Six years of digital marketing and business development experience in web and mobile applications, web publishing and ad agency environments. Managed the production and launch of the Eat St. App, which was covered by Mashable, ranked #5 in its category in Apple’s App Store at launch and has been downloaded by more than 425,000 users. Graduated the Sheridan College Advertising program with honours, currently enrolled in the ACETECH Market Validation Program. Initiator, leader, strategic thinker.
There are a few ways to track things automatically, but they get complicated:
- referral program software
- Give your referrers special URL's with parameters that identify them as the referrer (like http://url.com/?referrer=JohnDoe), then push that value into a hidden form field
- Create a separate landing page for each referrer
I'd keep things much simpler to start. Just tell your social club that there's a referral program in place, then add a form field on your signup process asking who referred the new customer. If John Doe knows that there's a program in place, when he refers someone, he's likely to tell them "make sure you say I referred you". When the new customer joins, they'll likely remember to enter "John Doe" as the referrer.
It's not bullet proof, but it's an easy way to start.