Gamification

Gamification is the process of applying game mechanisms and game design elements to non-gaming contexts. By gamifying something that’s typically boring or difficult, users can be motivated towards adopting desired behaviours and taking targeted actions. Gamification is a powerful digital tool that can be applied across sectors for improving user engagement in the pursuit of increased productivity and efficiency.

Gamification works by tapping into people’s ingrained appetites for competition, achievement, recognition, and social interaction. By incorporating game elements like points, badges, and leaderboards, gamification provides users with quick feedback, while motivating and rewarding them for completing desired actions. By more effectively engaging users in a task, you typically achieve improved outcomes and attain a greater rate of user satisfaction.

Gamification in education refers to the application of game-like elements to make learning more engaging, or more fun, for students. By making learning materials more interactive, more autonomous, and incorporating quick feedback cycles, like in video games, you can reframe a student’s relationship with learning, which can lead to increased motivation, more productive participation, and greater retention of knowledge.

A gamification strategy is using gamification techniques to achieve specific goals. It involves identifying the target audience, defining the objectives, selecting the appropriate game mechanics or game engine, designing the user experience, and measuring your gamified content’s return on investment (ROI). More broadly, a gamification strategy could refer to your approach to gamifying processes across a number of different business functions.

Because gamification can be applied to any task, its effectiveness depends on several factors. Using it sporadically could lead to less than optimum results, and indicate constraints in the practice. However, when implemented properly and used consistently in the long-term, with learnings carried from one project to the next, gamification can be effective across numerous business functions.