Integrations / Loyalty & rewards

How to Set Up a Loyalty and Rewards Program on Shopify with BON

Most loyalty programs are launched, ignored, and quietly cost money. A program worth running starts with the arithmetic, not with the app.

  • Steps9
  • Time2 hrs
  • DifficultyNo code required
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WHY THIS MATTERS

Repeat customers are cheaper than new ones — that part is not controversial. What is under-examined is whether a given points program actually changes behaviour or simply discounts purchases that would have happened anyway. BON is the loyalty app we deploy most on regional stores: it handles points, tiers, and referrals, and it translates cleanly for bilingual EN/AR storefronts. Before you configure any of it, work out what a repeat customer is worth to you with the LTV calculator — that number sets your entire reward budget.

Before you start

  • A Shopify store
  • Your customer lifetime value and gross margin
  • Customer accounts enabled

Step by step

The same sequence we follow on client stores. Do them in order — several of the later steps depend on decisions made in the earlier ones.

  1. Do the maths before you install anything

    Decide what percentage of order value you can give back without breaking margin, using your real LTV and gross margin. Everything else in this guide is downstream of that single number — and a program set without it is a discount with a loyalty label on it.

  2. Install BON and enable customer accounts

    Install the app and confirm Shopify customer accounts are turned on. Points need somewhere to live, and a program a customer cannot log in and check is a program they will forget.

  3. Set an earn rate people can do in their head

    Points should map to something a customer can compute at a glance. If they need a calculator to know what their balance is worth, the program will not change behaviour — it will just accrue a liability.

  4. Reward the actions you actually want

    Points for purchases, yes — but also for reviews, referrals, and signups. Reviews compound with your Judge.me setup, and referrals bring customers you did not pay for.

  5. Set redemption thresholds that are reachable

    A first reward a customer can reach within two or three orders keeps them engaged. A reward that takes ten orders is invisible, and an unreachable reward is worse than none — it teaches people the program is not for them.

  6. Add VIP tiers with names that mean something

    Tie tiers to annual spend and give them names that fit the brand rather than generic metals. The status is doing as much work as the discount, so make it feel like it belongs to you.

  7. Turn on referrals with a two-sided reward

    Reward both the referrer and the friend. One-sided referrals ask your customer to advertise for you; two-sided referrals give them something to offer.

  8. Translate the widget and check RTL

    For bilingual stores, translate every string and verify the panel renders correctly in Arabic. See the Arabic RTL guide.

  9. Announce it, then watch the liability

    Launch it to your list, put it in the footer and the account page, and then track outstanding unredeemed points as the real cost it is.

What we do differently

The three things that separate a working setup from a default one — drawn from the stores we ship, not from the documentation.

Set the reward budget from LTV

The earn rate is a margin decision. Work it out before you pick a number that sounds generous.

Make the first reward reachable

Two or three orders. Anything further away is invisible.

Points are a liability

Unredeemed points are money you owe. Watch the balance grow.

The app in this guide

BON Loyalty

Loyalty & rewards · by BON

Get BON Loyalty ↗ See the alternatives

Next in the stack

These are the integrations that most often go in alongside this one.

UpPromote How to Launch a Shopify Affiliate Program with UpPromote 8 steps · No code required Read the guide → Judge.me How to Set Up Judge.me Reviews on Shopify 8 steps · No code required Read the guide → Klaviyo How to Connect Klaviyo to Shopify (and the 5 Flows That Matter) 9 steps · No code required Read the guide →

Would rather we just did it?

We set this up on every store we build, and we do it as standalone work too. Start with a free audit — we will tell you what is worth changing before you spend anything.

Get a free audit Start a project

Frequently Asked
Questions

What clients ask us about this integration before we set it up.

Is a loyalty program worth it for a small store?

Only if you have repeat purchase potential. For considered one-off purchases — furniture, for instance — referrals and reviews usually beat points. For consumables and fashion, loyalty earns its place quickly.

BON or Smile.io?

Both are in our stack and both are solid. BON is our default on regional and bilingual stores; Smile.io appears in several of our proposals where the client already uses it or wants its integrations. Our best Shopify loyalty apps list explains the trade-off.

What earn rate should I use?

There is no universal answer, and any number quoted without your margin in it is guesswork. Start from what you can afford per order and work backwards.

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