The following article will walk you through the steps needed to create your own program with SheerID.
Each program represents a single, gated offer targeted toward a specific consumer community (also known as a segment) and protected by a verification flow.
For example, you may have a program that verifies whether a visitor to your website is a student, and if so, provides a 15% discount on merchandise. If you also wanted to offer a 15% discount to verified first responders, this would be a second program.
You can create unlimited programs with SheerID.
Creating an account
Before you can get started creating programs with SheerID, you'll need to register an account.
If you've been working with a member of SheerID's Sales team, you may already have an account created. If you're not sure what it is or how to access it, reach out to your SheerID contact to inquire.
If you don't have an existing SheerID account and you're planning to create programs on your own, you can register an account for free using these instructions.
Once you have registered an account, log in at MySheerID to begin building a SheerID program in MySheerID.
Selecting a consumer community
After creating a new program you will choose a consumer community to verify. While most communities are available for immediate launch, please note that Employment, Identity, and Licensed Professional requires SheerID services.
First tab: Countries, languages, and eligible status
The first step on this page is to select the countries and languages in which you wish to make your offer available. The options selectable depend on package type, but starts with 3 countries and 1 language per program. For more information about available packages and how to upgrade, visit SheerID's business site.
Eligibility subsegments
Each consumer segment supports a predefined set of subsegments. By default, new programs will have the most popular applicable subsegments selected.
Our recommended best practice is to be as inclusive as possible (i.e., select as many subsegments as possible) in the offer definitions in order to reach the broadest possible audience. This is also useful in avoiding negative sentiment from consumers who unexpectedly find themselves excluded from a community during the verification process.
If you wish to narrow down your offer, you may deselect eligible subsegments beneath the “Eligible student status” heading.
In our example program above, high school students who have been accepted into college are excluded from receiving the gated offer.
Based on your subsegment selections, the program will automatically update the following:
- The selectable organizations in the verification form
- The data sources used to instantly verify consumers
- The document review rules applied to your program
When you are satisfied with your offer's eligibility details, press Next to save your progress and move to the next tab.
Second tab: Defining a reward strategy
Discount method
The discount method you choose will determine how a consumer will ultimately redeem your offer.
Select Discount Codes if you would like to give every customer that successfully verifies a discount code. You can choose:
- One code for all eligible customers. The same code is given to all verified customers (e.g. "LABORDAY-20"). This is the simplest option, but also the least secure type of promo code as it is an easy target for offer abuse.
- Unique, single-use codes. Each verified customer receives a unique code (e.g. XYRC-0905-LPRF) pulled from a list of codes you have uploaded to your program until all codes are exhausted. Codes should be alphanumeric, and uploaded as a .CSV file with each code in a separate row. For more information, see Uploading codes.
You must define your discount code or upload codes in order to move to the next step if you have selected Discount Codes.
Select Account Linking if you'd like to update customer profiles in your database with verification data. Account Linking is the best reward method if you have an existing rewards program or account login process.
When you choose Account Linking, you must provide the URL where you want SheerID to POST verification data for eligible and ineligible events.
Press Create program to save your progress and continue building your program.
Third tab: Customizing the experience
In the Customize section of MySheerID, you can customize the look and feel of your program's verification flow in order to better align with your own brand guidelines.
Customizing text
In the Customize Flow section, you can choose to edit Content text fields to customize the messaging that consumers will encounter during the following steps of the verification flow, which changes depending on the community selected. Features also change or are stateful depending on the targeted consumer community.
To customize your messaging, select the Verification Method on the left of the preview window. The steps for that method will appear below where you can then click on a step to edit the content fields on the right side of the page. Flow options appear in the order that they are seen by the consumer.
Flow
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Collect step
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Success
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SSO
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Email Loop
Email loop is enabled by default on some programs. SheerID Product Support can add it to your program by request.
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Document Upload
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Document Upload Countdown
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Document Upload Pending
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Document Upload Limit Exceeded
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Consolation
Contact SheerID Product Support to have Consolation Offers enabled on your program.
By default, all text fields are prefilled with our recommended copy.
If you've chosen to narrow the scope of eligibility, you should also update the messaging at the Collect step to clearly and succinctly state the conditions of eligibility.
For example, if you have only selected the "Full + part time college students" subsegment as being eligible, you should update the subtitle text at the Collect step to read something like, "Verify you're a student at a degree-granting school."
Read through each field and update any you'd like to better reflect your brand's messaging.
As you edit the fields, the form preview in the middle of the screen will update to reflect your changes.
Once you are satisfied with the content, click Save.
Customizing the theme
Design
In the Theme section, you can find options for the following design elements:
- Upload a logo for your program
- Select colors and one of 5 web-friendly fonts
- Upload a background image
To upload your logo, click the Upload Logo box, and select a .png, .jpg, or .gif logo file that is 210px X 70px, and 1MB or less. You can delete the logo and upload a new one at any time by navigating back to the Theme section of your program.
Landing Page
Layout
There are 3 layout options for landing pages:
- Centered
- Right justified
- Full page
To upload your background image, click the Upload box, and select a .png, .jpg, or .gif logo file that is 2000px X 800px, and 2MB or less. You can delete the logo and upload a new one at any time by navigating back to the Theme section of your program.
Next, select the colors for your Layout (for full page option) or Landing Page:
- Background Color
- Primary Font Color
Verification Flow
To choose colors for the verification flow throughout your program, click in the color sample box to make your selections.
Once you are satisfied with the content, click Save. Close the Customization window to move to the next step.
Overview
Before you publish your offer, you'll need to decide how to integrate the offer into your website or webstore. Click on the Share button on the top to see your options.
SheerID offers three ways to install your program:
- Pop-up form. Make use of a modal lightbox to present the offer in a pop-up window when the relevant button is clicked on your webpage. We provide the code snippet that can be copied and pasted into your current webpage code.
- Embedded form. This option will allow you to embed the offer as an iFrame within an existing brand webpage you own. We provide the code snippet that can be copied and pasted into your current webpage code.
- Landing Page. Present the offer in a new, standalone landing page hosted by SheerID. This option provides a discrete URL toward which your marketing can point toward. If choosing this method, be sure to confirm the copy for this webpage matches your branding and offer, as it will default to our best-practice messaging.
Once you've selected the method you'd like to use to publish the offer, your program will successfully be created. Additional details on publishing programs are available here.
It is recommended that you fully test your program before going live with it. Instructions for testing your program and pushing it live can be found here.