What Is Gamification In Business?

Running a business is not an easy task. You have to focus on keeping your employees happy and ensuring customers are satisfied with the products or services you provide.

Over time, many new strategies have been developed to help improve customer satisfaction while attracting more business sales. It does push up the amount of competition you have to face, but with the right strategies, you can ensure your company’s success. 

Gamification in business is one of the more recent trends that many companies have started to adopt. These gamification strategies can work internally and externally, offering new opportunities to enhance customer engagement and improve employee performance.

This article focuses on helping you understand what adding game mechanics to certain parts of your business can do for you.

What Does Gamification Mean?

In the United States alone, the gaming industry has already surpassed a value of $60 billion. Globally, there are 2.7 billion people who consider themselves regular gamers. So, what does this has to do with your business?

The thing is, many of the people you engage with regularly – that includes employees and your consumers – are gamers. Introducing game elements in the way people interact with your business or that affects how employees work can help to provide better interactivity among these individuals.

Even the primary player who slides their finger two create matches on Candy Crush will appreciate a gamification strategy, mainly because these game mechanics often come with rewards for the user.

Rewards For Users That Engage

Let’s face it – people like awards and free things. So, when asked to complete a set of tasks or “quests” as part of your gamification strategy, many would be willing to receive that gift, discount, or perhaps even a promotion or higher salary at the end of the day.

With this said, let’s consider what gamification means and its role in the corporate world. Successful gamification can form part of marketing campaigns to drive more people to your business – and even help make your business stand out among competitors.

You are usually given tasks to complete when you play a video game. These are called quests in many games. You need to do something and get something in return. In games, the task may include:

• Collecting a certain number of collectibles.
• Killing a large enemy.
• Running a few errands for the NPCs.

You then get money, weapons, new clothes, and other types of gifts as rewards for the quests that you complete. These elements help with user engagement in games – and can be used to help you grow your business.

Gamification in business essentially means lending some elements you see in these titles and implementing them into your business.

Sure, you will not create a gameplay system in real life – but rewards programs with gamification solutions are a great way to create loyal customers.

For example, give customers a loyalty card. Every time they shop at you, they need to ask for a stamp on the card. When they have a certain number of stamps, then they get an award.

This is a classic and fundamental idea of a “collect collectibles and is rewarded” system. Even though basic, it’s still going to make customers want to come back to you to collect more stamps – all with the hopes of obtaining that award.

Types Of Business Gamification Strategies

There are different types of business gamification strategies that can be used.

You must understand how each of these works and consider the business goals you have in mind.

When you have a better idea about the goals, you want to strive toward, choosing a gamification solution that will be appropriate for your company is easier.

The first thing you should consider here is whether you want to use gamification for customer or employee engagement. You will usually have a different type of strategy for each, and the rewards will also not be the same in these two scenarios.

Gamification For Employee Engagement

Let’s start by considering how gamification can build better employee engagement. When employees are not adequately motivated, they become less engaged – which can lead to errors and even reduced productivity within the business.

Unfortunately, when employees are not as productive as you need them to be, it is bad for business.

Gamification makes the process of keeping employees motivated and increasing engagement. It can also harbor some friendly competition among co-workers.

No fixed strategy will work for every company, as you first need to understand what will be suitable for the type of business you run.

A Sample Scenario

One idea is to create an online community for your employees that are part of the workplace. This works even for small business goals. You then set up tasks that employees need to follow or have a checklist they should use throughout the day.

As they tick off the duties and responsibilities that fall onto them within the workplace, they get points. This is a fun way to increase participation in important tasks that makes your business thrive. The employee then earn rewards as they build up their score. It is a fun way to add some competition to the workplace without causing issues in the process.

Different types of rewards can be used with this type of gamification solution in the workplace. You could offer the employee the most points at the end of the week an extra day off or give them a voucher to shop at a local store.

Gamification For Customer Engagement

Another side of gamification is when it comes to aiming for increased user engagement among your customers. Gamification when it comes to customers is different than with your employees.

You can look at a few examples of gamification to draw inspiration from. This also includes gamification in sales, which essentially serves as an award system that offers vouchers, discounts, or free products based on the customer’s engagement with your brand.

Example Scenarios Where Businesses Implement Gamification strategies

One great showcase is how Starbucks created a mobile app that offers users access to their drinks selection and a reward program. This helped to engage users more effectively.

Small businesses can undoubtedly learn from this gamification solution that Starbucks uses to increase engagement and motivate people to buy more cups of coffee.

Another example of gamification comes from Reddit, which does it uniquely.

Reddit is a prime example of how social interaction can be turned into gamification for both its users and its own success. Reddit has been working on a long-term strategy with its gamification system, but it remains consistent.

The platform does not offer awards in the form of discounts and money but rather in the form of reputation. The more Karma your account has on the platform, the more reputable people view you when you post something or leave a comment.

When you look at the up and down vote features, the gamification element comes in. When your post gets upvoted, it rises in the ranks, essentially leading to the distribution of karma points to your account. This is especially useful for businesses on Reddit.

Your business results will show up to more people and higher up in lists once your account builds up more karma points. Sure, it helps you, but this entire engaging system not only benefits the users but also builds Reddit’s reputation and popularity at the same time.

Tips For Game Mechanics And A Gamification Strategy In Your Workplace

Businesses that want to add gamification to nongame environments need to think out of the box and be creative.

Start by considering the goals and expectations you have. For example, would you like employees to go through a training process that is like a game but still gives them the ability to learn skills?

In other cases, you might want clients who enter your workspace to feel motivated for a return visit when they have something to achieve.

A small business that wants to build customer loyalty should also ensure the tasks required from the client are realistic. Similar to game playing, the customer also expects an enticing reward when they complete the tasks promoted in your digital marketing strategy.

Spinify is the Solution

Implementing game mechanics in your sales strategies or dealing with internal employees can help with business growth.You can effectively enhance employee engagement and productivity while also giving customer loyalty a boost at the same time. You can use these game mechanics in your business in different ways, and Spinify makes it easy! Book a Demo today to see how our incredible gamification solution can help amplify your team’s performance.