Mapping the referral ecosystem

Before designing interfaces, I mapped the complete referral ecosystem to understand every interaction between both users and identify where friction could occur.

The journey starts when an Infinite member shares an invitation and only ends after the invited user completes the qualifying FX conversion, unlocking rewards for both participants.

The experience needed to support:

• Two different user journeys.

• Three referral redemption paths.

• Multiple onboarding scenarios.

• Referral progress tracking.

• Push notifications.

• Reward redemption.

One of the biggest challenges was supporting three different redemption paths for invited users:

• Opening a referral link with the promo code automatically applied.

• Entering the referral code manually during onboarding.

• Redeeming the referral after onboarding through a profile banner within a limited eligibility window.

Although these paths were defined by backend logic, the experience needed to feel consistent regardless of how users entered.

Key insight: Because both users progressed independently, visibility became just as important as sharing. Members needed to understand what happened after they sent an invitation, while invited users needed multiple opportunities to redeem their reward successfully.

Competitive Analysis

To better understand user expectations, I benchmarked referral experiences across several fintech products.

Rather than focusing on visual design, I analyzed how competitors approached sharing, onboarding, reward communication, and referral tracking.

Some patterns quickly emerged:

• Most products focused primarily on the sharing moment.

• Referral progress was rarely visible.

• Reward conditions weren’t always easy to understand.

• The experience often ended immediately after an invitation was sent.

These findings highlighted an opportunity to design a more complete referral journey, extending the experience beyond sharing into progress tracking, notifications, and reward redemption.

Opportunity: Most referral experiences focus on getting users to share an invitation. We saw an opportunity to design the complete journey, giving both the referrer and the invited user visibility and guidance from invitation through reward redemption.

Designing the experience

Helping members start the journey

The referral program needed to feel like part of the Infinite membership rather than another promotional campaign.

Dedicated entry points across Infinite made Member Get Member easy to discover while reinforcing it as one of the membership benefits.

Members could invite friends by generating a referral link or manually copying their referral code.

Because referral codes were long and difficult to share, I prioritized the Invite Friends CTA and kept it visible throughout the experience using a sticky action button.

Supporting different onboarding behaviors

Not every invited user joins AstroPay in the same way.

Some open the referral link immediately, others receive a copied referral code, and some forget to redeem it during onboarding.

Instead of forcing a single journey, the experience supported all three redemption scenarios while ensuring each path felt consistent.

This reduced the likelihood of users missing the referral benefit simply because they entered through a different flow.

Constraint: The redemption logic was determined by backend requirements. The design challenge wasn’t simplifying the system, but ensuring every path felt like one cohesive experience.

Making referral progress visible

Sharing an invitation wasn’t the end of the experience.

Members also wanted to understand what happened after sending a referral.

Instead of ending the journey with a confirmation screen, I designed a referral progress tracker where users could monitor invitations, completed referrals, and how close they were to earning another free month of Infinite.

Push notifications complemented the experience by surfacing meaningful milestones throughout the referral lifecycle.

Design principle: Referral programs don’t end when users share a link. Keeping members informed throughout the process reduces uncertainty and encourages continued participation.

Celebrating successful referrals

Once the invited user completed the qualifying FX exchange, both participants became eligible for their rewards.

A push notification and an in-app banner clearly communicated that the member had earned a free month of Infinite, while the invited user received 15 free days of the subscription.

Rather than silently applying the reward, we wanted users to immediately connect their successful referral with a tangible membership benefit.

Iterating with data

To understand how members interacted with the referral experience after launch, we instrumented analytics events across every sharing method, including Invite Friends, Copy Link, and Copy Code.

The data showed that users overwhelmingly preferred sharing through the primary Invite Friends CTA instead of manually copying referral codes.

This insight directly informed the next iteration, where simplifying the sharing experience by removing the manual copy option became a clear opportunity.

Another limitation we identified was the inability to associate every newly acquired user with a specific referrer, which constrained some reporting capabilities. While we couldn’t solve this during the project, it highlighted an opportunity for future improvements to the referral infrastructure.