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.
| ShortStack | Viral Loops | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | From $24 | From $35 |
| Pricing model | Free plan, paid tiers | Free trial, then paid |
| Free tier | Yes | No |
| Billing | Monthly or annual | Monthly or annual |
| Free trial | Not stated | 14 days |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Data export | Not stated | Everything, in an open format |
| Their cut | Not stated | Not stated |
| Runs on | Web | Web |
| Covers | Giveaways & Referrals, Landing Pages & Funnels | Giveaways & Referrals, Affiliate & Referral |
| 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 |
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
Referral programs from templates, per campaign
Viral Loops ships templates for the referral mechanics that already worked for somebody else, a waiting list, a milestone giveaway, a straight refer-a-friend, and lets you run one without building it. Participants import and export as a list, so it plugs into whatever you already send email with. Pricing rises with the number of participants rather than with features.
Our note
The ten-participant cap on the trial is the thing to plan around: it proves the mechanics work and tells you nothing about scale. Against UpViral this is cheaper at the entry tier and gives away less of the API.
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.