GAMIFICATION CAN IMPROVE YOUR MARKETING
BY HEIDI MCIVOR ALLEN
Gamification is an exciting and relatively new marketing technique which can help improve user engagement, drive more conversions, and increase sales. Watch your marketing performance skyrocket by adding in this hot new marketing strategy! The expert team at McIvor Marketing is here to partner with you to implement a targeted gamification strategy tailored to your target audience.
WHAT IS GAMIFICATION?
BENEFITS OF GAMIFICATION IN A CORPORATE SETTING
BENEFITS OF GAMIFICATION IN DIGITAL MARKETING
IMPROVE USER ENGAGEMENTS
From waking up to working out, from long drives to quick showers, Spotify
People love to play games as an interactive form of entertainment. Therefore, gamifying content on your website is an effective way to improve engagement among your audience.
Gamification makes it possible to make your campaign both interactive and engaging at the same time. When your target audience sees gamified content on your website, curiosity gets the better of them and they can’t resist clicking on it. When people become aware of your brand, they are more likely to read your marketing emails and blog posts, refer you to their friends, and proceed along the client journey.
SKYROCKETS YOUR CONVERSION RATINGS
When your user engagement increases, your conversion rates should equally increase. With gamification, improved engagement leads to higher conversion rates, if done properly, because playing games hardly feels like marketing to your target audience. Therefore, they are more likely to respond to your call to action than a traditional marketing method.
If you attach rewards to your gamification methods, your audience will be more encouraged to take actions that drive conversion rates. Consider an instance where a user wins a 30% discount from a spin-to-win game on your website. The user won’t see any reason not to proceed to use the discount to make a purchase in your store.
So, if you aren’t using gamification yet, you’re leaving a lot of conversions on the table.
INCREASES BRAND LOYALTY
While getting new customers is good, retaining existing customers is even better! Acquiring new customers can cost five times more than satisfying and retaining current customers. Now that you have valuable loyal customers, the trick is learning how to not only attract but keep them.
Adding gamified content to your website or campaigns is the easiest way to attract and keep loyal customers through brand loyalty gamification strategies. Gamification content works by using gaming integrations to increase engagement with web users. As customers interact with your gamification efforts, they’ll likely be interested enough to continue patronizing your brand. Sometimes, they will even keep coming back just to keep consistent wins.
When customers interact with your gamified content, they get a sense of familiarity with your brand. When they are ready to make a purchase, they are highly likely to opt for your brand due to this feeling of close awareness.
Gamification can also reward your existing customers, thus increasing the chances they’ll become advocates of your brand.
GAMIFICATION IS FUNCTIONAL ACROSS ALL PLATFORMS
EASY COLLECTION OF CONSUMER DATA
And, the means of getting this data is equally important. Data needs to be accurate to be effective. For example, if you’re looking for a way to entice web visitors to provide personal information, try gamifying some aspects of your website. You could ask them to provide their information to have their names on a leaderboard, a badge or even to unlock levels of a game.
You can then use this data for your marketing and business strategy.
IT’S AFFORDABLE
GAMIFICATION CAMPAIGNS ARE NOT STOPPED BY AD BLOCKERS
5 BEST PRACTICES FOR IMPLEMENTING GAMIFICATION
KEEP IT SIMPLE
UNDERSTAND YOUR TARGET AUDIENCE
No matter the route you take with your gamification strategy, your target audience should always be your priority. If you don’t target them specifically, you can’t expect to receive positive results.
Research your audience. Factors such as gender, location, and age play a huge role in choosing the gamification strategy that will return positive results. Ask yourself questions like, “what will attract my audience?” and “what do my customers like?”. Using the right techniques will ensure your target audience will be receptive to and readily interact with it, thereby gaining you the engagement and high conversion rates you need.
GIVE REWARDS
If you were offered the chance to win a prize and the process was simple, would you turn it down? Probably not! Offering your visitors a chance to win a reward will make them more likely to interact with your gamification campaign.
If you are new to gamification, you can start by offering small prizes, and once you see the positive return, can start rolling out larger prizes. Make your audience curious about what they can win.
ENCOURAGE USERS TO CHALLENGE THEIR FRIENDS
PROMOTE YOUR GAMIFIED CAMPAIGN
Promote, promote, promote!!
Promotion is key to the success of any marketing endeavor.
If you’re hoping to reach a longer audience with your gamified content, you have to go all out with your promotion. Consider the best way to promote your specific gamified campaign based on your target audience research. Social media marketing is a great way to promote, and be sure to utilize all the platforms! Email marketing is another means you can use to invite your subscribers to participate in your new game.
EXAMPLES OF GAMIFICATION IN SHOPIFY & MARKETING
It’s no surprise Spotify users have spent over 2.3B hours streaming Discover Weekly playlists since the feature’s launch in 2015. Spotify gives listeners a direct connection to where culture is headed (and where it’s been) through editorial playlists, personalized experiences, and more. Some of the most popular Spotify hubs listeners tune include EQUAL, Black History is Now, Pride, and more to experience socially conscious curated content, in addition to their curated playlists. Listeners are twice as likely to view Spotify as “trend-setting” and “enjoyable” than radio and are more likely to pay attention to digital audio, because it’s both culturally and personally relevant. Spotify truly knows how to connect to their listeners in more ways than one.
FALLING GIFT GAME
SPIN-TO-WIN COUPON WHEELS
LOYALTY REWARD PROGRAMS
DIGITAL BADGES
Digital badges are perhaps the most common type of gamification in digital marketing. Businesses award a digital badge, similar to a digital trophy, to their users as a sign of achievement. Achievement could be finishing a module of a course or making a certain number of purchases. People find it exciting to collect trophies and unlock new levels of challenges.
Badges promote brand loyalty by getting your users to continue coming back to earn more badges. If you decide to go the digital badge gamification route, make sure the badges have an attractive design that appeals to your audience.
HOW MCIVOR MARKETING CAN HELP YOU IMPLEMENT A GAMIFICATION STRATEGY
Whatever gamification strategy you choose, don’t forget that your target audience is your main priority. Here at McIvor Marketing, we know how to track your past data and audience’s characteristics to learn who your core client demographic is. We can analyze your data to ensure your audience has fun interacting with your gamified content. Rewards are good, but the fun that comes with playing a game is equally important – and we can figure out exactly what would be fun for your target audience.
We can implement these gamification techniques onto your website and help you start collecting even more useful customer data. We have skilled promotional experts who can help you promote your new gamification campaign on all social media platforms, through Google or Facebook Ads, and through email marketing. Contact us today to talk about if a gamification marketing strategy is right for your business and your brand.
What Business Services Does McIvor Marketing Offer?
We are so glad you asked! From setups to start-ups, to businesses in growth and transformation, McIvor Marketing specializes in a variety of services to meet your needs. Our Phoenix based digital marketing agency can help with website design & development, logo design, branding, off-line marketing design and strategy, paid search management, social media management, email marketing, display advertising and more!
Not ready to dive into hiring a full-time marketing director? Maybe you’re just curious about how your marketing is performing. We can help you set up trackable ways to measure your marketing ROI with a project-based digital audit to gauge current performance. We can also help you get your social media advertising portals set up. We also offer training on Google Analytics, Facebook Business Manager, Facebook Ads, Google Ads, Canva, as well as how to plan content and brainstorm ideas to help you grow through research.
Check out our full list of services and reach out with any questions.
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