In short, Gamification’s definition would be that it’s the game mechanics use (and experience too). Gamification (not only in the world of finance) implements mechanics and dynamics (that most commonly can be found in games) in certain environments – businesses, communities, websites, or workplaces. Those dynamics include such solutions as collaboration, different rewards, competition with others, and constant progress. It also helps you emotionally engage the ‘players’ (customers, partners, employees, etc.).
The mechanics refer to collecting badges, points, ranking up in the leaderboards, and obtaining new levels. The people affected by the gamification are more driven and inspired to achieve goals and targets. And there are no exceptions – this could also be implemented in the companies from the financial services field. And these actually have started to implement some gamification elements.
The numbers behind gamification
The market of gamification has been growing, and the projections claim that the rise and development will continue. Some suggestions say that it has the potential to rise from $6.33 billion (in 2019) to as much as $37 billion (by 2027). The steadily rising cloud-based and AI-based solutions’ adoption is hugely influencing the growth, as both big companies and Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) started to appreciate this technology.
Walmart, for instance, has started to use VR-based gamification in the process of employee training. This allows simulating certain real-life situations, and thus eliminates the necessity to reenact them physically in real life.
The gamification solutions are great for a lot of internal processes in the companies – the recruitment, coaching, onboarding, but also engaging the workers and helping them gain knowledge. Noble Systems have conducted the research which brought unambiguous conclusions:
- the employees are 90% more productive if they use gamification;
- the engagement of the employees is 48% higher;
- 72% of them believe that they had been more inspired to work.
These tools are also used to engage and educate customers as well as offer them more personalized, innovative services and products. Automatically, this helps with building their trust and loyalty.
Gamification case studies
- Recently the Samsung’s story became quite a hit, as the company launched a new loyalty program which was aimed at the customer base that already existed. It of course was gamified, and the results of the project are really incredible. There was a site visitors increase of 66%, 30% more comments, and 500% more product reviews submitted by customers.
- BBVA launched an application to promote the bank’s online banking services. It was filled with videos, which allowed the users to earn points. With them, they were able to redeem some services or products. BBVA was successful and improved customer retention.
- Australian Commbank launched the game that allowed their customers to take part in a simulation of buying and then managing their own property. This works as a practice of different activities such as paying taxes, applying for mortgages, and what’s the most important, learning the consequences of one’s actions.
- Extraco Bank wanted to reduce the negative feedback that they were receiving and introduced an app, that explains the benefits of certain solutions implemented before by the bank (and being the reasons for such a bad reception). As the users became more aware of the bank’s products and services, the conversion rate of the institution grew over 7 times.
The mixture of gaming and fintech
This may seem odd, but in the case of gaming and fintechs, the relationship is actually two-sided. As reported, the online gaming sector is adopting the newest fintech solutions at a much faster pace than others. This is because before fintechs appeared, the gaming industry was using traditional payment systems, traditional accounts, and ATMs.
To get to know how fintech uses gamification and the other way round, read Disruption Banking’s piece: https://disruptionbanking.com/2021/03/16/gamification-in-financial-services-by-equitech/.
