Bringing gamification to market is easier than you might think.
4 March 2019
Max Savransky

Gamification (i.e. using elements of game-play in non-game environments) is a really great way to get consumers to engage with your brand and attain cut-through you may not ordinarily have been able to. There are always cool things coming to market, so here are some examples I thought were interesting.

Pepsi Battle have digitised the classic rock, paper, scissors game. Developed by the Kinetic Agency, this simple game incentivises consumers to purchase any Pepsi product at Woolworths for the chance to Play & Win.

The way it works is that after the consumer has purchased the product, they head online on their phone and choose their ‘move’… then ‘shake’ to battle! If their move wins the battle – they win instantly. If they don’t win, they can enter the second chance draw.

The one thing that takes the gloss off is the fact that you need to enter your receipt number for verification. What they could have done instead is receipt scanning (for which excellent technology already exists), which is much simpler and requires less effort than finding the receipt number and then painstakingly entering it manually.

Nike has gamified fitness with its reward system for the Nike Plus app. The rewards range from things such as unlocking curated playlists on Apple Music, guided meditation exercises on Headspace, Class Pass credits or maybe even a custom t-shirt for the consumer’s efforts.

Nike states: “The premise is simple: The more active you are, the more you get rewarded. Whether you run more miles through the Nike Run Club app or do five new strength routines in the Nike Training Club app this month, every time you stride or rep, your physical achievements trigger rewards.”

For the consumer, it’s a way to go beyond badges and notifications and actually make their efforts worth something tangible. There’s also a birthday promo, where consumers will get discounts that last all month long and gifts when they buy certain items – such as a free pair of tickets to a home game for a sports team.

Amazon Moments has just been launched into market. This is a cross-platform marketing tool for companies, that leverages Amazon’s massive physical and digital presence, allowing the delivery of rewards to consumers across 100+ countries.

To be fair, this itself isn’t a gamification play but rather a super clever way by Amazon to bring gamification to the surface and make it easily accessible for companies to use.

Consider a company wishing to deliver a range of hundreds of thousands of rewards to its customers by incentivising a particular behaviour (i.e. re-subscribing to a streaming service). This company would need to either establish a relationship and supplier agreements with thousands of companies, or go through an agency, which would almost certainly incur prohibitive costs.

Now, via Amazon Moments they can run any campaign they like and spend only what’s required for the incentive. Genius.

So, if you’re a company wanting to further engage with your customer base in a meaningful way, gamification is absolutely not out of reach. Designing and executing a strategy is actually quite a simple process and now with Amazon Moments, delivering the reward to pretty much any consumer in the world is also quite seamless.

Max Savransky is Loyalty Director of Loyalty & Reward Co, a leading loyalty consulting firm based in Sydney. He has 10 years’ experience within the loyalty industry including roles at Mastercard Loyalty (Pinpoint), Silverneedle (Next & Sage Hotels) and Pureprofile. As Loyalty & CRM Manager at HOYTS, he launched the highly successful partnership with Qantas Frequent Flyer, including a world-first Qantas Points in-store redemption proposition. Max consults on program design, commercial modelling and lifecycle strategy, across both traditional and blockchain loyalty projects.

Max is an active cryptocurrency trader and a key contributor to www.blockchainloyalty.io, a global resource centre for everything blockchain loyalty.

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LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maxsavransky/

<a href="https://loyaltyrewardco.com/author/maxs/" target="_self">Max Savransky</a>

Max Savransky

Max is the Chief Operating Officer at Loyalty & Reward Co, the leading loyalty consulting firm. Loyalty & Reward Co design, implement, and operate the world’s best loyalty programs for the world’s best brands. Max has consulted on 40+ projects and has previously held roles at Mastercard Loyalty, Pureprofile and HOYTS. Max leads the implementation and operations business functions, specialising in all aspects of loyalty consulting and program management.

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