Growing an audience
Running the business
Both cover giveaways & referrals. Here is what separates them on price, billing, what you can take with you, and coverage.
| ReferralCandy | ShortStack | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | From $39 | From $24 |
| Pricing model | Free trial, then paid | Free plan, paid tiers |
| Free tier | No | Yes |
| Billing | Monthly or annual | Monthly or annual |
| Free trial | 7 days | Not stated |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Data export | Not stated | Not stated |
| Their cut | 10.5% of what you earn | Not stated |
| Runs on | Web | Web |
| Covers | Giveaways & Referrals, Affiliate & Referral | Giveaways & Referrals, Landing Pages & Funnels |
| Works with | Nothing in particular | Nothing in particular |
| Founded | Not listed | Not listed |
| Reader rating | No reviews yet | No reviews yet |
| Live deals | None right now | None right now |
Refer-a-friend for a shop, on a success fee
ReferralCandy runs the customer referral program for an online store: the reward, the emails chasing it, the fraud checks and the payout. Every plan has every feature and the tiers differ only in the split between a fixed monthly fee and a percentage of the sales the program brings in. Working out which tier is cheapest for you is real arithmetic, and the dearer plans can genuinely cost less.
Our note
Do the arithmetic rather than reading down the price column, because the cheapest plan is the most expensive one past a few thousand dollars of referred sales. The break-even between the first two tiers lands near $600 a month in referred revenue.
Only on this side
Contests and giveaways with entry rules
ShortStack builds the contest itself, not only the widget: a landing page, the entry form, the rules that decide what counts as an entry, and the random draw at the end. Emails to entrants go out from the same place. Pricing is by page views rather than by entries, and overage is charged per thousand once a campaign catches on.
Only on this side
Ratings are the average of reviews readers left. The facts are stated by each tool’s own listing and are not verified by CloutStack. How we make money.