ABSTRACT With the popularity of social media, firms are prone to relying on the existing customers’ social contacts to acquire new customers. Referral reward programs (RRPs) have become one of the most effective methods. We highlight social motives for customer referrals and assume that the customer can obtain both firm-offered rewards and psychological intangible rewards named social value from his successful referral. Then we explore the impact of social value on firms’ optimal referral reward structure by comparing the equilibriums of two nested Stackelberg games among a firm, a sender (existing customer), and a receiver (new customer). One of the games ignores the sender’s social value, while the other one considers the impact of the sender’s social value. Firstly, we give the applicable conditions for using RRPs, and show that the sender’s social value helps the firm avoid excessive rewards by sharing the rewards burden. We also find that the firm’s optimal reward structure shifts away from rewarding the sender toward rewarding the receiver or forsaking the reward programs when the firm takes the sender’s social value into account. Considering the conditions under which the firm should use reward programs, the optimal reward structure is closely related to the tie-strength between the two customers. Concretely, when the tie-strength is weak, the firm tends to reward the sender more; conversely, the firm tends to reward the receiver more.

中文翻译：

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客户社会价值对优化推荐奖励计划的影响

摘要 随着社交媒体的流行，公司倾向于依靠现有客户的社交联系来获取新客户。推荐奖励计划 (RRP) 已成为最有效的方法之一。我们强调了客户推荐的社会动机，并假设客户可以从他的成功推荐中获得公司提供的奖励和称为社会价值的心理无形奖励。然后，我们通过比较公司、发送者（现有客户）和接收者（新客户）之间的两个嵌套 Stackelberg 博弈的均衡来探索社会价值对公司最佳推荐奖励结构的影响。一种游戏忽略了发送者的社会价值，而另一种则考虑了发送者社会价值的影响。首先，我们给出了使用RRP的适用条件，并表明发送者的社会价值有助于公司通过分担奖励负担来避免过度奖励。我们还发现，当公司考虑发送者的社会价值时，公司的最佳奖励结构从奖励发送者转向奖励接收者或放弃奖励计划。考虑到公司应该使用奖励计划的条件，最佳奖励结构与两个客户之间的联系强度密切相关。具体而言，当联系强度较弱时，公司往往会更多地奖励发件人；相反，公司倾向于更多地奖励接收者。我们还发现，当公司考虑发送者的社会价值时，公司的最佳奖励结构从奖励发送者转向奖励接收者或放弃奖励计划。考虑到公司应该使用奖励计划的条件，最佳奖励结构与两个客户之间的联系强度密切相关。具体而言，当联系强度较弱时，公司往往会更多地奖励发件人；相反，公司倾向于更多地奖励接收者。我们还发现，当公司考虑发送者的社会价值时，公司的最佳奖励结构从奖励发送者转向奖励接收者或放弃奖励计划。考虑到公司应该使用奖励计划的条件，最佳奖励结构与两个客户之间的联系强度密切相关。具体而言，当联系强度较弱时，公司往往会更多地奖励发件人；相反，公司倾向于更多地奖励接收者。