Using Gamification in Digital Marketing

• It is the use of game elements and game-design techniques in non-game contexts.
• by reverse-engineering what makes games effective and graft it into a business environment.

According to the book "For The Win" by Kevin Webach (Harvard) and Dan Hunter, there are three categories of game elements that are relevant to gamification:

• Dynamics are the big-picture aspects of the gamified system that you have to consider and manage but which can never directly enter into the game.
  • The most important game dynamics are:
  1. 1. Constraints (limitations or forced trade-offs)
     2. Emotions (curiosity, competitiveness, frustration, happiness)
     3. Narrative (a consistent, ongoing storyline)
     4. Progression (the player’s growth and development)
     5. Relationships (social interactions generating feelings of camaraderie, status, altruism)
• Mechanics are the basic processes that drive the action forward and generate player engagement.
  • We can identify ten important game mechanics:
  1. 1. Challenges (puzzles or other tasks that require effort to solve)
     2. Chance (elements of randomness)
     3. Competition (one player or group wins, and the other loses)
     4. Cooperation (players must work together to achieve a shared goal)
     5. Feedback (information about how the player is doing)
     6. Resource Acquisition (obtaining useful or collectible items)
     7. Rewards (benefits for some action or achievement)
     8. Transactions (trading between players, directly or through intermediaries)
     9. Turns (sequential participation by alternating players)
     10. Win States (objectives that makes one player or group the winner—draw and loss states are related concepts)
• Components are the specific instantiations of mechanics and dynamics.

The fifteen important game components are:

1. Achievements (defined objectives)

2. Avatars (visual representations of a player’s character)

3. Badges (visual representations of achievements)

4. Boss Fights (especially hard challenges at the culmination of a level)

5. Collections (sets of items or badges to accumulate)

6. Combat (a defined battle, typically short-lived)

7. Content Unlocking (aspects available only when players reach objectives)

8. Gifting (opportunities to share resources with others)

9. Leaderboards (visual displays of player progression and achievement)

10. Levels (defined steps in player progression)

11. Points (numerical representations of game progression)



12. Quests (predefined challenges with objectives and rewards)

13. Social Graphs (representation of players’ social network within the game)

14. Teams (defined groups of players working together for a common goal)

15. Virtual Goods (game assets with perceived or real-money value)

Gamification in Digital Marketing

Brands or events can use gamification in two primary ways:

1. Integrate gamification with existing services, portals, websites or apps to increase user interaction.

The Times of India - India

• Online versions of newspapers like Times Of India use a gamified system to increase interaction where users get points for commenting and sharing content.

Coca Cola Shake It in Hong-Kong

• In Hong Kong, teenagers are offered a free and branded app for their phones. A television spot ran during the evening. During this time, fans are asked to run the app and shake their phones to win discounts and prizes from partners like McDonald’s. In the evening, a spot was broadcast on television during which time it was possible to run the application and … begin to shake the smartphone in front of the TV!

• Similary, Dominos has incorporated gamification in to their mobile pizza ordering app. Users can shake their Droid or iPhone if they don’t know what they want to order and the app with pick the toppings. (Source: http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottdavis/2012/06/21/getting-apps-right-how-dominos-is-beating-the-odds/)
• Airtel in India does something similar with their app.

Heineken Star Player in Italy

Tabasco Nation

Tabasco Nation, a gamified Facebook app brought people together around spicy food. "People who like spicy food are a tribe," says Zichermann, and the marketers at TABASCO know that, so they played on "gamified ideas of tribalism and team sports" to create an app that allowed those spicy food lovers to compete against each other. Every drop of sauce that the customers used earned them a virtual point. TABASCO created challenges such as using hot sauce on a cake or taking a bottle to the top of a mountain. It was practically impossible to keep track of, but it didn't matter because it was all about fun. Zichermann says that TABASCO gained about a million followers through this playful app. (Source: http://www.econtentmag.com/Articles/News/News-Feature/Applying-the-Secrets-of-Gamification-to-Your-Digital-Marketing-Strategy-97170.htm )

2. Use gamification as part of a new allied services to be introduced

• "Nike launched Nike+ Fuelband and accessories launched this application in January 2012. And since then it has developed into a popular gamified sport. The company extended themselves beyond their comfort zone as a well known product brand one that actively fosters lifestyle changes by helping their customer keep themselves fit." (Source: http://yukaichou.com/gamification-examples/top-10-marketing-gamification-cases-remember/ )
• Adidas created, Adidas Micoach, a virtual sports training environment for games like football, tennis, etc and the users had their avatars, whose capabilities and performance depended on the real workout of the users.

Examples of non-digital gamified marketing campaigns

1. Coca Cola Friendly Twist

However, one important point to be remembered is while developing a full-fledged game to promote your product, brand or service may be a viable option, it is not technically 'gamification'.

Alibaba's Single Day :  the digital marketing view ?

We guess you all know the company Ali Baba…the famous Chinese online retailer, one of the biggest in the world. But do you know what is the Ali Baba Single’s day ? 

  

 

The single day in China is, as it is so-called, the day to celebrate the people who do not have any boyfriends or girlfriends. Here, AliBaba took the opportunity of this celebration to create a huge marketing event around this topic to provide strong discounts on lots of products presents on its online shop. To give you an idea : the revenues of the single day in 2015 were around 14,3 billion dollars…in 24 hours only !

Of course, the gain is for AliBaba because it generates an enormous amount of money, and it promotes the company to a worldwide recognition. Also for AliBaba, this day is a real marketing product for the company to spread its image of huge retailer. 

But even if brands play the game of the war prices, how can they differentiate if the price is the only angle of attack ?

Well this is the question some marketing departments of some companies asked to themselves : Asos, Xiaomi (Chinese smartphone maker) and Zalora (online fashion retailler).

Strategy of Mobile Marketing 

It developed a sharable emoji for WeChat application. 

WeChat is like the Whatsapp of China, and there no less than 600 million users in the world, so the impact can be huge.

In this case, Asos clearly uses a strategy of content marketing to aware people. Indeed, the emojis will make users friendly with the brand because it is something funny. Moreover, it is easy-to-share, so the speed of information can target a huge amount of people. The difference here is that this Single Day is very expected and it is only a 24 hours deadline, so as soon as a brand starts marketing operations, people are more eager to play the game.

Strategy of social networking

It created a community outside with deadlines and cash coupons to win. It went outside China to be on Facebook and Twitter.

Here is a great opportunity for Xiaomi because it will be able to go outside Chinese borders thanks to Internet, and then target almost the entire world. What is interesting also is that people might not be lurkers anymore (like 90% of the people usually). But thanks to this kind of event, users can change in becoming very active on social medias.

Then, Xiaomi will bet too in the voices of great influencers on each social network : that is to say people with lots of followers will target lots of people, and the brand will get known. 

Strategy of Viral Marketing 

It offered vouchers for the first 1000 people sending the message on WeChat : I LOVE ZALORA. 

In this case, Zalora puts in practice a process so-called mobile couponing. Words are self-explanatory, it is like a privilege to a discount. This creates much more a speed effect, which is emphasised by the deadline of 24 hours, and consequently getting the brand affinity higher.

In addition, the few words I LOVE ZALORA are also part of the viral marketing, as it is very short and easy to remind, and it utilizes existing communication networks. Of course the spread is without efforts and increase the number of people very fast until 1000 thousands in quite a short time. Obvioulsy, people who will play the game will share the same motivation.

To put in a nutshell, here are great ideas for digital marketing as the users’ activities on mobile devices increase more and more every year. Such an event like the Alibaba's Single Day has to communicate not only offline, but of course by a digital way thanks to social medias, and through different ways to attract people. And brands will gain from all this viral communication.

But, there are of course lots other ways to develop a brand appealipng…

Sources : Alibaba Single's Day

@ Clickz.com

By Gaetan Lusven & David Delpoio

The new wave of selling on mobile and social

The upcoming holidays are expected to experience a raise in the US e-commerce, up to 9% of the total retail. Mobile will have the biggest growth, with an increase of + 32%. How do retailers react in front of this trend?

 

Mobile e-commerce Shopping

Mobile friendly websites are obviously their first answer. But we observe, in addition, an expanding trend, which is the focus on the shopping on apps. It is called contextual commerce. Indeed, Thanks to the fact that mobiles allow us nowadays to pay for daily transactions, and that they follow us anywhere, huge amount of inherent data is stored. Apps are an easy way to get some of those informations about the way of life of your customers and their preferences.

As a consequence, the shopping on social media apps is another growing trend. In this extend, it is fundamental to have good CTAs (Call to Actions). Shopping on social media provides an even more wealthy way to have access to useful informations for the CMOs, such as: the purchases done, the interests, the browsing history, the preferences or even the connections. By monetizing these informations, the retailers will be able to shorten the customer journey, personalize their offers and improve the profitability. Social media allow also sharing of opinions and ratings of the products. That is it now strategic for marketers to reward customers who share their opinions.  

  

As the use of Internet on mobile keeps on increasing and has notably surpassed the desktop’s, we think that e-retailers should perhaps increase the ad spending on mobiles. As a matter of fact though, it is hard to compare the mobile ad spending strategy between mobile and desktops. Mobile face indeed lower conversion rate. That is why a focus on the usability on mobiles seems to be a better strategy. Retailers may focus more on the service than advertisement presence to catch growth. In other words, think on ways for customers to purchase more easily on their phones. Nevertheless, as mobiles’ technology keeps on increasing, we may see in a cupple of years a conversion rate on mobiles close to this of desktop’s. 

By Alban Couturier and Margaux Peuvergne

Sources: 

http://techcrunch.com/2015/11/29/the-new-wave-of-selling-on-mobile-and-social/ 
http://zeendo.com/info/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/mobile-pos.png 

The Creative Data

           This article deals with the  creative data . The creative data  is a new discipline in advertising agency in order to make the link between the big data and the advertising creation.

What is the creative data ?

          The creative data is the using of the big data to find the right insight on the targeted consumers in order to give the right answer to a  brand issue. The data is an interesting  way to have information more accurate than ever before about the consumer ( his habits, his way of life). Thus, the insight consumer become an amazing source of inspiration for the creative people in advertising agency. A right insight coupled with a good dose of creativity allows to create an excellent advertising !

The using of our phone, google, the social media or our  cash card offering a lot of information for the brand, which can be scary.. However, if the big data allows the brand to speak to us in a good way, that can be interesting.

What is a data avertising campaign ?

The Netflix campaign in France is a good exemple. The big data was use to know all the information about the SVOD. For instance, the fact that everyone hate to be spoiler or that everyone is eaten up with envy to watch an additional episode.Then, from these insights, the agency has created animated GiF images which answering to these issues. Moreover, these animated GIF images integrate changements about  the environment, the weather or  the actuality to be in adequation with the life of the consumer at the same time.

Thus the data will play a role more and more important in the advertising agency. If the big data allow the creative people to have the right consumer insight, the data also allows to adapt the campaign according the the consumer reaction.and improve it in real time.

Sources : 

http://lareclame.fr/135998-baptiste-clinet-creative-data

http://hyzy.fr/2014/10/30/pub-netflix-gif/#prettyPhoto

Yohann Gouttes 

Edouard Pinon 

Maria Sayarh 

What is viral marketing?

The viral marketing is an effective tool in these days, where millions of online content is being shared everyday. It is a type of marketing, that some refers to it as a virus since the concept is to share and share fast, through the Internet. It is all about spreading and by that create awareness. As described on Dictionary.com viral marketing is: “A marketing strategy that focuses on spreading information and opinions about a product or service from person to person, especially by using unconventional means such as the Internet or email.” (dictionary.reference.com) 

Picture 1

The positive thing about the viral marketing is the possibility of very much attention in very short time! But the content has to be catchy in order to work, since people have to be willing to share it. As the entrepreneur.com puts it, the most important thing is that the campaigns have triggers that get people sharing and talking. Something catchy can for example be a word, a phrase or song that is easy to remember and will spread by word-of-mouth, also. And the number 1 key ingredient in digital marketing campaigns is fear, sex and fun. (Gregory Pouy, 2011.) So it is also important to think about which feelings, to appeal to. It is no news really that funny things and sex appeal to us, but as professor Jonah Berger, author of “Contagious: Why Things Catch On,” puts it, “When we care, we share.” (helpscout.com) – So, it can turn out very valuable to try and also “catch” the stronger emotions. This table shows which emotions is most likely to catch our attention:

Table 1

An example of a successful viral marketing campaign is from Dove and is based on their broad campaign, “Real Beauty.” This campaign is catchy because of the women and awake some emotions, such as anger, since it is focusing on the woman figure and the modern world’s representation of slim, perfect bodies that are not really realistic. The campaign generated close to 3.8 million shares in the first month.  

It can be difficult to create viral campaigns and companies can believe that they created a campaign, that is going to spread easily and catch a lot of attention – and then the opposite happens. Spiceworks.com provides an example of a viral marketing campaign gone wrong: “A 2013 campaign be Kellogg’s in the UK drew appropriate criticism for this post: “1RT=1 breakfast for a vulnerable child” as part of a Give a Child a Breakfast campaign. So if the message isn’t tweeted enough, the kids will starve?” so companies has to be careful – you want an reaction and reach people’s emotions, but you do not want to be offended and provoke by you as a company.

 Picture 2

What is so interesting about the viral marketing is that, of course companies has to be aware of technology and making the medium easy to transfer or share, but what is more important is to understand the psychology behind the sharing process. As mentioned before, when some specific emotions are trigged, the campaign will have a better chance of being shared. But also, people are social and in the modern world of social media where for example facebook, twitter, youtube etc. has become a tool to expressing who you are, what you stand for, like and so on, it is very important to think about which social key drivers is relevant in the viral marketing.

Jonah Berger has identified six key drivers, that are very useful, and called them STEPPS – it is the Social currency (what we share has contain something that makes us look good to those around us), Triggers (has to be easy to remember, so it stays at the top of our mind,) Emotion (stay true to our brand and have the feelings of our receiver in mind, “talk” to them,) Social (people identify what they see others do or share,) Practical value (our campaign has to be relevant for the time being) and Stories (it should reinforce the story of your brand.)

So if a company manage to understand the technological and psychological tools and elements of the viral marketing, it can turn out very efficient and they can acquire a lot of attention in short time and at a low price, compared to the number of people who will share and see the campaign. 

Written By Camilla Sønnichsen and Benedicte Hurlen

References:

(Gregory Pouy, 2011)- Mady Keup, PowerPoint, SKEMA 2015.

dictionary.reference.com

http://webmarketingtoday.com/articles/viral-principles/ 

http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/233207

http://www.spiceworks.com/marketing/viral-marketing-examples-why-they-worked/

http://www.clickz.com/clickz/column/2298865/jonah-bergers-6-stepps-for-success-applied-to-email-marketing

Table 1: http://www.helpscout.net/blog/viral-marketing/

Picture 1; https://circle.solutions/ad-vines/ 

Picture 2; http://www.kelloggs.co.uk/en_GB/whatwebelieve/helpgiveachildabreakfast.html