

You can create the following landing pages:

• Subscribe form that triggers a message with a unique code to every new subscriber.
• Invitation to join a loyalty program that sends loyalty cards to every invited customer.
• Landing page with a redeeming form to let your customers redeem their promo codes.
• Landing page with subscribe form and referral links that ensure complete referral workflow. 

Step 6: Manage redemptions

Redemption is the single use of any code or cart-level promotion. In loyalty programs, redemption occurs when exchanging points for a reward. Your pricing plan defines the number of invoked redemptions you can handle monthly.

How does redemption work?

Your system must be connected to your Voucherify account to let customers redeem codes. This integration guarantees that the app will recognize promo codes used by your customers so they can be validated and redeemed. Each redemption attempt is noted in the Dashboard with details like status (success, failed), customer’s data, date time, and more. If the redemption fails, you’ll see the reason for the failure.

With Voucherify connected to your application, our API handles redemptions invoked by your customers and sends a response with a redemption result. You can also enable redemptions on your landing pages or web widgets. Moreover, the Dashboard allows manual redemptions straight from a detailed code view. 

Mobile application

For offline redemptions, you can use our mobile application. All you need to do is download the Voucherify application (it’s free) and log into your Voucherify account. From that moment, you can scan QR codes physically to validate and redeem incentives on mobile devices. The mobile app lets you also publish codes and track redemptions. 

Step 7: Track campaigns

Tracking the performance of your campaigns is crucial to securing your budget. Voucherify tracks redemptions and campaigns so you can analyze them with the Dashboard metrics or export data for future analysis in external BI tools. 

Reports and tracking

The internal reporting system comes down to the following concepts:

• Redemption tracking – every time someone tries to redeem your code, Voucherify notes the redemption results with details.
• Dashboard reports – a global perspective on your performance. They give you a bird's-eye view of what’s working best.
• Detailed campaign and incentive reports – you can track each campaign and incentive separately. 
• Distribution reports – graphs and activity tab, including distribution updates and a result of each sent message.
• Notifications – get automatically notified when something important happens. You can customize notification channels and events you want to be informed about.
• Customer activity tracking – 360-degree customer profile and Activity tab that notes all actions and updates of the customer’s data.
• Data export – enables you to analyze your promotions using external tools.
• Quick troubleshooting with filtering – comes in handy if there are any issues with your incentives. You can quickly filter codes based on numerous attributes and deactivate them with one click. 

Fraud prevention

Voucherify provides two-sided security and fraud prevention. On the one hand, redemption limits and tracking of every interaction with your campaigns guard you against client-side misuses. On the other hand, the app provides high-level account security with controlled data access, multi-factor authentication, SAML login protocol, and detailed account history. 

Help and support

Our team is always ready to support you. Please contact us if you have any questions or need more information about Voucherify's capabilities.

• Contact support if you need any help during your journey with Voucherify.
• Contact sales to discuss your expectations.
• Visit docs for developers.

Pricing glossary

The pricing glossary explains how our pricing works and which parts of Voucherify are limited by the subscription plan. 

Project

The project is a separate workspace in your account. Each project has its unique API keys. You can use projects to differentiate production and testing environments or create separate spaces for different stores, markets, or time zones.

API call

The API call is a single request sent using our API. You can create API calls using methods from API Reference or by using the Dashboard that calls the API behind the scenes. Hourly API call limit refers to a single project and can’t be exceeded. When you reach your limit, access to the API is blocked. The same applies to the monthly limit that is counted per all projects. You can monitor your current usage in the Project settings > API usage to prevent exceeding the limit. 

User

There is one account Admin that can invite other users to join a Voucherify account. Admin counts as one user. Users are assigned to specific projects, but the overall user limit refers to a single Voucherify account. 

Self-service subscription

When you choose a self-service subscription, you need to activate the paid or a free plan after the trial. From that moment, you’ll be charged monthly with the flexibility of upgrading and downgrading each month. Self-service accounts are hosted on the multi-tenant infrastructure (Asia Singapore, US East, or Europe Ireland). Users can get in touch with the Voucherify team via email support. 

Enterprise subscription

Enterprise subscriptions are individual offers prepared by our team based on your unique requirements. If you need higher limits or features not provided in self-service plans, let our team know, and we’ll get back to you to discuss details. Standard enterprise features include premium support, dedicated infrastructure, custom API calls, and redemption limits. 

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You can enjoy our support all along the way!