ReferralCandy is built for e-commerce — Shopify stores selling products customers repurchase often. SmallGyfts is built for local home-service contractors and brick-and-mortar businesses where customers don't repurchase for months. Different problems, different mechanics.
Try SmallGyfts Free →ReferralCandy is a referral marketing platform for e-commerce. It integrates with Shopify, WooCommerce, BigCommerce, Magento, and similar storefronts. Existing customers refer friends in exchange for store credit, gift cards, or discounts on their next purchase. Works well when customers repurchase often.
SmallGyfts is built for local home-service contractors and brick-and-mortar businesses where the customer doesn't repurchase for 6-24 months. The referral mechanism is a branded reward card (digital or physical) the customer carries and shares in person, with an optional community-donation feature that lets the incentive flow to a local cause the customer chooses. The cause and its supporters start hearing your business name — your reach extends well beyond the original customer.
If you sell products customers repurchase monthly, ReferralCandy is a fit. If you run a plumbing, HVAC, electrical, roofing, landscaping, auto repair, salon, restaurant, or any business where customers don't return for months, SmallGyfts is built for your use case.
| Feature | ReferralCandy | SmallGyfts |
|---|---|---|
| Built for | E-commerce (Shopify, WooCommerce, BigCommerce, Magento) | Local home services and brick-and-mortar |
| Trigger for referral flow | Online checkout completion | Invoice (QuickBooks) or manual card issuance |
| Customer behavior assumption | Repurchases monthly or quarterly | Returns every 6-24 months |
| Reward type | Store credit, gift cards, discounts | Card discount + optional community donation |
| Physical reward cards | No | Yes — $2/card, 250 minimum |
| Community / cause donations | No | Yes — flows to local cause customer chooses |
| Free tier | No (free trial only) | Yes — digital cards free forever |
| Starting price | ~$59/month + revenue commission | $0 (Free) or $249/month (Entry) |
| Per-referral cost | Revenue % to ReferralCandy on some plans, plus the customer reward | None to SmallGyfts; $10-$50 donation per redemption to a local cause |
| Where the money goes | Mostly to the customer (store credit / gift card) | To a local cause the customer picks |
| Automated email drip | Yes | Yes — 4-email welcome / follow-up / win-back |
| QuickBooks integration | No | Yes — invoice list feeds the drip |
| Reach beyond the customer | None | Community donations put name in churches, schools, sports leagues |
ReferralCandy is built for e-commerce — Shopify, WooCommerce, BigCommerce, Magento. Existing customers refer friends in exchange for store credit, gift cards, or discounts on their next purchase. SmallGyfts is built for local home-service and brick-and-mortar businesses where customers don't repurchase for months. The referral mechanism is a branded reward card the customer carries and shares in person, with an optional community-donation feature that lets the incentive flow to a local cause.
Not really. ReferralCandy is built around e-commerce mechanics: storefront integration, post-purchase popups, automated discount-coupon delivery. None apply cleanly to home services where the customer doesn't have an online checkout and doesn't repurchase for months. SmallGyfts is built for the physical, in-person, long-gap referral pattern.
ReferralCandy pricing starts around $59/month and scales based on monthly revenue tracked through the platform, with per-referral commissions on some plans. SmallGyfts is free to start with digital cards, $249/month for Business Entry, $349/month for Business Pro, and $499/month for Community Host. SmallGyfts has no per-referral fees on any tier.
Technically yes through manual reward management, but the workflow is friction-heavy because the platform assumes an online checkout to trigger the referral flow. For local service businesses, SmallGyfts has the QuickBooks Online integration: your invoice list automatically feeds the customer email drip, so the referral flow is triggered by your actual billing rather than an e-commerce checkout.
SmallGyfts is purpose-built as a ReferralCandy alternative for local home-service and brick-and-mortar businesses. Free to start, no per-referral fee to SmallGyfts itself, branded reward cards (digital or physical), automated 4-email drip, Impressions Dashboard showing returning and referring customers, and the unique community-donation referral: you set a donation per redemption (typically $10-$50) and it flows to the local cause the customer picks.
Yes, and you can run both during the transition if you have a hybrid business. SmallGyfts doesn't require historical-referral import to start — just sign up free, design a card, send it to your customers. If you have Zapier set up between ReferralCandy and a CRM, the same Zapier connection works with SmallGyfts at the Business Pro tier ($349/month).