Make Money From Directories & Referrals

Everyone Can Have Their Own Directory.
Watch How To Make Money From Directories & Referrals

Directory Referrals

Before starting a Directory Referral program, make sure you watch the video above.

The screenshots below provide you with additional features with step-by-step instructions.

Your Directory Program

A Directory Referral is when you refer a visitor on your website to a landing page showing a 'list or directory' of advertisers. You can use Directory Referrals to allow advertisers to quote on a job. For example visitors could give request quotes on house painting, graphic design, photography, or interior design.

Your visitor completes a Referral Form where their information is passed onto all advertisers at the same time. This information usually includes the visitor's name, email address and a description of what they are looking for. Then an email is sent to all of the advertisers with the visitor's information. You can send your leads to an unlimited number of Referral Companies. Income Activator tracks these leads by date and by company and creates your invoices.

If you charged each advertiser $10 to bid on each job submitted, and you had 10 advertisers, each lead would earn you $100 per visitor referral.

You can set up the Referral Form to collect the visitor's name, email address and any other kind of information by adding additional questions.

You also have the option of sending an email to the advertiser with the visitor's information.

Referral Form Example

An example of this is if you had a website about home and office painting, and you could offer your visitors the chance to submit a painting project and receive a quote from multiple companies.

Here is an example of what you might ask your visitors:

1. Name

2. Email Address

3. City Location

4. Specified Information

5. General Information

The Submit Button takes the visitor to landing page showing a 'list or directory' of advertisers.

Payment For The Referral

Once the visitor is shown the advertiser's contact information, it becomes a billable referral.

In this example, each painting company is paying $10 for the visitor's information and the chance to quote on their project.

1. Payment for the lead is based on the 'Visitor Completing the Referral Form' not on the information they entered. In some cases the visitor will enter in fake information, but still end up contacting the advertiser.

2. Payment for the lead is never based on the advertiser generating business from it, any more then the leads they're sent by Google's Pay Per Click Model are.

The lead generated for the Referral Company is superior to any Per Per Click lead as the visitor actively entered in their information to get the advertiser's contact information.

How To Register Referral Companies

Registering Companies Manually
You can register referral companies yourself.

This is explained below in Step 1: Setting Up Your Advertiser.

Companies Registering On Your Website

You can place registration forms on your website pages for referral companies to register for your referral programs.

Registration forms can be put on any page. To see how to do this, click here.

Email Notifications

Referral Company: You have the option of sending the advertiser an email, in real time, with the information entered in by your visitor. This information may or may not be useful to the advertiser. Sometime visitors enter in fake contact information but contact the advertiser and buy or use their service. You've probably done this yourself. Regardless, it's good to send the advertiser the email notification with the information entered by the visitor. It also makes billing at the end of the month less of a surprise to your advertiser if they are continuously notified of the leads they're getting from your website. To view an example of the email, click here.

Visitor Email: You also have the option of sending the visitor an email with the advertiser's contact information. This is recommended, and is a good selling point for the advertiser. Pay Per Click leads don't send emails with the advertiser's contact information in it to the visitor as there is no way for the visitor to enter in their email address. To view an example of this email, click here.

Your Email Notification: You automatically receive an email notifying you of the lead sent. If you do not want it, simply click on the top bar entitled 'Your Account', then click on 'Account Settings'. Scroll down to the section entitled Email Notifications, and check the box that says 'Check this box if you do NOT want to be notified of Visitor Referrals.' To view an example of the email, click here.

You also have the option of sending this lead email notification to another email address. This would be the case if someone in your company was responsible for the leads being generated through this program. To do this simply enter in the email address into the box entitled Referral Email and make sure the box isn't checked that says 'Check this box if you do NOT want to be notified of Visitor Referrals.'

Data Collection

Website Owner: All information entered into the Referral Form is collected and leads can be viewed by clicking on the top bar entitled 'Referrals', then clicking on 'Revenue Date' or 'Revenue By Company.'

You also have the option of deleting 'duplicate' or 'test' Leads before billing the advertiser.

Messaging First Names & Email Addresses are also automatically downloaded into your Messaging section where you can send out email messages to the visitors that entered in their information. To view these entries click on the top bar entitled 'Messaging', then from the dropdown menu click on 'Mailing Lists', to the right of the page you'll see the Title of the Referral Form you created. Click on the Title Link and you will see the names and email addresses of the visitors who completed your referral form.

Advertiser Login: Your referral companies can login your website to view their leads. To do this simply click on the top bar entitled 'Your Account', from the dropdown menu click on 'Account Settings'. Then scroll down to the section entitled Additional Website Features, and check the box that says Show Referral Login. The login link will then be visible on the bottom bar of your website.

Advertiser Registration: You can also have a Registration page on your website for Advertiser to register to get your leads.

Setting Up Your Directory Program

There are 3 steps to setting up your Directory Referral Program.

1. Set Up Your Advertisers Enter in the advertiser(s), known as your Referral Company, who will be paying you for leads and the chance to quote.

2. Create Your Directory Program: Give your lead Program a title and set up what you will be charging Per lead.

3. Create Your Referral Form: Create your Referral Form Questions, Landing Page, and Email Notifications.

Set Up Your Advertisers (Referral Company)

To register a Referral Company, click on the top bar entitled 'Referrals', then from the dropdown menu click on 'Referral Companies'.

You also have the option of setting up a Referral Registration page on your website. When an advertiser registers, you will be sent an email and their Company Name will appear to the right of the 'Referral Companies' page.

To view how to set up a Referral Registration Form on your website, click here.

1. Directory Program Previously Set Up If you created your Directory Program first it will show up in this section. To add your advertiser to your program, check the box beside the Program Title.

2. Setting Up Your Advertiser Enter the company information here, such as address and website.

3. Login Information Enter the Login Email and Login Password that this company will use to login to the referral section of your website.

How to set up your Advertiser's Login: You can also set up a login for your referral companies to view their leads. To do this simply click on the top bar entitled Your Account, from the dropdown menu click on Account Settings. Then scroll down to the section entitled Additional Website Features and click on the box that says Show Referral Login. The login link will then be visible on the bottom bar of your website. To see how a company logs into your website, click here.

4. Main Contact Enter the contact information of your main contact at the company. This is for your own reference.

5. Referral Contact Enter the contact information of the person handling the referrals.
Note: The email you enter in this section will receive the email notifications of the leads. If you leave the email field blank, no email will be sent out to the advertiser. To view an example of this email, click here.

Warning: When testing referral links and leads, remove your advertiser's email address from here or they will receive your test emails.

6. Then click the 'Insert' button. You will see your advertiser's company name appear to the right of the screen under the title Unassigned Referral Companies. Now you need to create you Directory Program.

Note: If you already created your Directory Program, and assigned your Advertiser to it by clicking in the box at the top of this page (Refer to Point 1) you will be automatically be sent to the Directory Program to customize your advertiser's settings.

Creating Your Directory Program

You now need to create your Directory Program which determines what you are going to charge your Referral Companies per lead.

To do that go to the top bar entitled 'Referrals', click on 'Directory Programs.

1. Program Title Give your Directory Program a Title. This will be for your on reference.

2. Status The Status says that your Directory Program is Active, however you can set it to Pause.

3. Referral Rate Here is where you enter in the amount you will be charging all advertisers for visitor leads.

4. Program Description The Program Description is for your own reference.

5. Directory Page Title This title will appear at the top of your Directory Page which is the page your visitors see after submitting your referral form. This page shows the visitors the directory of companies. The page title and content you enter here will appear above the directory of companies. To see an example of how a Directory Page looks, click here.

6. Directory Page Content This content will appear under the directory page title, and above your directory of companies.

7. No Referral Found - Default Page If you don't have an advertiser to send the visitor to that completes your Referral Form they will be sent to a Default page saying 'Sorry we couldn't help you at this time.'

8. No Referral Found - Redirect You also have the option of sending the visitor to another website or a page on your website if you don't have an advertiser to send them to. To do that simply enter in the website's page address known as a URL into the box, which you will see when you click on the Radio button.

9. No Referral Found - Custom Page Finally you have the option of creating a Custom Page to send the visitor to if you do not an advertiser to send them to. This is the best alternative and this page should give the visitor some good information so that they don't feel that they gave you their contact information for nothing.

When a visitor is sent to your No Referral Found page their information is collected and you can see how much money your 'Lost Referrals' are costing you. This is telling you where you should fill in the gaps of your referral program. You can view your Lost Referrals by clicking on the top bar entitled 'Referrals' and from the dropdown menu click on 'Referrals By Company'. To the right of the screen you will see the red title 'Lost Directory Referrals.'

10. Referral Companies If you have Referral Companies registered, they will show up here. Check the box to add them to this Directory Program.
A program with a single company will always send referrals to that company.
A program with multiple companies will rotate between them.

11. Insert Button Then click Insert and you will automatically be taken back to your Referral Company to customize your Referral Companies Settings.

12. With respect to point 10, in the case where you have multiple Referral Companies listed and you attached more than one company to this Directory program at once, then click the insert button, you will remain on this page. You will also see your Directory program to the right of your screen.

You then need to setup these referral company's settings, to do that click on the top bar entitled 'Referrals', then from the dropdown menu click on 'Referral Companies'. Then on the right you will see your Referral Companies listed. Click on the Referral Company you want to setup the settings for, then click on the white tab entitled 'Directory Referral Settings'.

Company Program Setting & Directory Profile

Now that you've attached your Directory Program that will send leads to your Advertiser, you have the option of filtering the referrals geographically and/or by a trigger question.

This is where you create the profile for this company that will show up in the directory of companies. To view an example of this, click here.

This is also where you set up where to send the visitor after they complete your Referral Form and click on the submit button.

If you checked off a program in the previous step you will be automatically sent to this section to set up your program.

1. Referral Company Your Referral Companies (advertisers) will always be listed to the right of the page. Click on your company to edit the settings.

2. Directory Program Settings Click on the 'Directory Program Settings to edit the directory program settings for this company. You are automatically sent to this tab when creating a company and selecting a program to put it in.

3. Company Referral Programs Here is where you can see which Directory Program(s) are providing referrals for this advertiser.

4. Company Profile Preview This preview will show you what the directory listing for this company will look like to your visitor. The listing includes the company name, website, and a description that you create.

Create The Company Profile Now you need to create the company profile that will appear in the directory of companies.

5. Name Enter the company name in this field.

6. Website Enter the company website in this field.

7. Description Enter the company description here, this could include their telephone number, business hours, company information. Its up to you what you want to show your visitors.

8. Company Image Click on 'Browse' to upload a company image or

9. Referrals By Location This is only used when your referral company can only service in a certain geographical location. You have the option of filtering by country, province/state and city.
Country From the dropdown menu you can select the Country.

Provinces / States If you select Canada or the US, you can also select which provinces or States you want.

10. City You can even narrow it down to the City selection by typing in which cities this advertiser wants Referrals from.
You can use the Country selection, Province or State selection, or City selection in combination with each other or separately.

As an example, by setting up Referrals by Location, when a visitor completes the Referral Form, they will be asked to select their Country, Province, State or City location. If it matches what this advertiser's settings are, the visitor will be sent to them.

Zip Code: You can also use the city field to enter zip codes. You can use this Zip Code Radius Finder to find zip codes close to your referral company.

11. Trigger Question Here you can ask a trigger question to determine if the referral is sent to this advertiser. An example of this would be if you were sending visitors to car dealerships, for a Ford Dealership the Trigger Question may be 'What make of car are you interested in purchasing?'.

12. Trigger Answer The Trigger Answer for this advertiser would be Ford. Therefore only visitors that selected Ford from the Referral Form would be referred to this Advertiser.

13. Referral Period The leads are set to automatically be sent to the advertiser or you can select a time frame with a beginning and ending date.

14. Admin Status Here you can set the Lead Generation Program to Pause. If there is only one company in your program, doing this will then direct all the leads to your No Referral Found Page. If you have multiple referral companies in this program, it will skip this company in the rotation.

An example to when this would come in handy is if you where sending leads to suppliers and they ran out stock. You would simply set your program to pause, and the visitors completing the Referral Form would then be sent to your Default Page. Your Default Page could then say 'Temporarily Out Of Stock. We Will Contact Your We Get More Products In.'

15. Company Pause If the advertiser logs into their account they can Pause the Lead Generation Program. Pausing a program means this company will not receive Leads. An example of when this would happen is if the advertiser went on vacation. You will be sent an email when one of your advertisers pauses a program.

16. Custom Rate Here you can a charge a different rate for this specific advertiser, either higher or lower than the rate shown above.

17. Daily Referral Cap Advertiser leads are set with no Cap. Here is where you can set a Daily Cap of referrals to send this advertiser. When the Cap is hit, your advertiser will stop receiving referrals for that day. The Cap resets at midnight.

18. Update Program Setting Click on the button and you're done and now you are ready for step 3, Create Your Referral Form.

Create Your Referral Form

1. Select Form Type Select 'Paid Referral Form'.

2. Referral Programs From the dropdown menu select the Referral Program you are working on.

3. Form Reference Title This title is for your own reference to identify it when your want to edit it.

4. Introductory Comment Line You can type in text that will appear above your Form.

5. Select Question Format Your answer boxes to your questions are set to automatically appear below your question. You can select them to appear beside your questions, however this is meant for very short questions.

6. Submit Button Location Your Submit button is located at the bottom of your form and is what your visitor clicks on after they have completed your form questions. Your Submit button is automatically set up to be left justified on your page, however you have the option of centering it.

7. Submit Button Text Your Submit button is automatically set up to be blue with white type that says Submit. You can type what you want your submit button to say. Examples; Submit, Sign Me Up, Contact Me. You can also change it's colours by clicking on the top bar entitled 'Your Account', then from the dropdown menu click on 'Customize Your Colours'.

8. Concluding Comment You have the option of having a comment under your submit button. Example: "We won't share this information with anyone."

9. Continue Button Click 'Continue' button to go to the next step.

Email Notification

Here you have the option of receiving email notifications to monitor your referral activity.

Once you're comfortable with your activity you can turn this off by clicking on the top bar entitled 'Your Account', then from the dropdown menu click on 'Account Settings'. Then scroll down to Email Notifications and check the box that says 'Check this box if you do NOT want to be notified of Visitor Referrals.'

If you want to login and view your referral activity, click on the top bar entitled 'Referrals', then you can click on either 'Referrals By Company' or 'Referrals By Date'. To the right of the screen click on the company name or date that will bring up your data to the left of the screen.

Your Email Confirmation (Optional) You have the option of receiving an email when a visitor completes your Referral Form. This allows you to know the activity of your referrals and you can give yourself a message or action within the email. To view an example of this email, click here.

1. Subject Line Enter the subject of the email you will be receiving. Give this title a name that will remind you that you are receiving a referral notice.

2. Email Addresses Enter in the email address you want your notifications to go to. Here you also have the option of sending the email to additional email addresses by separating the email addresses by commas. Example: YourName@Website.com, Coworker@hotmail.com

3. Content Editor Give yourself a message that reminds you why this email was sent to you. Maybe it could include an action you wanted to do.

4. Data You are automatically sent all the information your visitors entered into your referral form. If you do not want this information included in the email sent to you, uncheck the box.

Visitor Email Confirmation (Optional) You have the option of sending the visitor who completes your referral form an email. This is recommended as this email includes all of the your advertiser's contact information. The message content you enter here will appear above the directory of companies. To see an what a visitor email would look like, click here.

5. Subject Line This is the Subject Line of the Email Confirmation your Visitor will see. Write a subject that entices the visitor to open the email.

6. Content Editor Enter in your email content in the content editor that will appear above the directory of companies in the email.

7. Attach A File You have the option of including an attached file, picture or free eBook in your email to the visitor. Click on the Browse Button, and select which file you want to attach. This operates the same way as sending an attachment from your own email.

No Referral Found Email (Optional) This is the email you can send your visitor that was not directed to a Referral company.
They would receive this email when landing on your No Referral Found Page. These are the visitors that you are not getting referral fees from.

8. Subject Line Enter in the Subject Line of the email that the visitor will receive if they are sent to your No Referral Found page.

9. Content Editor Enter in your email content in the content editor. Be sure to give your visitor an action to perform that will take them through your sales path. In this case may be an Affiliate link for a product purchase.

10. Attach A File Click the 'Choose File'/'Upload' button if you want to include an email attachment in the email. Here you could include a free eBook.

11. Continue Button Now you can proceed to attaching your form onto your website page, or another website or blog.

Placing Your Referral Form On A Website Or Blog

Here are the options you have for placing your form.

1. Place Your Form On The Top Or Bottom Of Your Page To do this, click on the radio button to select weather you want the form to be placed above or below your page content.

2. Attach Form To Pages Check the box beside your website page titles that you want to show the form on.

3. Embed Your Form On Your Own Website To do this, copy the code in this box. In the brackets is your form's ID number which you can use to identify this form.

Now go into the page you want to embed your form on and paste the code you just copied. Only the [Form ID#] will appear in the content editor, you'll need to Save your page and click on the 'View' link to see your form on the page.

4. Embed Your Form On Another Website Or Blog To do this, copy the code in this box and then paste it into the HTML code of the website page or Blog you want to show the form on.

5. Click on the button to complete your form.

Testing: You should always test your Referral Forms to make sure it is working the way you want. Also remember to delete any test Referrals you do. When testing referral links and leads, remove your advertiser's email address from 'Receiving Email' on the 'Referral Companies' page or they will receive your test emails.

Revenue By Company

The 'Revenue By Company' page allows you to review Directory referrals and revenue.

1. Referral Company Click on the Referral Company.

2. Lost Directory Referrals Click on Program Title to view lost revenue for that program.

Reviewing Referral Revenue By Company

When you click on a company link, it will show you:

1. Date Range Select a date range to view referrals and revenue, then click on 'View'. To show all referral revenue click on the link 'Show All Referral Revenue'.

2. Print Invoice Select a date range above, click on 'View', then click on the 'Print Invoice' link to view your invoice. To the right you'll see the Date Range Total and the Balance owed to you.

3. Directory Referral Revenue This shows you the your referral revenue and data collected.

4. Totals These are the subtotal, taxes, and total revenue for this Directory Program.

Reviewing Referral Revenue By Date

To view your revenue by date, click on the top bar 'Referrals' then from the dropdown menu click on 'Revenue By Date', it will show you:

1. Revenue Summary It will list all of your referral programs; Pay Per Click, Lead, Directory and the total revenues earned.

2. View Revenue You can also select a date range to view revenue, then click on 'View'. To show all referral revenue click on the link 'Show All Referral Revenue'.

3. Revenue By Day By clicking on this link you will see your revenue details for that day.

Recording Referral Payments

To manage and record referral payments, go to the 'Referrals' tab in the menu bar and select 'Referral Payments'.

1. Payments Owed To You These are the payments owed to you by your referral companies. To generate an invoice to send your company, go to the top menu 'Referrals' and from the dropdown click on 'Referral By Company'. Click on the company on the right, then select a date range, then click on 'Print Invoice'.

2. Payment Amount Enter the amount of the payment received in this box.

3. Reference Number/Note Enter the form of payment, any reference numbers, or notes here.

4. Record Payment Click the 'Record Payment' link and balance owed will be reduced by the amount you entered. It will then show up below in the 'Payments Made To You' table below.

5. Payments Made To You These are the payments you've received and recorded.

6. Edit Payment The 'Edit' link will allow you to add a reference number or change the amount.

7. Delete Payment The 'Delete' link will delete this payment. You may use this for a bounced check.

If any of your test referrals show up here and you want to delete them, go to the Revenue By Company, click on the company name, then delete the test referrals.