Case study · Growth SaaS
PerkZilla
A viral growth engine that turns one signup into many — built so brands can own their growth instead of renting traffic.
PerkZilla is a growth-marketing SaaS — referral programs, contests and waitlists in one platform. I worked on it as a full-stack build: the product surfaces that make viral mechanics feel effortless for marketers and trustworthy for the audiences they’re trying to win.
Stop renting traffic
Paid ads are a leaky bucket — the moment you stop spending, the traffic stops too. You’re renting attention, never owning it. PerkZilla’s core idea is the opposite: referrals, contests and waitlists are mechanics that compound. Every happy participant becomes a channel, so one signup can quietly turn into many without buying a single extra click.
That framing shaped the whole product. Instead of selling “more ads,” PerkZilla sells an owned growth loop — and the interface has to make that loop legible, so a marketer can see the asset they’re building rather than just a number going up.
Key decisions
Many mechanics, one mental model
Referrals, contests and waitlists are unified behind a single way of thinking, so a marketer learns the platform once and reuses that knowledge across every campaign type. The trade-off was more abstraction to design up front — but it pays off every time someone launches their second and third campaign without relearning the tool.
Dashboards that prove the loop is working
Analytics and social-proof surfaces let users see growth compounding rather than just trust that it is. Showing the loop close the gap between “we ran a campaign” and “we built an asset,” which is exactly the belief the product is selling.
Frictionless for the end-user
Share-and-reward flows are tuned to convert without feeling spammy — because the brand’s reputation is on the line every time a participant shares. Low friction for the audience is what keeps the loop healthy instead of burning goodwill.
What was built
A campaign builder for referrals, contests and waitlists; participant dashboards that show progress and rewards; sharing and reward mechanics tuned for conversion; and analytics surfaces that make the growth loop visible to the marketer running it.
- Stack: full-stack web application (SaaS).
- Scope: full-stack build — features, UI and delivery.
Outcome
PerkZilla is a platform brands use to build compounding, owned growth — designed for clarity and trust rather than dark patterns. The mechanics do the heavy lifting, but the product never tricks the audience into them; that restraint is what makes the loop something a brand can run again and again.
“Very quick and very easy to talk to — oh yeah, the work was amazing as well!”