HeyTaco 30-Day Trial Guide

Suggested 30-Day Timeline

Week 1: Get the taco party started

• Create your celebrations channel and add HeyTaco
• Give away your tacos for a few days
• Turn on Milestones
• Add your first reward to the Taco Shop
• Encourage people to react, reply, and participate

Week 2: Create social proof

• Share your first “top taco givers of the week”
• Bring a few taco messages into a team meeting
• Encourage managers to acknowledge taco moments in 1:1s or standups

Week 3: Build lightweight rituals

• Introduce a simple weekly ritual (Taco Tuesday, Friday Wins, etc.)
• Add 2–3 fun custom rewards to the Taco Shop
• Celebrate hitting your first mini-goal as a team (50 tacos, 100 tacos, etc.)

Week 4: Wrap-up + Next Steps

• Celebrate your team reaching 100–200 tacos
• Share a “best taco messages of the month” spotlight and/or top taco giver of the month
• Ask your team how they enjoyed sharing tacos
• Decide whether you want to continue with HeyTaco (we hope you do!)

Step-by-Step Guide

1. Create a single celebrations channel and add HeyTaco

If you are looking to increase connectedness and cohesiveness in your team, as well as visibility into the awesome work everyone is doing, using HeyTaco in one channel is the way to go. It allows everyone to see tacos being given and celebrate each other even though they may not be in the same physical space.

If you already have a channel where you’ve been giving shoutouts, you can add HeyTaco there. If not, create a new channel such as #tacos, #gratitude, or something fun like #taqueria and add HeyTaco following the setup on our website.

2. Give your tacos away for a few days

Once you add HeyTaco to a channel, it will send a welcome message explaining how to give tacos. One thing that can make or break your trial is if nothing happens after that welcome message.

The key to getting the taco party started is you (and one or two others who are introducing HeyTaco) giving your tacos away—even one or two per day—to different people for a few days in a row. People will follow your lead and the Taco Economy will grow.

If no one gives tacos, HeyTaco will die on the vine. But if you start, people immediately understand the purpose and follow.

3. Celebrate key Milestones early

Before you build more structured rituals, take a moment to celebrate important Milestones. These moments create early emotional connection and give people an immediate “oh wow, this feels good” experience.

Turn on birthdays and work anniversaries. HeyTaco will automatically celebrate these, giving you a natural way to show people how recognition comes to life. These celebrations are often the earliest “spark” in the trial and help people understand the emotional impact of HeyTaco right away.

Milestones give the trial momentum and make recognition feel personal from day one.

4. Establish ongoing rituals

To ensure recognition becomes a sustained habit, introduce a few lightweight, consistent rituals.

Here are some of the most popular among HeyTaco customers:

• Taco shoutouts in meetings: Add an agenda item to company or team meetings where you highlight a few meaningful taco messages. You can even invite the person who shared the taco to tell the story. These moments inspire great work and keep taco-giving top of mind.
• Celebrate top givers: Every week or during your trial wrap-up, celebrate the top taco giver(s). Mention them in meetings and consider a small prize (even something as simple as a meme or a coffee). Research shows that celebrating givers increases helping behavior and collaboration.

Rituals work best when they’re simple, consistent, and easy to repeat.

5. Add rewards during the trial

Rewards help people explore the Taco Shop and create little bursts of excitement. You don’t need a full reward structure—just a couple thoughtful options work wonders.

Add a few simple rewards. A handful of small, personal rewards make the team curious and drive engagement:

• Virtual coffee
• Company swag
• Donate tacos to charity
• Extra-long lunch
• Choose the meeting playlist
• Team lunch
• A handwritten note from a leader

Rewards aren’t required—but they do help people explore what’s possible.

Repeat the first four steps over 30 days and you’ll quickly see whether HeyTaco is a good fit for your team (and we hope it is!). If you continue with HeyTaco after the trial, introducing more rewards—along with celebrating milestones and rituals—can help keep recognition fun and meaningful over the long term.

Quick-Start Checklist (with tips!)

☐ Create a celebrations channel

Quick tip: Fun channel names increase engagement more than you’d think.

☐ Add HeyTaco to the channel

Quick tip: Pin the “how to give tacos” message so no one has to dig for it.

☐ Give your tacos away for a few days

Quick tip: Give tacos to different people to model inclusiveness.

☐ Turn on Milestones

Quick tip: Add any missing birthdays or anniversaries—empty birthdays are sad.

☐ Introduce one simple ritual

Quick tip: Weekly > daily. Start slow and build up.

☐ Add rewards to the Taco Shop

Quick tip: Add 2–3 different rewards to cover all languages of appreciation in the workplace.

☐ Highlight top givers or a great message

Quick tip: Use screenshots—they help people “feel” the recognition.

☐ Ask for feedback at the end of the trial

Quick tip: Two questions are enough:

•      Did this make us feel more connected?

•      Should we keep it?