rewards

Value to the User vs Value to You

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Value to the system Value to the User vs Value to You

Here is a little excerpt for the book for you, you know that book that I am still editing but hope to have published in the next 2 weeks…!

Whist basing the value of the reward on a user’s personal investment is important, it is also important not to lose sight of why you were gamifying the system in the first place.

Normally it is because there are certain actions or activities that you want to encourage the user to perform and complete. That being the case, you have to sometimes consider how valuable the action is to you, not just how much effort it is for the user. Read More ...

Balancing rewards against effort in Gamification

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Perceived value vs effort Balancing rewards against effort in Gamification

I have said it before, if you are going to use rewards, you have to get it right. Whilst there are arguments about the value and / or damage of rewards in gamified systems, they are still being used and I feel they are of value.

One of the keys to getting the use of rewards right, is understanding their value to the user relative to the actions or activities you want them to undertake. You have to consider the effort it will take. Effort here is: skill, time, physical effort, mental effort etc.

For example, if you offer a user an iPad for posting a single two line comment on your blog, you are setting the reward far too high for the relative effort expected of the user. If you offered an iPad to the person who finds the most bugs in your system, knowing that they will have to spend hours of their own time doing it, that is a better match of reward against relative effort. Read More ...

4 Ways Extrinsic rewards bit me in the ass

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Silver 4 Ways Extrinsic rewards bit me in the ass

Not long ago I wrote about my daughters school and their usage of certificates to incentivise reading. The idea is that if a child reads a certain amount each half term, they can get a bronze, silver or gold certificate.

As you may remember, I have spent a lot of time trying to encourage my daughter to read. I thought I had cracked it after long gamified engagement. Little did I know, that in the background the school was undoing all my (and my wife’s) hard work.

Olivia has consistently got Gold awards for her reading, we have ensured that every school night for the entire school year she has read. Two weeks ago, she missed two days. This did not seem like that big a deal, two days in an entire year should not mean much in the long run. Read More ...

Getting rewards right. Recognise, don’t Bribe.

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Rewards recognise dont bribe Getting rewards right Recognise don 8217 t Bribe

One of the things that my daughters school like to do is give certificates to students for various achievements. Below are two that she has had over the last few months. Which one do you think she was happiest to get?

If you guessed the Gold award for reading 25 times or more in a term – you were wrong. She has half a dozen of them on the wall. The Bronze award for a “brilliant and inspiring” science experiment had her far more excited than all of the Gold awards put together.

I have mentioned our struggles to get my eldest to bond with reading and to be honest, even though she now does it quite happily, it really is not something she enjoys much. The thing is, she knows that it is something good to do and for the most part is OK with reading every night. That makes the Gold award pretty much guaranteed without having to put any abnormal effort in. Read More ...

Gamification, delayed gratification and rewards

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Reward vs investment Gamification delayed gratification and rewards

There has always been this common thought that if you have to work harder for something or you have to wait for it, the reward will be all the greater in your mind. Now for the most part. that is absolutely true. The anticipation of some sort of reward 1 is a massive trigger for dopamine and can make the reward all the more… well, rewarding – which we like!

The Marshmallow Test

However, not everyone is able to wait for a reward. There was a fantastic experiment in the 70s now referred to as the Marshmallow Test 2. The set up was that children were sat in a room and a marshmallow was placed on the table in front of them. They were given an offer. Eat this one marshmallow now OR wait until I come back and you can have two marshmallows. It is worth watching the videos if you need a smile! Read More ...