Case Study: Blinds.com achieves referral-driven sales growth and 82% friend conversion with Extole

Powering Sales With Referral Marketing

Blinds.com, the world’s largest online window-covering retailer (now owned by Home Depot), built its business on word-of-mouth but faced the ongoing challenge of maintaining a steady customer pipeline despite an average seven-year repurchase cycle. With a formal referral program only two years old, the company needed an easy-to-use, highly engaging referral experience that would drive more referrals, higher conversion rates, and stronger employee buy-in.

Blinds.com partnered with Extole to deploy an always-on referral platform, adding personalization (refer-a-consultant, “Referral Stars”), creative CTAs, A/B testing, and a switch to Visa gift-card rewards to simplify value communication. The optimizations boosted results dramatically: consultant referrals now outpace traditional campaigns, 82% of referred friends convert on consultant referrals, the new CTA improved advocate-to-friend conversion by 38%, and moving to Visa gift cards improved funnel efficiency by 50%, all contributing to a business where 60% of revenue comes from repeat and referral customers.

Blinds.com