How to design an architecture that manages referrals?

When designing a referral management system architecture, the following aspects should be considered:

• Data Model:

  • User with a unique identifier.
  • Referral relationships (Referral), where each user can have a referral and/or be a referral.

• Logic:

  • Generating unique referral codes.
  • Tracking clicks and registrations via referral links.
  • Awarding bonuses or rewards for referred users.

• Components:

  • API for creating and validating referral codes.
  • Service for tracking and analyzing referrals.
  • Database for storing users and relationships.

• Example in Python (simplified):

class User:
    def __init__(self, user_id, referral_code=None):
        self.user_id = user_id
        self.referral_code = referral_code
        self.referred_users = []

class ReferralSystem:
    def __init__(self):
        self.users = {}

    def register_user(self, user_id, ref_code=None):
        user = User(user_id)
        self.users[user_id] = user
        if ref_code and ref_code in self.users:
            referrer = self.users[ref_code]
            referrer.referred_users.append(user)
        return user

    def generate_referral_code(self, user_id):
        # for example, using user_id as code
        return str(user_id)

It is important to ensure scalability, security, and analytics capabilities as the system grows.