Gamification Definition
Whether you’re familiar with the term or not, gamification has become the online buzzword of choice over the last few months. Gamification is the use of game design techniques and thinking to solve problems and drive engagement.
Gamification is one of the most important trends of our generation, and can potentially be applied to any industry and almost anything to create fun and engaging experiences, converting users into players. This technique can encourage people to perform chores that they normally consider boring, like reading web sites or completing surveys.
Gamification Goes Mainstream
The gamification industry is booming. Wanda Meloni, founder and principal analyst at M2 Research in Encinitas, California, calculates that gamification industry revenue amounted to about $100 million in 2011, but she expects it to balloon to $1.6 billion in 2015.
"The growth is enormous," agrees Johnny Miller, founder of Manumatix, a gamification vendor based in Redwood Shores, California. "It's amazing how everyone wants to gamify everything, from car makers to airlines to clothing vendors and even restaurant chains."
Here is a listing of a few industries gamification has been applied to:
- Art
- Education
- Entertainment
- Environment
- Design
- Government
- Health
- Life
- Marketing
- Mobile
- News
- Social good
- Shopping
- Website
- Work Video : Exciting new approach to classroom learning
How Gamification is Changing the Website
The Gamification concept runs like this:
1) People enjoy playing games.
2) Popular games inspire extreme loyalty.
3) People are motivated by gaming reward and achievement systems.
4) Therefore, if non-games are made more game-like, we’ll be more likely to ‘play’ them.
So for website building, it doesn’t mean adding some mini games to your site, it means turn your whole site into a “game”, which Includes setting challenges, measuring performance and providing feedback.
