Gamification Elements: What You Should Know

Running a business is no easy task, as you constantly have to keep your eyes on all departments to ensure things do not go south. As many as 11 in 12 businesses end up failing at some point.

When focusing on the customer, it is vital to consider their experience with your company. While feedback mechanics like reviews helps businesses improve their strategies, many companies have found that using gamification elements helps them achieve greater heights.

Implementing game elements into your business is likely something that you have not considered in the past. Game mechanics are generally associated with video games.

The good news is that, regardless of the business you run, there are ways you can use gamification elements to engage with your customers.

This does not mean you will be turning your business into a game. Instead, it simply adds game design elements into your existing business structure to encourage people, offers rewards, and get more people onboard as customers.

If you want to add gamification to your business, then it is crucial to understand what elements make up this type of strategy. This post will help you understand the use of a game element in a corporate setting.

We will look at the most crucial gamification elements that should form part of your strategy and a few optional ones that can be useful in some instances.

The Most Important Gamification Elements

Setting up a gamification system for your business does not necessarily involve creating virtual worlds or incorporating social interaction functions into your existing business model.

Sometimes, even a simple strategy like adding a virtual economy and giving people a way to track progress can encourage engagement.

Whether you offer time-dependent rewards, set up a completely virtual currency, or offer badges as awards, there are certain gamification elements that you have to understand.

These are the game design elements that gamification strategies rely on to make interacting with a company, website, or app fun and exciting.

While it is essential to ensure your employees get corporate training in appropriate learning environments to adopt these new strategies, you should first learn about the elements that make up a successful gamification system.

This section will discuss the gamification elements you have to focus on to create a successful strategy.

Flexibility

Flexibility is one of the most crucial gamification elements you must remember during your strategy development.

When there is not enough flexibility in your gamification system, users may not find it worthy, or it could create too many restrictions – which could be off-putting to your customers.

For example, if you run a system that offers educational content and has multiple learning paths that users can follow, do not restrict your reward system to only specific pathways.

This would cause problems with your multiple learning paths, as the user feels forced to choose one pathway over another.

Create Platforms With Flexibility At Their Core

When thinking about the game mechanics you want to introduce, you should focus on two factors in terms of flexibility. The first factor relates to the progression of the user.

You could have progress bars showing their current status and how far they still have to go to achieve something specific.

Once the user achieves a particular goal, you could offer them another chance at gaining some “award.” This could be a badge or even random rewards they can draw from.

The main goal here is to ensure the user can realistically achieve the goals that you set out for them without feeling restricted.

When creating virtual worlds, for example, do not only award players when they use a specific tool or strategy. Let them use creative tools that they feel comfortable with – and as long as they progress, they remain eligible for achievements, badges, or random rewards.

Flexibility is sometimes a learning process for the business owner. This is especially true for the early stages of these campaigns.

Flexibility may differ with sales gamification, where you offer teaching materials at a fee – but then provide rewards for purchases made.

Rules

Once you can achieve flexibility with the game mechanics you wish to use, you must consider what rules you will enforce.

Setting out rules early on is a crucial part of the gamification elements you must remember.

A user plays a game thinking about the specific rules that regulate the gameplay. There may be restrictions to where they can go, or they first need to accomplish something to open up a new map area.

Rules should also be included in the gamification strategy you use for your business – and it is also essential to make it clear how the rules work.

Set out a complete list of restrictions and terms associated with the gamification system you want to introduce to your customers.

If they can win rewards, provide an overview of what rewards are available.

Awareness Of Unlockable rare content and other prizes

Customers do not want to win rewards when they do not know what they can get – as the random rewards made available might not hold any significant value for the customer.

Compile the rules into a simple-to-understand structure, then make sure customers can easily access the information.

Some elements to consider when you set up the rules:

• How many points the customer needs to obtain a reward
• Whether or not the virtual currency you offer holds any monetary value in the real world
• Step-by-step instructions on how the user can join the program
• Details about how achievements are awarded and obtained and how users can access their current achievements and badges.

Consider the desired behavior you want from the user. Use this to set up rules that can still offer intrinsic and extrinsic motivation to those who join your gamification system.

You could also have a separate set of rules for people with a specific social status or when hosting team-based competitions. For team-based competitions, make sure to use your development tools to differentiate the type of rewards compared to individual competitions.

Rewarding Game Mechanics

Rewards play an essential role in gamification.

When you want to encourage people to participate in the game mechanics you implement, they want to win rewards or be awarded something they consider valuable to themselves.

This does not necessarily have to be real money or another physical value element. Even unlockable or rare content can work – such as access to exclusive content your business offers or a badge on the user’s profile.

The rewards you offer as part of the game element features will be realistic and relevant.

Importance Of Relevancy When Choosing Your Own Reward Options

Don’t provide rewards that do not have anything to do with your business. This could be confusing to the customer.

Some companies find that offering the customer the ability to choose their reward from a pool of content is also very useful.

The customer might have their eye on rare content or another prize that you have up for grabs. This can motivate people to work harder toward a specific goal, such as using educational technology to learn new skills.

You can also use time-dependent rewards to motivate people to return to an app or website. For example, virtual currency may be awarded as a daily login bonus. This helps ensure people come back daily to get a part of your virtual economy.

Try to avoid unpredictable rewards that are not relevant to your company.

When the rewards form part of a virtual economy, then get a designer to create a physical symbol or logo that represents it. This can make your virtual economy have more of an impact.

Use the physical symbol to show customers the virtual currency they have collected. You can use development tools to set up the system in such a way that you integrate the symbol during the early stages of your campaign.

You can sometimes offer unexpected rewards to the users too. These unexpected rewards can help to set your business in the right direction to success with gamification features.

It is crucial to be fair with rewards. Don’t award someone something just because of their social status. The progress on your system should decide if someone gets unlockable or rare content, not their social status or the level of influence they have in an industry.

Quests And Tasks

When you want to use game elements as part of your business’s user engagement strategy, then guidance is another important factor to keep in mind.

People must be guided toward achieving goals that award them virtual currency, badges, or achievements. This is where quests or tasks come into the picture.

Make sure you set up a system that lists down the specific quests the user can complete. You can use creativity tools to help you develop catchy names for the quest system you will introduce.

When you implement quests as part of the game elements in your business, be sure to offer a way for users to track progress.

Monitoring User Progress

The user wants to know the progress they have made at any given point in time. Progress bars can be handy in this case, as they visually represent what the user has achieved.

You can turn to creativity tools to design exciting elements and encourage people to try to complete their quests.

Physical rewards can be given for specific tasks too. For example, ask people to attend your international conference, where you share a literature review. Or ask them to answer questions regarding elements that can help you with future research.

Fast Feedback Mechanics

How your system provides feedback for the game elements you implement is also crucial.

The user may feel confused when the system does not offer quick feedback mechanics when the user makes progress.

Your desired behavior among users is for them to feel excited about reaching a goal or obtaining a reward – so they do not want to complete a task and wait hours before they get the recognition they expect.

Immediate feedback is something that people will often demand when you create platforms with gamification elements.

Whether there is unlockable rare content, such as extra course content, or physical rewards, quickly notifying the user of their achievements and rewards is essential.

Optional Gamification Elements To Further Encourage People

The game elements and gamification factors discussed in the previous section are all essential to ensure success. There are also some optional game elements that you can also consider adding.

While these are not essential, they can add a competitive advantage that your business can benefit from.

Leaderboards And Leagues

People often play a game thinking about how they would perform against other players. Whether you offer a learning environment or have a physical store, adding some competitiveness to your gamification strategy can be very helpful.

This can work with both digital and physical rewards. The idea here is to offer elements like linked challenges or a scoreboard that lets people compete for the top position. When people see their current ranking, they might be motivated to work harder to reach a better position.

You can take things one step further and add unlockable rare content to the leaderboard. Those with the most skill points or score at a certain point would then win rewards you previously announced.

You could also have one epic challenge a few times a year where sharing knowledge is encouraged. Or ask your customers about playing games that you create. This is a fun way to get people talking about your business while offering a reward for those who top the leaderboard.

Badges And Achievements

If you have an app or website where you will add these game elements, you should also consider the implementation of achievements or badges. This type of element can help the user quickly see their accomplishments on a single page.

There are different ways you can use these achievements, and they can often go hand-in-hand with the quest system you have in place. For example, if a person answers questions that the community asks, you could give them a badge for their contribution.

Even if this will not provide the user with personal gain, it still offers them the ability of self-expression when they showcase the badges on their profile.

Avatars And Profiles

Another gamification element is implementing profiles on the app or website you offer your customers.

A profile generally adds a social element to the platform. You can add features like social discovery, user types, and social status to the profiles section.

This allows the user to easily customize the appearance of their profile, add an avatar, and offer a short description of themselves.

You can add interactive features, such as sharing knowledge with others, linked challenges, and other gaming elements to the profile section.

Spinify is the Answer

Gamification design depends on a set number of elements that should be present in your strategy. Each gamification element contributes to the overall success of the campaign that you develop.

Make sure to focus on factors like intrinsic motivation, personal gain, social comparison, and different user types when you set up your gamification strategy. While striving for positive feedback, be sure to keep your company values in mind still.Spinify is the world’s #1 sales gamification system, making us the perfect solution for implementing this strategy in your business. Book a Demo today to get started.