Gamification is a phenomenon that has managed to sweep across businesses and industries for more than a decade. It is no secret that the competitive drive for mobile-based users is significantly high right now. In fact. It is expected that by the end of 2025, the gamification market will amount to $30.7 billion.
Technically, gamification refers to the inclusion of engaging and interesting elements you may find in games and non-leisure apps. Contemporarily, gamification has been proven to be successful because it entices users to take care of certain tasks.
What Does Gamification Do?
Gamification can boost user retention for a specific product, service, or activity. It inherently (more or less) tricks you into being more productive and still enjoy your challenges. Today, gamification is the answer to influence users to finish repetitive and tedious tasks.
It is a viable strategy to retain the engagement ratio for a long time. However, to achieve sustainable growth, the hybrid or exploitation of gamification often backfires. To harness the power of gamification, your focus of attention should be its primary elements.
Realistically, there are many gamification elements that most of the time go unnoticed. For instance, progress bars matter because they allow users to complete tasks within a specific deadline. The human brain is extraordinary; it is hardwired to push towards progress.
Other obvious elements include likes, achievements, leaderboards, challenges, levels, and badges. However, the magic of gamification does wonders when you don’t cram elements together. Also, the failure and success of a gamification element depend on how it improves the user experience.
Gamification Benefits
There is a wide array of benefits related to gamification. The most common one, of course, is the boost in user retention. So long as the user experience is more fun and enjoyable, you can expect high engagement. In fact, most apps utilize gamification to create better engagement with users.
Gamification also improves user acquisition. Social media sharing and word of mouth, after all, are powerful methods to take user acquisition to another level. Similarly, it is the most cost-effective way to focus on high user attention and retention.
Another key benefit of gamification is improved awareness and brand loyalty among users. You have to look at it through the lens of cause-and-effect; it maintains the interest of the users through positive reassurances, better app-experience, and heightened brand acceptance.
Perhaps, the most dynamic aspect of gamification is how it conveys users a sense of accomplishment and growth. As a result, it makes user-specific data accumulation easier and allows businesses new insights into users.
How Exactly Gamification Continues to Hook More and More Users
. Challenge Must Translate into Fun
Despite the nature of a challenge, it has to come across as exciting and fun to your users. For instance, the visualization of online lessons should not be segmented and saturated. Users should be able to take one look and think, “yeah, I want to try this.” At this point, users should identify easy with boring and challenging with something exciting.
Conversely, the repetitive tasks will discourage your users from using the app again. Therefore, bring your spotlight on what matters the most to users and create a sense of accomplishment and pride when they complete a goal. You have to make sure that the challenge is equal for all users to create a flow of responses.
. Easy-to-Share Accomplishments for Users
Social sharing is an excellent way to boost competitiveness among your targeted users. Also, it allows apps to attain new users. Once users accomplish quick wins, apps can prioritize to share that accomplishment on social media platforms easily.
Meaningless rewards, however, wouldn’t amount to anything. For example, an instant reward for reviewing an app won’t work. Therefore, think of an early reward that can boost retention among new users.
. Reminders to Users About Incomplete Tasks
Practically, you can apply progress bars that would serve as automatic reminders about the status of a task. At the same time, you can show users the achievements and badges they can get after completing a task.
You may have noticed a tactile approach from apps to entice the interest of users about brand awareness through reminders. It is vital to understand that incompleteness of a task creates stress and tension among users. Psychologically, users tend to hold onto a task until it is finished.
. Rewards for User Accomplishments
More effort and time means better rewards. Your reward should represent a certain degree of satisfaction and value. You can count on the motivation of your users so long as you introduce the right rewards. Often, it is better to reintroduce or reinstate a reward for users.
. Collaboration Cancels Out Competition
Competitiveness among users doesn’t always work out. Your approach should be to prioritize collaboration over competition among users. When your users start to work collectively towards an achievable and specific goal, the act of completing the task turns into something bigger. And that bigger picture always entices users to come back and be part of something bigger than themselves.
. Optimistic Vibes Among Users
The only way to create optimism among users is to grant them a sense of control over tasks. Apps can’t just shove the red pill down users’ throats. Instead, the right course of action would be to offer them a chance to choose between the red and blue pill. Simultaneously, don’t forget to create a sense of immediacy about the task so that users can act as fast as possible.
Conclusion
The eternal question of what each user values the most is subjective. The best strategy is the one that avoids the generalization of gamification. Instead, focus on the psychological parameters that can attain and retain engagement.
Again, whether you prioritize entertainment, recognition, financial rewards, or status depends on what you’re trying to achieve. Gamification has the power to turn even boring surveys interesting. Users fill out intuitive, animated, and UI responsive surveys that accumulate responses over time.
Essentially, it all comes down to how you create a chain of value around a selective element that users would consider “fun.” In retrospect, the answer lies in a personalized and defined element that would incentivize your users’ efforts.