When it comes to customer conversions, a proper marketing strategy on your website is far from the only thing that matters. Without a well-designed website, even the best strategies will fall short of your traffic and customer goals. But there’s more. Even if you have a site that looks good and functions well, it must also be engaging. This part is critical for success. 

Today, building websites can be considered an art form. It demands skill, knowledge, and experience. If your company doesn’t work in the web design and development industry, you shouldn’t blindly jump into this process alone – all this will do is lead to losses of money and time. The best way to get a functional, cohesive, and effective site is to hire a reputed and reliable web design company. There are many amazing web design agencies in San Francisco today, so it shouldn’t be difficult finding one that is capable of providing you with all the services and solutions you need. 

But this all begs the question – what exactly makes a website a sales force? How can a site help boost your customer conversion rates, and ultimately result in higher returns? Customer conversion relies on slick and well-designed websites. One design element that separates the bland from the great in the world of web design is gamification. 

What Does Gaming Have to Do with Web Design? 

People love playing online games. In 2018, 67% of Americans played video games, with 90% played on mobile devices – over two-thirds of the USA’s population. That’s a ton of people. Online games are fun, relaxing, and offer their players several cognitive advantages, including improved coordination, memory, and problem-solving skills. So, it’s easy to see why there’s such a huge push by many modern brands and companies to develop marketing strategies that utilize gamification. 

Integrating games into a website can often boost client engagement and participation, build brand loyalty, and create an overall more enjoyable user experience. Put all of this together, and it’s almost guaranteed you’ll see a net positive effect on your brand via boosts in conversions, sales, and loyal customers. 

In this article, we are going to cover three of the top e-commerce gamification marketing strategies that are currently popular in the market. They are vetted and have proven to produce results. We’ll also take a closer look at some of these examples so that you can try the same methods on your website. Let’s check them out!

Gamification Marketing Strategy #1. Scavenger Hunts 

There’s something about scavenger hunts that many people find infinitely appealing. Part of it is nostalgia – scavenger hunts are a popular summer camp pastime for kids. Left to roam around and search for particular plants on a list, the first one to find them all would get a prize. It’s a fun way to learn about nature and unleashes the competitive spirit in everyone. 

Scavenger hunts also work perfectly in the world of sales and function as a strategy that countless brands have put to good use. For example, McDonald’s is well known for its Monopoly contest, in which participants win prizes when they find particular board pieces. 

Also, Mountain Dew somewhat recently ran its “50 States, 50 Labels” contest, in which participants had a chance to win $100 if they found bottles from all 50 states. 

One good idea that you can use for your e-commerce store is to have shoppers look for a hidden symbol within your website – just like a scavenger hunt. The first thirty or so shoppers that find the symbol get a cool prize or a discount. This technique was used by the footwear and accessories company Aldo a while back. Shoppers had to look through their website for a hidden symbol, an “A.” It was a fun way to bring attention to their brand and encouraged shoppers to explore their corners and crevices of their website with more detail and precision. It had a positive impact on client engagement and led to increased sales throughout the contest. This is something that, if designed well, could work wonders for your website. 

Gamification Marketing Strategy #2. Points-Based Rewards 

Another popular strategy that’s used by many brands involves awarding points for performing actions like spending a certain amount of money. Once clients accumulate enough points, they can redeem them to get free products or discounts. This concept has been around for a long time – take airline miles, for example – but now includes the twist of gamification. 

For example, e.l.f. Cosmetics, a makeup and beauty supply company, has a rewards program called “Beauty Squad,” in which clients get points each time they buy something, as well as a free product on their birthday and other bonuses. The more points clients collect, the better the rewards they have access to. e.l.f. Cosmetics keep their clients up to date on how much progress they’ve made by showing them how many points they have at any given moment. So, this allows them to exchange their points as soon as they want or to collect enough points to get something of higher value like a free deluxe beauty set. 

This approach basically turns shopping into a game and creates a fun customer experience that motivates people to keep buying and routinely check their points. The best part is that it encourages repeat business, instills brand loyalty, and is a fairly simple gamification strategy to implement. 

All you need to do is devise a points-based system where you determine how many points a customer receives for each dollar they spend. Then determine which products or discounts they earn for redeeming them and voila – the shopping experience has been gamified. 

Gamification Marketing Strategy #3. Gamifying Personalization 

As you are already well aware – modern e-commerce shoppers love personalization. It factors heavily in piquing their interest and motivating them to buy things.

Studies have even revealed that 91% of consumers are more likely to buy brands that provide relevant recommendations and offers. Further, 80% of clients are more inclined to buy a product or order a service from a company that provides a personalized experience. In other words – it only makes sense that so many brands are mixing personalization with gamification. It’s a combination that e-commerce shoppers can’t seem to resist.  

Fabletics, a women’s workout clothing company, uses all of this well on their site. Users can sign up for a VIP member exclusive and get a huge discount on two leggings – a $99 value just for $24. But here’s where gamification comes into the equation: when signing up, users take a quick lifestyle quiz to get personalized outfit picks for their workouts. They go through six simple questions, and they’re ready to get their reward. Fabletics even uses a discount wheel where the winner can catch up to 50% off everything in the store. The gamification is layered, constant, and directly beneficial to customers. 

Customers can fill Fabletics in on their preferences in a fun, simple, and easy way. This helps them know what kinds of offers to send their clients. It is a win-win situation – users get individualized, highly targeted offers, while the company increases revenue by matching buyers with hyper-personalized products. 

Thus, if you’re looking for an effective way to develop personalization efforts and make them fun for users to provide their personal preferences, this strategy is a great one to use. 

Conclusion 

One of the central goals of quality web design is to grab users by the hand and lead them through your website without concern for their current position in the sales funnel. For example, if you visit a site that seems to have something you’re looking for, and you’re in the very first stages of the sales funnel, it will be easier to find information about the services or products you need, the further down the funnel you go. 

Gamifying your website will help you keep visitors engaged with your content and actively want to come back for more. This way, you will be able to grab their attention and direct them to the things you need them to see along their journey. People love playing games even if they don’t acknowledge them as games. 

Engaging web design is crucial for your business, and you need a reliable web design agency to help you create a high-performing site. Talk to your web design agency and consider all the possibilities. Make sure you describe your goals and mission and clearly emphasize what you want to achieve and then see what the company’s team has to offer. Once your solid website is up and running, all you need to do is sit back and watch your conversion rates grow.