Gamification, IxD & what it takes!
Here’s how you can apply gamifying & what it takes to be able to use it effectively over improving your interaction design, engaging and engrossing users with the best of UX on offer.
The motivation
Q: What do you like to do once you finish your workday which could mostly mean a hectic 9 to 5 or even worse is the WFH thanks only to the pandemic – Covid which could stretch to multiple hours before the regular 9 AM and 5 PM?
A: RELAX! (Isn’t it obvious?)
Because there’s a sense of comfort, solace in relaxing and it doesn’t necessarily have to be a physical rest as most active people could choose to enjoy playing an outdoor game / indoor game / video game or even hit the GYM which does demand a quaint physical activity.
So, when one’s talking of RELAXING one is essentially referring to the MIND. So, Mental Relaxation any day scores higher as it is totally soul satisfying.
The Correlation
If you refer to the users using a product by and large, it could apply all the same to them albeit to a varying degree. One of the main reasons’ users shift their choice of products’ is how using them could make them feel all fatigued.
It would amaze you how much of UX is got to do with actually making the users feel good over their usage of the product, not just over their first login / session but over and over, time and again.
Here’s a PIE:
Ease of use is also important, no doubt. But, it may not be enough to help you secure higher scores every time over those user sessions.
If you want your product to have a lasting impression and for a long time too, then it simply means you ought to concentrate on adding more and more of those DELIGHTERS gravitating towards providing a great UX. And it cannot be a one-time affair, if anything it ought to be ongoing and continuous with ample thought apportioned over devising a way to tackling all that pressure and yet being consistent with the outcomes.
Gamification & IxD
Gamification is the process of how designers cleverly blend the visual elements one would often associate with games by and large and use them to stitch a great user experience. When it is commonly believed that this usage is limited to leaderboards, badges it could go well beyond that when the effective use of accolades that are totally performance-oriented or goal-oriented is interspersed with elements of interaction design.
Given the parlance of gamification, it’s amazing how many of us PMs directly map it and correlate to Interaction Design (IxD). But, for gamification to work and fit in well with the overall cause, one would need to go beyond just IxD in terms of research and understanding.
Gamification Structure
We’ve seen how gamification has been tried and proven to be ineffective, the number of examples where the things on the screen and the total lack of relevance to context given how a user would get on the App to finish / get a job done and witness a completely vague use of gamification are commonplace.
Given that the case for gamification comes at a much farther stage in the UX, which is to say the basic elements in the App and the purpose the users get on it and use it need to be served and served well at first, there could be ample time for product / design teams to think of incorporating these elements into the workflow targeting a better experience for the users over every instance of a login or a session.
Here’s what I’d like to term Gamification Structure in the sense that if the Design / UX team is staring at an outcome which is Gamification, then to begin with there ought to be a whole lot of clarity over why building / designing it actually makes total sense & seems more than justified:
Gamification for the NEW SaaS Era
Take a look at most of the new age tools in the current era of the 2022s, you’d see how they map the usage of the product across each of those user’s sessions and build a milestone map as to the outcomes possible over a regular usage of the tool, it’s capability as correlative to the problems it is meant to solve and where the user stands with respect to his current journey.
Once they know that the user is a little behind in his steps, they’d just prompt / prod him via a notification / an e-mail telling him / describing the capability of the tool so as to generate interest & draw him onto the platform and get him to using that tool again.
Incidentally, that also happens to be a typical case for Gamification where one could list out all possible outcomes over stages say (1 to 5) and if the usage pattern hints at some sort of a break then just pop up this notification or drop a message onto his e-mail, something on the lines of:
“You have built (x) which is Step 1 of your usage and the capability of the tool. Get on right now and explore more over how some of the recent additions could be of great value to you and smoothen out your build experience.”
Which when graphically represented could end up looking like this:
There could be 2 outcomes of this exercise.
User considers the request and gets on to the platform to further his usage of the tool which a great WIN if that happens & it would most certainly mean “mission accomplished”! YaY!
User sees the message and chooses to ignore it, in which case you don’t have an option but to keep trying by sending him these messages over a regular cadence with of course a bout of experimentation over the subject line and the content! Try harder next time!
NOTE: These could also be done over messages or in-app notifications or even mobile notifications as relevant. But, consensus shows how e-mail is still KING as for executing this.
Conclusion
Given the current era and how SaaS seems to be majorly ruling the market sentiment & what seems truly an exodus of choices thrown open to the users, there are tons of strategies product people use for retention / reversing churn & strategies oriented towards gamification could prove to be greatly effective and could help you hit that BULL’s EYE!