Game Mechanics News & Articles

Can gamification improve customer engagement? Yes, says a new report from Forrester Research -- but some companies misunderstand the concept and misuse the techniques. 

Gamification is certainly a hot topic nowadays. We've seen the power it has to engage customers, and now many companies are turning to gamification within the workplace in hopes to engage their employees like they have their customers. But is it a good idea, or does gamification cause an unhealthy competition amongst co-workers?

There's been a lot of talk about Gamification lately, and while I'm no expert, I'd like to take some time to explain why I just don't get it, why I don't think I ever will, and why I think the current treatment of the subject is overblown and heading into "trendy fad" territory.

“Employee engagement,” the high-profile catch phrase that’s been echoing through the halls of corporate America for the better part of the last decade is buzzing anew. The reason? An actual solution -- a game changer if you will -- has emerged, and with its proven ability to impact employee participation and commitment, it’s injecting new life into the concept of an engaged workforce.

Collaboration. Engagement. The Consumerization of the Enterprise. Today, global businesses are beginning to realize that driving and sustaining an engaged workforce is a necessity to increase efficiency and profits. Yet four out of ten employees worldwide are not engaged, according to an AON Hewitt study, and this lack of engagement is crippling business growth potential.

Gamification is no game, as competition heats up between companies offering game-like techniques to increase customer and employee engagement. In its latest move to keep up with the accelerated pace of this field, Bunchball released this week the next generation of its Nitro gamification platform. 

Badgeville is bringing its games-for-engagement platform to Adobe’s Marketing Cloud. The integration will allow marketers to design engagement programs that are based on insights obtained from Adobe’s marketing metrics combined with Badgeville’s behavioral data.

This month we explore the connection between employee engagement and gamification. It's a partnership that many companies have been wrestling with for a few years now. The idea that incorporating simple, but meaningful "games" into workflows can somehow enhance an employee's productivity, while providing some healthy competition isn't so far-fetched. But like anything designed to disrupt the traditional nature of work, the success of gamifying the workplace comes down to people and process.

One of the most unique and new organizational learning strategies is gamification. The theory arises from the increasing embrace of gamer culture as a whole with younger generations rising to take the reins left them by their predecessors.

IBM’s social software platform for businesses, Connections, is bursting with new features and add-ons. Now there’s one more, with the announcement this week by gamification vendor Bunchball of its first Nitro for IBM Connections. 

Engagement with a brand is critical to its success in the marketplace. As described in a recent quarterly technology forecast from PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), applying game-based design -- or gamification -- to mainstream business can help create the levels of passion and engagement necessary for a brand to stand out among its competitors and remain in the front of consumers’ minds.

Gamification is all hype.

By both understanding and driving customer behavior through the use of social media and gamification, marketers can solve an ongoing “engagement crisis” in today’s marketplace. In a session at this week's virtual event hosted by Marketo and Badgeville, “Good to Great Marketing,” Badgeville VP of Marketing Chandar Pattabhiram described why today’s consumers are so hard to engage and how marketers can use leading-edge tools and strategies to reach them.

If you believe that all work and no play makes Johnny a dull boy, chances are you haven't experienced game mechanics in your workplace. 

Although location-based services (LBS) are best-known for providing features based on “checking in” at different locales, the future direction of LBS as a digital marketing tool will likely be shaped more by a combination of game mechanics and simple practicality than anything related to checking in.