Important note: This is a critical review and not a salesletter or an ad!

Format

Cgi-script (written in Perl).

Delivered as a zip-file.

Review

What this script does

Viral Refer Pro is a socalled refer-a-friend script - also called a tell-a-friend script.

It works this way: When someone visits your web site, they'll see your refer-a-friend form. If that visitor fills in this form, he will send an email message to one or more of his friends. This message can be a recommendation of your business, your web site, ezine or whatever. That's up to you as the webmaster of the site.

There is nothing new in this concept. It has been on the Internet for years.

What's different about Viral Refer Pro is it's viral features. You see, if you really want to motivate your visitors to use your refer-forms, you better give them a really good reason to do so. For instance, you could offer them some kind of download (an ebook or e-report) in exchange for their recommendation of your site.

The problem, however, is that many of the users of your refer-forms probably won't fill in real names and email-addresses. Or even if they do, many of these receivers of these emails may not belong to your target market.

What this means is that your viral marketing campaign will be stopped. The emails (recommending your web site, business, ezine etc.) that your visitors send to others, never get read. The visitors get your downloads (which they get in exchange for recommending your site), but you don't get much more traffic to your web site.

Do you see the problem?

Viral Refer Pro offer a solution to this problem.

What Viral Refer Pro does, is that it requires the person who receives an email recommending your web site (or whatever) to actually visit your web site. If this person doesn't  actually visit your web site, the visitor who recommended your web site won't get the gift you offer him in exchange for recommending your web site.

This is just short explanation of what Viral Refer Pro does. There are several ways of adjusting the script (through the control panel), according to your particular wishes and needs.
 

Ease of set-up

Viral Refer Pro was easy to set up. Everything went fine and I had no problems. 

The documentation is really good and to the point.

Setting up your individual refer-forms, can be done directly through the control panel. It's not difficult in any way, but you'll probably have to invest 15 minutes or so, in order to plan and set up each particular form.

In my experience, when setting up refer-forms, the planning process is extremely important. Of course you can just jump ahead and set up a dozen of forms in five to ten minutes, without giving too much thought to how you want them to work. But I don't recommend that.

If you really want to benefit from this script (and any other refer-a-friend script), I strongly recommend that you invest the small amount of time it takes to plan each campaign. Because that's exactly what it is. Each refer-form should be a vital part of a complete and well planned campaign. That's what this script is meant for and does really well.

Features

Viral Refer Pro has a lot of features. Here are some of them:

• The control panel is password protected so that no intruders can destroy anything for you.
• New refer-forms can be set up directly through the control panel.
• You can control your script and your forms directly through the control panel.
• After having set up your forms, they can be changed and adjusted directly through the control panel.
• In the control panel you get exact statistics over the number of users of your forms etc.
• You can delete the statistics any time you want, and start all over.
• You have easy access to the logs, which display new users, their email-addresses, their IP, the date they use your forms etc.
• When you set up new forms and want to choose a format, you can either use 1) standard settings, 2) default settings, 3) settings you've copied from another of your (existing) forms, or 4) custom settings.
• Your forms can easily be deleted, just by clicking on a button in the control panel.
• When you set up new messages (that appear in each section of the form), you can either use 1) standard settings, 2) default settings, 3) settings you've copied from another of your (existing) forms, or 4) custom settings. Just like it's the case when choosing the format of new forms.
• The reward settings can also be customized according to your wishes and needs. This can also be done through the control panel.
• The settings of the recommendation-emails can also be totally customized.
• Viral Refer Pro has it's own "cookie"-system which prevents your users from trying to cheat (i.e. users sending emails to their own accounts to earn credits).
• Etc.

Ease of using

The documentation for Viral Refer Pro is really good. Short and right to the point. And you still get all the details you need in order to get the script to work optimal.

I found the script really easy to use in your day-to-day operations. Once you've set up your forms, almost everything takes care of itself. 

You just need to visit the control panel from time to time in order to assure that everything is working correctly. By going to the database section, you'll get a good overview over who's using your forms and how popular they are.

The control panel is really good, in my opinion. Most functions explain themselves, and the navigation is really good.

How well this script works

What really sets this script apart from most other refer-a-friend scripts, is of course it's anti-cheating features. In fact, I don't know any other script that has the same anti-cheating features.

Actually, I've been looking for a script precisely like this for some time before I found Viral Refer Pro. I even contacted a famous programmer and shared the idea with him, and he liked it. But then other projects came across and we didn't proceed with the idea. So, I was pleasantly surprised when I discovered that Paul Hancox had made this new script. And consequently I was also excited to see how well it works.

After having tested the script for some time, my conclusion is that it works really well. The script does exactly what you want it to do, and - as you see from the feature-list above - it even has some nice features, which you won't find in most refer-a-friend scripts.

For instance, each user of your refer-forms, gets his own password-protected member page, through which he is able to check the status of the friends that he has referred. Thus, if one of his friends still hasn't visited your web site (after having read the recommendation email), the user of the form can write a reminder-email to his friend. This can also be done directly from the password-protected member page.

All in all, Viral Refer Pro has a lot of really useful features, and it works really well.

I still haven't used the script for an actual campaign, so I don't know whether the reward-system is a (psychological) hindrance to the users or not. But if you've do it smart, it probalby won't be hindrance to your visitors in any way.

Overall assessment

Viral Refer Pro is an excellent script in my opinion. It does something that I've been looking for for a long time. And if you're planning to set up a Viral Marketing campaign, using refer-a-friend forms, it's almost indispensable.

The control panel is really good, and you're able to manage all your actions from here. The documentation is also really good and gives you exactly the help you may need if you're running into problems.

In my opinion, Viral Refer Pro is a winner. And I'm sure that you'll hear much more about this fine script in the future, when more marketers find out how useful it is.

Price (at the time of this writing)

US $99

About Paul Hancox

Who is Paul Hancox? Click here for the answer!
 
 

Buying information

Websites 

http://www.viraltools.com/ 

http://www.51steps.com/ 

Email

mailbox@51steps.com 

Snail mail

Paul Hancox
Absolute Media & Marketing
37 Ivyhouse Road
Kings Norton
Birmingham
West Midlands
B38 8JL
England