There are several ways to increase eCommerce sales with gamification:
Implement a loyalty program that rewards customers for repeat purchases or certain actions, such as writing product reviews.
Use gamified elements, such as leaderboards and badges, to create a sense of competition and encourage customers to engage with your brand.
Incorporate quizzes and surveys to increase customer engagement and gather valuable information about their preferences.
Offer exclusive deals and discounts to customers who complete certain challenges or reach certain milestones.
Use gamification to create a sense of community, by encouraging customers to share their purchases on social media or participate in online forums.
Use push notifications and other forms of customer engagement to remind customers of their progress and rewards.
Use gamification to educate customer about your products, services, or brand by creating interactive tutorials, videos, and other educational materials.
It's important to note that gamification should be used in a way that is relevant, fun and engaging to your target audience. A/B testing, tracking and customer feedback can help you to optimize the gamification elements over time to achieve the best results.
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2. Shopping is a therapeutic activity for many people.
Going to malls and bargaining for your favorite items gives immense pleasure. For many of
us, even if we spend the entire evening in the mall without buying a single item, it would still
be fun.
But as the pandemic started in 2020, things changed. Window shopping was no longer an
option for people.
Businesses turned their attention to e-commerce.
However, it’s not easy to get people to buy online. Here are the major challenges most e-
commerce brands face
4. 1) Abandoned carts
Abandoned carts are always a dilemma for e-commerce platforms. In fact, e-commerce
brands lose over $18 billion in sales revenue every year due to cart abandonment. There are
two major reasons for higher cart abandonment -
1) Checkout process is slow
2) Prices put off users.
To solve this problem, Amazon included a progress bar on the checkout page. It has a
shopping trolley rolling across the progress bar. This phenomenon is the Zeigarnik Effect
which says that people remember unfinished tasks more easily than finished ones.
Adding a progress bar urges users to complete the task of placing the order instead of
abandoning the process midway.
5. Getting loyal customers for an e-commerce platform is difficult when the slightest difference in
pricing can nudge them to buy from competitors.
Flipkart launched its rewards program SuperCoins in 2019. Millions of customers have earned
more than 10 billion Super coins to date. The reward scheme offered customers redeemable points
when they shopped from the platform. Buyers can further use these points in their next purchase.
2) Customer Loyalty
6. Super Coins rewards program
helped Flipkart build a win-win
relationship with customers. It
also encouraged them to revisit
the platform for their shopping
needs.
7. 3) Getting the user's attention
E-commerce brands struggle to grab attention. The best way to solve this problem is to
make your e-commerce platform about them.
Yoox, an e-commerce brand did something unique. The size of clothes is a major concern
for online shoppers.
Yoox lets users create their digital avatars and try on clothes exactly how they would in trial
rooms.
It’s a personalized way to engage users.
There are countless ways to make your shopper's experience fun. This includes trivia,
personality quizzes, redeemable points, countdown clocks, progress bars, spin-the-wheel,
and scratch cards.
12. It went from 0 to 868 million+ active buyers in just seven years.
It reported a net profit of $1.33 billion in Q1 of 2022.
It has more monthly active buyers than Alibaba.
Pinduoduo is an e-commerce platform that offers a wide range of products at dirt-cheap prices
through group buying.
If you haven’t heard of Pinduoduo before, here are 3 facts -
In Pinduoduo’s case, when more people associate with a deal, they higher the discount they get.
The secret sauce to its viral growth is Gamification. It made the user's shopping experience
interactive and encouraged them to keep coming back.
Here’s how -
13. 1) Shake money
In China, there is a tradition called 'Hong Bao' where people hand money to others in a red
envelope as a gift. Chinese call it 'lucky money’ which brings luck and happiness to the receiver.
Pinduoduo offers Hong Bao every day to its users. When users click on the icon at the bottom,
they receive transferable points to WeChat Pay.
Another interesting feature is Shake Money. When a user shakes their phone and another user
living nearby does the same, both earn coins.
Users are further rewarded with Hong Bao when they invite their friends to Pinduoduo.
14. Users can redeem these coins
only when they reach 100RMB
($15.77). And it must be done
within 24 hours. This requires
them to return to the app
multiple times and get their
friends involved.
Pinduoduo users are always
looking for new ways to earn
coins just so they can convert
them into real money within 24
hours.
15. 2) Sign-in beans
Pinduoduo also incorporated a
daily-sign task where users
would get a cash reward for
logging into the platform daily.
Users were rewarded if they -
Log in for 5 days in a row
Return to the App after 4 hours
Scroll through the product page
for 60 seconds
16. 3) Duo Duo Orchard
The next game is the 'Duo Duo
Orchard', where users select a
fruit tree they want to grow.
To make that happen, users
have to involve themselves in
tasks to earn water and
nutrients for the tree. When the
tree is fully grown, Pinduoduo
delivers a basket of its fruit to
their house.
17. Every game is simple to understand and designed to generate curiosity.
The tasks aren’t boring either. Users who want to win are on the App 24*7 and invest time referring
friends or purchasing items.
Offering small rewards makes users want to come back and earn more.
To progress in a game, users have to either buy products or invite friends. Result? More sales and
users.
The 30-60 seconds task of viewing the product page has led to higher conversions and sales.
It also added a competitive element to this game by showing a leaderboard of friends who have
successfully grown a tree.
These are some of the surface games users will find on Pinduoduo; there are many more when they sign-
up. In Pinduoduo, there is a task for almost everything. The end results of these tasks ensure users stay or
more people join the application.
Pinduoduo Gamification works because -
Pinduoduo's target audience is price-sensitive and loves playing these games to save on their grocery bill.
So, making them stay on the app and, in return, offering a feeling of reward is a win-win situation for both.
18. 2) Alibaba - A Lesson on
Gamification of Philanthropy
19. In 2019, Alibaba said that it was working to make Chinese consumers more ethical.
Over the last decade, Alibaba launched a series of mini-games in its App. Unlike Pinduoduo,
Alibaba's Gamification efforts focus on sustainability and a low-carbon lifestyle.
The three most prominent game that Alibaba launched was-
1) Collecting Sesame seeds
Users are rewarded with virtual treasure boxes whenever they -
- Buy subway tickets from Alipay or ride Alibaba-owned shared bikes.
- Complete transactions using Alibaba and rent Alibaba-affiliated phone chargers.
Players open these boxes for a chance to win 'sesame seeds’. Players can donate these seeds to
various charitable projects in the rural area.
20. Buying sustainable products
Taking public transport instead of cars
Buying e-tickets instead of printed ones
2) Ant Forest: Plant trees
Alipay Ant Forest Project was launched on the company's website to adopt a green lifestyle. Users
were rewarded with ‘Green Energy Points’ each time they performed actions that reduce carbon
emissions. For instance -
Green energy points help the virtual tree grow on the App.
For every virtual tree fully grown, donates and plants a real one. Similar to Pinduouo’s Orchard game,
activities such as signing up regularly to collect fresh air or giving the plant nutrients by completing
certain tasks would help the virtual tree grow.
21. Since its launch, the
initiative has attracted
more than 600 million
users. Over 326
million trees have
been planted in
Northwest China in 5
years.
22. Making daily payments via Alipay
Winning online Quizzes
Miscellaneous in-app activities
3) Ant Farm: Virtual Pet Chicken
Alipay’s Virtual Pet Chicken game was launched in August 2017. Users keep a virtual chicken as a
pet and their responsibility is to keep the pet well-fed. They do this by -
If users miss out on feeding the chicken, they run away to find food in other users’ digital farms.
When the chicken is full, they lay ‘love eggs’. After gathering five love eggs, users can donate real
eggs to NGOs. Sympathetic players can also check on their friend's chicken and send them food or
alerts urging them to return to the App and feed their pet.
23. According to Gamification Yu-Kai Chou, one of
the human beings’ core drives is Epic Meaning
& Calling. It means that people are motivated
because they are engaged in something
bigger than themselves. Alibaba used this core
drive in its Gamification strategies to engage
and retain users.
24. 3) Harry's
- How to create a buzz about
your brand before it launches
25. In 2012, New York-based grooming brand Harry’s collected 100k emails in a single week.
The brand had not even launched yet and they were about to enter a market dominated by giants
like Gillette. So how did Harry’s go from 0 to a profitable business?
A milestone-based Referral program.
In milestone-based referral programs, users are rewarded after they reach a specific number of
referrals (milestones). Harry’s milestones were something like this:
Refer 5 friends = Free Shaving Cream
Refer 10 friends = Free Razor
Refer 25 friends = Free Premium Razor
Refer 50 friends = Free Shaving for a Year
Within a week, 20,000 people referred 65,000 friends.
26. On average, 1 person
referred 3 friends, 200 users
referred more than 50
friends and 77% of the
overall email collected was
through referrals.
Today, Harry’s is a profitable
business valued at $1.7
billion with 20 million
customers.
27. 4) Zappos - The Wrong Way to
Implement Gamification
28. Can a multi-billion dollar company get Gamification wrong?
It might seem like an easy task, but Gamification requires extensive planning. If executed poorly, it
can heavily backfire. Zappos is one such example.
Zappos is an online retail company, acquired by Amazon in 2009 for $1.2 billion.
It is known for its stellar customer service. It implemented Gamification by giving users a chance to
earn badges and points and showcase them on their profiles.
But it turned out to be a big mistake.
Zappos treated Gamification as a 'good to have' feature. Customers who left a review on any
product got a badge. It created a buzz at first but users quickly got bored of it because the badges
served no purpose. Apart from maybe looking cool, it was useless.
29. The program was eventually scrapped because more than helping, it was harming the
company's image.
One of the most important elements of Gamification is Purpose.
“Why should users care?” If a brand does not answer this question, any gamified campaign
is sure to fail.
30. Wrapping up
When it comes to online shopping, India is just getting started.
In 2020, India was one of the fastest-growing online retail markets with 179.5 million customers. It is
expected to rise to 291.2 million by 2025.
With so many D2C businesses entering the market, it becomes essential to differentiate your brand
from competitors.
Gamification can be that differentiator.
It can be an amazing way for brands to provide an actual “shopping experience” to their customers
online.
31. About Flyy
Flyy is gamification as a platform. It provides a powerful SaaS marketing tool to help apps and
websites ace their new user acquisition, user engagement, and user retention game!
Flyy platform enables businesses to integrate comprehensive campaigns for users such as
gamified referral programs, loyalty, and rewards solutions via scratch cards, spin the wheel,
leaderboards, and more.
Flyy’s gamification is like a plug-and-play tool to help growth hackers like product managers
and marketers, grow and get their users hooked.