Why use gamification for your start-up?

Large multinationals and the US military began experimenting with gamification back in the latter half of the 20th century, but now, through advances in technology, chiefly the arrival of accessible high speed internet and modern mobile devices and the functionality of their apps, gamification is more accessible and widespread than ever. A business no longer needs to have programmers and developers in-house, and it’s been proven that gamification not only works, but can be effectively implemented across all business sectors and all business functions.

Through games creation platforms, small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) can easily customise existing game engines to their own branding, and the needs of their own gamification strategy. This means the superpowers of gamification aren’t just the reserve of the established and powerful, it’s there to be utilised by startups too.

How precisely do you define a startup? How does it differ from a regular business?

A startup literally means a business that is “getting started,” and focuses on a single product or service that the founders want to bring to market. It is important to note that a startup does not exist long-term. Startups are actually a temporary state. They don’t exist as a startup for more than 5 years at the most. A successful startup will grow into an established business and expand, build a community of loyal clients, and grow their team. For example, publicly traded computer giants Microsoft and Apple, once upon a time, were both startups. Obviously along those fabled business journeys, they left the definition of startup a long time ago.

The success of a startup depends on many factors, including luck, location, and the relevance of their products and services at the time of their launch on the market. The goal of startup teams is to experiment with their business model, and test the market or sector by providing a new solution to a common problem, or a new product that improves upon existing offerings. Whether it is a simple idea or a revolutionary concept, the goal of a startup is to innovate in order to conquer new markets around the world.

Startups are initially reliant on cash injections

Startups typically need significant funding to get the ball rolling due to their long-term development goals. In fact, the method for mobilising startup capital is different to traditional businesses, since banks look for a minimum guarantee before granting a loan. Initially, startups are funded by their founders, lines of credit, crowdfunding means, and venture capitalists, as they essentially race against the clock (or at least against a metaphorical hourglass as big as their funding) to develop their business model, generate sustainable income and growth, and turn a profit.

What is the appeal of gamification?

Gamification consists of applying gaming mechanics, and game design elements from video games, to an activity, a marketing campaign, or even a project, to promote user and audience engagement. The aims of gamification projects can really be anything, including to secure investment, encourage customer loyalty, and to educate users or potential stakeholders. In a nutshell, it’s about making a game of something which is not inherently fun to get more out of users.

By creating a fun and competitive gamified environment, which encourages players to explore, learn, try and succeed, companies can subtly motivate users to desired actions and behaviours. Because games appeal to psychological motivations, like the desire for competition and discovery, they can be used to get the best out of users. They demand user concentration because they are a participatory, rather than a passive form of content.

An innovative and versatile digital tool that can connect companies to all audiences at all times

Modern gamification projects take the form of games designed mobile-first, typically on a gamification platform like Drimify, meaning they can be played on any modern web-enabled device, whether that’s a mobile phone, a tablet computer, or a desktop or laptop.

As more and more people rely on personal and professional online apps supported by mobile devices, digital gamification is quickly becoming one of the most popular and effective ways to improve audience engagement, collect valuable data, and increase online conversion rates. As well as being able to engage users at traditional, fixed location computers, games can be used to engage users on their commute, on their lunch breaks – essentially anywhere that their service allows them to get online.

How can gamification be beneficial for your start-up?

Gamifying your digital marketing efforts can do wonders for your startup by motivating users to sign up and interact in a more compelling way than traditional content. As human beings, we naturally want to be entertained, and tend to get bored with a lot of the same types of media bombarding us. Less interactive content is less appealing as it blends into a sea of sameness. Gamification allows start-ups to meet this need to entertain customers while simultaneously making their marketing messaging stand out by offering their target audience a new way to interact.

Like established businesses, startups need to communicate with potential customers, and a marketing game or an app with integrated gamification is an effective way to achieve those communications goals more quickly and effectively. Startups can, for example, use gamification to share teasers for product launches in their marketing campaigns, and once the product has launched, they can offer incentives to potential and existing customers, generating more prospective leads, more interactions, and ultimately, more conversions and sales.

Gamification can serve startups as a means to sell their product or services through education

Gamification, while being used across sectors and business functions, can be said to have found itself most heavily used in a few areas. Marketing, human resources, and education and training. That latter area or function, training and education, might be the most helpful for startups.

Consider if the product or service you’re trying to launch is legitimately a game changer, or something so out of left field but effective, that it could leave the Shark Tank and Dragon’s Den mobs with egg all over their faces for passing on it when you know that in a few years everyone will be saying, “I don’t know how we managed without it.” A lot of great ideas don’t get picked up. Some are undeniable, and eventually get to where they’re destined, but as a start-up, you’re playing against the clock. If you can create a Quiz, or series of Quizzes, or another gamified piece of content that can educate people on why your product or service deserves their investment, or their support, or is something they need to buy, you’re creating yourself a digital advocate with a lot of sharing potential on social media.

A well made game serving to educate people on your product or service could be tailored to appeal to investors or customers.

Marketing games add significant value to a startups social media activities

Startups are often looking for visibility through their social media. Marketing games, which is the form gamification takes when applied to marketing, make for highly shareable content to capture the attention of the audience through fun and interactive gaming experiences. Gamification elements like leaderboards can invoke the spirit of competition, and can naturally encourage users to share their performances, and let the marketing game spread, boosting brand visibility, and boosting your startup’s chances of finding and establishing not only an audience, but a customer base.

Young businesses are also often in the trial phase, and being equipped with elements of gamification helps them to multiply and regulate different types of campaigns to see how their audience reacts. This A/ B testing approach is very popular in the startup sector, and helps to build prototypes very quickly and cost-effectively by using the minimum of required resources, which we call a proof-of-concept startup.

Drimify, the gamification platform that meets all your needs

The Drimify game creation platform empowers startups in all sectors, all over the world to use the superpowers of gamification to further their business goals and find their customers. For young businesses like startups, where there is increased stress, a lot of costs, and volatile funding situations to deal with, the main advantage of using a SaaS gamification platform is that it offers tried-and-tested game engines to customise at a more affordable price point. It’s a playing field-leveller against the big businesses and established enterprises.

For the best results, startup teams should look to use gamification regularly in order to create a trend with their audience. Be known as the innovative and interactive brand that values communicating with and educating their customer, and learn better what works with your audience from one marketing game campaign to the next. Through the powerful data collection capabilities inbuilt in all game engines customised on the Drimity platform, you can monitor key performance indicators (KPIs) like participation rate and engagement rate, to continuously improve your gamification strategy for the best results.

Gamification is a rapidly growing practice which offers many advantages to your startup. Choose to collaborate with the gamification experts at Drimify and offer your start-up the best start to maximise its chances for success in your sector.

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