You can use Airbridge tracking links to measure the performance of referral marketing initiatives, such as share-the-campaign and invite-a-friend campaigns, and identify users who refer your service to others to reward them accordingly.

Here is a typical user scenario using an Airbridge tracking link as a shareable link to measure a referral campaign:

1. User A clicks a CTA button, such as a Share button or Invite a Friend button. A link will appear that the user can copy and share with others. This link will contain the user ID that can be used to identify User A for rewards.

2. User A shares the link with User B through email or messenger.

3. User B clicks the link.

• When the app is not installed: User B is redirected to the app store where the app can be downloaded. By using deferred deep linking, User B can be redirected to a specific in-app location upon launching the app for the first time after the app install.

• When the app is already installed: The app is launched on User B’s device. By using deep linking, User B can be redirected to a specific in-app location.

4. User A can be rewarded after User B installs and launches the app or performs a certain app event.

The following steps should be handled by a developer. Ask your developer for help.

1. Develop a CTA button so that when a user clicks the button, the Tracking Link API is called. Make sure the user ID of the user who clicks the CTA button is included in the tracking link. The following parameters shall be used.

For a sample request, refer to the example below.

$ curl -d '{
  {
  "channel": "in_app_referral",
  "campaignParams": {
    "campaign": "referral-01",
    "ad_group": "referral",
    "ad_creative": "invitation"
  },
  "isReengagement": "ON-TRUE",
  "deeplinkUrl": "ablog://good-product-growth-team?referrer_id=1668",
  "deeplinkOption": {
    "showAlertForInitialDeeplinkingIssue": true
  },
  "fallbackPaths": {
    "option": {
      "ios": "itunes-appstore",
      "android": "google-play"
    }
  },
  "ogTag": {
    ...
  }
}
}' -X POST "'https://api.airbridge.io/v1/tracking-links" -H "Authorization:{AIRBRIDGE-API-TOKEN} -H "Content-Type: application/json

2. The tracking link should be provided to the user who clicks the CTA button as a shareable link. We recommend providing the trackingLink.shortURLparameter value from the Tracking Link API response as the shareable link, which follows the format as follows.

• {default or custom domain}/{shortID}

To use your custom domain instead of abr.ge, which is the default setting, refer to this article and configure your custom domain in the Airbridge dashboard.

For a sample response, refer to the example below.

{
    "data": {
        "trackingLink": {
            "id": 77281,
            "link": {
                "click": new-tracking-link
            },
            "shortID": short-id,
            "shortURL": new-short-tracking-link
            "trackingTemplateID": template-id,
            "channelType": "custom"
        }
    },
    "at": 1585104275
}

3. Configure the deep link callback to get the user ID of the user who clicked the CTA button. You can use the user ID to identify users who participated in your referral campaign and provide rewards.

Airbridge.getDeeplink(getIntent(), new AirbridgeCallback<Uri>() {

	@Override
	public void onSuccess(Uri uri) {

		try {
			Map<String, String> queryParameterMap = new HashMap<>();
			for (String key : uri.getQueryParameterNames()) {
				String value = uri.getQueryParameter(key);
				if (value != null) {
					queryParameterMap.put(key, value);
				}
			}
			
      // Parsing referrerID
			String referrerId = queryParameterMap.get("referrer_id");
			
			// Show proper content using url (ablog://good-product-growth-team?referrer_id=1700) and referrerID (1700)
			if (referrerId != null) {
			}
			
		} catch (Throwable e) {
			// Handle exceptions here
		}
	}
	
	...

Airbridge.getDeeplink(intent, object : AirbridgeCallback<Uri> {
            
	override fun onSuccess(result: Uri) {
	
		try {
			val queryParameterMap = mutableMapOf<String, String>()
			result.queryParameterNames.forEach { key ->
				val value = result.getQueryParameter(key)
				if (value != null) {
					queryParameterMap[key] = value
				}
			}
			
			// Parsing referrerID
			// Show proper content using url (ablog://good-product-growth-team?referrer_id=1700) and referrerID (1700)
			queryParameterMap["referrer_id"]?.let { referrerId ->
			}
		} catch (e: Throwable) {
			// Handle exceptions here
		}
	}
	
	...

[AirBridge.deeplink setDeeplinkCallback:^(NSString * _Nonnull deeplinkURLString) {
    // Parsing url
    NSURL *url = [NSURL URLWithString:deeplinkURLString];
    
    // Parsing referrerID
    NSMutableDictionary <NSString *, NSString *>* queryItems = [NSMutableDictionary new];
    for (NSURLQueryItem *item in [NSURLComponents componentsWithURL:url resolvingAgainstBaseURL:NO].queryItems) {
        [queryItems setValue:item.value forKey:item.name];
    }
    
    // Show proper content using url (ablog://good-product-growth-team?referrer_id=1700) and referrerID (1700)
    NSString *referrerID = [queryItems valueForKey:@"referrer_id"];
    if (referrerID != nil) {
    }
}];

AirBridge.deeplink().setDeeplinkCallback { deeplinkURLString in
    // Parsing url
    guard
        let deeplinkURL = URL(string: deeplinkURLString),
        let queryItems = URLComponents(url: deeplinkURL, resolvingAgainstBaseURL: false)?.queryItems
    else { return }
    
    // Parsing referrerID
    var uniqueQueryItems: [String: String] = [:]
    queryItems.forEach { item in
        uniqueQueryItems[item.name] = item.value
    }
    
    // Show proper content using url (ablog://good-product-growth-team?referrer_id=1700) and referrerID (1700)
    if let referrerID = uniqueQueryItems["referrer_id"] {
    }
}

Note

If you are using the DeepLink Plan, only data collected through the tracking links used in the referral campaign is available in the Airbridge dashboard. Note that user actions regarding sharing cannot be collected, and relevant metrics or GroupBys are not available to create a report.

To properly measure your referral campaign, specific user actions relevant to the referral campaign, such as clicking the CTA button, should be collected as an Airbridge event. Such action can be collected as Share event (airbridge.share) which is a Standard Event or can be collected as a newly defined Custom Event.

If the Airbridge SDK is already collecting such user action and sending the events to Airbridge, no additional task is required. If not, however, you need to reconfigure the Airbridge SDK to collect such user action and send the events to Airbridge, conduct SDK testing, and release your app with the new Airbridge SDK.

Refer to the developer guides listed below for SDK configuration.

The performance of your referral campaigns can be viewed in the Airbridge reports and raw data files. You can use the following metrics and GroupBys to visualize the data in the reports.