Gamification of Mobile Marketing: Let's Play

Are you a marketing pioneer? Are you ready to take your marketing communications strategies to the next level? Then check out what gamification can do for your business! It can be a lot of fun!

Hello nice people! I hope you are doing fine and you are pursuing your commercial endeavors with unmatched intensity and ferocity. You know this is the only way to make it in the contemporary business world, where shrewdness, diligence, and consistency are highly rewarded. Following that line of thought, I would be very glad if you find my piece on mobile games useful. In fact, I dare argue it is a nice starting point for all of you who would like to develop mobile games and do not know where to start. It abounds with pointers and it gives you certain valuable insights on how to proceed should you decide to make a game that can rock the mobile stores. If you, however, do not feel confident about developing a full-blown mobile game, you can still develop an application, which has the trappings and the mechanics of a game but at the same time, it is not a game at all. It is just an app that has been gamified. Interested? Intrigued? Then read on to find out more about this brilliant technique for market conquest.

Gaming is a passion. Gaming is a thrill. Gaming is a way of life. Indeed, it is the closest thing to magic that mankind knows as it surreptitiously invites, encourages, and persuades people to engage in desired behaviors. In fact, the latter makes perfect sense in the context of the innate human predisposition to engage in gaming. After all, its dynamics are so simple and yet so captivating that they appeal to each and every one of us, we can easily follow them, and hence, we can flawlessly interact with the content of games. Currently, we are in the midst of a gaming revolution. The gaming genie has been let out of the industry bottle and set free. As Seth Priebatsch, the founder of SCVNGR, argues, ‘Game dynamics are too powerful to leave bottled up in games.’ What is more, the pure essence of gaming could be captured, extracted, reshaped, and utilized for different marketing purposes. No, I am not re-inventing the wheel. Instead, I am merely referring to a marketing tool, the popularity of which has been soaring. Indeed, in times when we can no longer afford the luxury of selling mere brands and we have to deliver memorable experiences, we have to resort to the usage of special techniques that capture the imagination of people, rock them to the core, and leave them craving for more.

As you might have guessed, it is high time I introduced the notion of gamification. Do not let this term deceive you! Its omnipotent brilliance is hidden in its outstanding simplicity. Indeed, in its gist, gamification is nothing more but the usage of game design techniques and mechanics to provide solutions and engage audiences. It is a tool used to design and develop non-game applications and processes and it encourages people to adopt them. Gamification works its magic by making technology more engaging, an underlining characteristic of each and every successful product or service. In fact, gamification has what it takes to shake the foundations and redefine marketing. Once again. Furthermore, it holds the key to giving mobile marketing a powerful edge, which can transform the way people interact with mobile applications, keep users engaged, and increase brand exposure exponentially. Yet, this is not all.

In a recent article on the communications trends for 2012, gamification takes its well deserved spot as one of the tools we all have to keep an eye on. Whereas it is still in its infancy, it has an immense potential to change the way we design, develop, and market our products and/or services. In fact, game dynamics and mechanics could be added to enhance the degree of interactivity of each and every product and/or service. Take the social networks for example. They have been using various gamification techniques to stimulate and foster engagement. FourSquare, for example, gives people achievement badges, an element typical of games. The recently acquired by Facebook locacion-based social network Gowalla employs the same tactic to keep its users engaged and to encourage continuous use of its platform. Indeed, components such as achievement badges, levels, leader boards, progress bars, systems of awarding, points, or even small casual games embedded within other typical activities are the very bread and butter of gamification. Have you seen those before? It turns out you are much more familiar with the usage of gamification than you initially thought. You just have not realized it yet.

What do you think the whole rationale behind the Groupon phenomenon is? Does it remind you of a game of scavenger hunt? What do you make of the whole Men vs. Women Challenge issued by Nike? Do you scan and follow the QR codes scattered around town? Those are just a few examples of gamification at work. Slowly but surely, the tentacles of gamification are enveloping all the industries and setting a standard of attempting to reach and appeal to the inherent predilection of people to play games and get engaged. What is more, even music bands release gamified applications to interact with their fans in a specific way and keep the relationship going. Thus said, you can only imagine the feats you can accomplish if you decide to diversify your mobile apps and add a few gaming elements to them. In fact, gamification of mobile applications could be the real deal-maker.

As you already know, competition on the mobile stores is really stiff. Only a handful of amazing apps break through. If you, however, decide to give your mobile application an edge and create an engaging piece of software, which whets the appetite of your users, stimulates their curiosity, and it appeals to their ingrained predispositions to play games, you can go really far. Indeed, as I have pointed out many, many times, mobile apps are all about delivering great experiences, which captivate and enthrall people. Games, on the other hand, have everything to do with experiences. Therefore, you can easily gamify your mobile applications to deliver spectacular presentations and engage your users. Moreover, almost all, if not all, kinds of mobile applications can be gamified. If you, for example, have a mobile application, which promotes your restaurant or food or drinks brand, you can add coupons to your mobile application, which can be downloaded, scanned, and redeemed directly on people’s mobile devices, you can issue a challenge and make people compete for a free drink, a free sandwich, a free dinner, etc. If you are the owner of a gym and you have a mobile application that promotes it, you can create leader boards, give people badges for their achievements, you can give rewards in the form of free hours at the gym for the most active ones, etc. You just need to unleash your creativity and embed gaming mechanics within your mobile applications. This is a relatively secure way to create an engaging and interactive mobile piece of software that keeps people hooked. Moreover, gamification increases your brand exposure and it gives you the chance to go viral. What a way to make marketers' dreams come true!

So boys and girls, I will draw the line here and let you reflect on the possibilities, which gamification offers to your business. You can take it from here, go ahead, and create amazing interactive mobile applications. Give gamification a try, you might actually like it! Meanwhile, do not forget to subscribe to the feed that rocks and share your comments with us about your gamification experiences. You can also follow us on Twitter, join us on Facebook or Google+ or simply check out the stuff we say. Alternatively, you can simply stick around and read my next entry on arrogance in business and why some people will never learn. Yet, this is something that I have planned for next week. Till then, have fun and press to Like!