Game-based mechanics—a collection of activities and technologies that add up to define a user experience—can heavily influence social media marketing/content marketing campaign strategy — a specialty of DigitalEYE Media.

Common interactive gameplay features of most gamified applications or services for customer loyalty programs include the awarding of “badges” for achievements, players ranked by “level,” public “leaderboards” showing who’s scoring the most points, feedback (progress bars, points toward next level, etc.) that lets players know how they’re doing, a point system or other virtual currency for purchasing upgrades or prizes, and the ability to challenge or talk trash with other users.

Incetivize Customers, Build Loyalty

The gamification movement seeks to take these kinds of common video game elements and apply them to the “real world” in an effort to incentivize customers, build loyalty and introduce some fun into what might otherwise be mundane, everyday activities (like getting coffee, shopping and exercising) when the games are played.

The game flow of the games may be either “turn-based,” in which players are given a number of turns to execute their actions. or “real-time,” in which player actions take a real amount of time to complete.

Online gaming is a technology rather than a genre, a mechanism for connecting players together rather than a particular pattern of gameplay.

All online games are played over some form of computer network (which almost always means the Internet). One advantage of online gaming is the ability to connect to multiplayer games, although single-player online games are quite common as well.

Online games can range from simple text-based games to games incorporating complex graphics and virtual worlds populated by many players simultaneously. Many online games have associated online communities, making online games a form of social activity beyond single-player games.

The rising popularity of Adobe Flash and Java led to an Internet revolution where websites could utilize streaming video, audio, and a whole new set of user interactivity.

Flash, a multimedia platform used to add animation, video and interactivity to web pages, is frequently used for advertisements and games.

The Java software platform refers to a number of software products and specifications from Sun Microsystems. Java’s suitability for games programming is based on features like direct access to graphics hardware and external devices. As a result, there exists a growing number of excellent, fun Java games on the market.

On-demand Entertainment

When Microsoft began packaging Flash as a pre-installed component of IE, the Internet began to shift from a data/information spectrum to also offering on-demand entertainment. This revolution paved the way for sites to offer web surfers online multiplayer games like the mighty World of Warcraft.

More humble online browser games are played over the Internet using a web browser like Internet Explorer, Foxfire, Google Chrome or Bing. Browser games are often free-to-play and do not require any client software to be installed apart from a web browser. Browser games are also portable and can be played on multiple different devices. They can be created and run using standard web technologies or browser plug-ins like Flash.

Browser games come in many genres and themes that appeal to both core players and casual players.

They can be single-player (e.g., Robot Unicorn Attack, Castle of Heroes, The Room) or multiplayer (e.g., Domain of Heroes, Fallen Empire: Legions, Virtonomics).

Virtonomics is a business simulation, simulating economics, that enables users to study the basics of management. The game is turn-based and the conversion of a game situation occurs once a day.  The main purpose of Virtonomics, which resembles the game Capitalism 2 designed by Trevor Chan, is to build a successful business in a tough competitive struggle.

Multiplayer browser games have an additional focus on social interaction, often on a massive scale. Due to the accessibility of browser games, they are often played in more frequent, shorter sessions compared to traditional computer games.

This makes them ideal for the short social games so appealing to both marketers and consumers alike.

For brand marketers, their ultimate functional goal remains, as always, customer engagement leading to repeat purchases of products and services.  The name of the social gaming game is more eyeballs and longer brand engagement. Gaming can be used socially to reach a vast array of customers who may have little to nothing in common outside of the gaming networks in which they choose to participate.

Fortunately, social gaming is simply a variation on quite familiar (and centuries old) customer loyalty programs—in this case just updated and pixelated to deepen brand involvement and create online buzz.

Social games are popular because they cover a range of genres, including RPGs, strategy games, virtual worlds and action. What they all share in common is that they can be played in 5-10 minutes, making them perfect for coffee breaks (or discrete loafing). Many games can also be played between and among friends and replicate the fellowship of sitting around a board game, while the quest for top scores plugs into the human competitive edge.

With 62 million U.S. Internet users (or 27 percent of total users in the U.S.) playing at least one game on a social network per month, advertisers are spending lots of money hoping to cash in on all those eyeballs. Users are obliging by increasingly spending their money to buy virtual goods like “ammunition,” “crops” and “new levels” as they get deeper into their gaming habit.

According to research from eMarketer, users are expected to spend $653 million in virtual goods in 2011, 28 percent more than last year with $248 million coming from lead generation and $192 million from advertising.  eMarketer says virtual goods will continue to lead the way in generating revenue for the industry with a 60 percent share in 2011 and 2012.

Marketers are also spending money on “lead generation” campaigns – or the exchange of a user signing up for their newsletter or special offer in exchange for free virtual goods for a favorite game – with the hopes of enticing the user to sample or test their products.

According to a Feb. 2010 survey from game publisher PopCap, men make up 45 percent of the total social players. But the person most likely spending time tending virtual farms (and maybe even whacking rival wise guys in Mafia Wars), is a 43-year-old woman who plays several times a day, even though she holds a full-time job (and most likely has kids). She’s also most likely to be playing FarmVille, Bejeweled Blitz, Texas Hold’em Poker, Cafe World, and Mafia Wars, and has likely played an average of six games — many of which were recommended by friends. Facebook is her preferred gaming destination of choice. In fact, 83 percent of those surveyed say they choose to play on Facebook over other social networks. That’s not exactly a surprise, though, given the dominance of Facebook and the fact that most social games land on Facebook first.  As for spending dollars on playing these games, over 50 percent say they’ve earned and spent virtual currency in these games (but only 28 percent have bought virtual currency using real-world money).

MSN Games reports 40 percent of their casual games customers are college graduates or higher, 25 percent are in a professional or managerial role at work, and 55 percent have a household income of $50,000 or more.

“Social gaming has a business model,” Jonathan Miller, Zynga’s head of digital media, told the Abu Dhabi Media Summit in March 2011. “People who play FarmVille actually spend real money to buy virtual food or whatever it may be for their pig.  Most people don’t but enough do so that it’s a real business.”

In an online world hyper-sensitive to advertiser intrusion, brands have experimented via social engagement and branded content with ways to make their messages not an interruption but desirable in their own right.  The challenge to brands is to capture customer attention and then make themselves a part of the rhythm of their customers’ lives, sort of scratching the itch to play games that reinforce a relationship with a brand.

The true skill lies in combining brand messaging and game player desires in a coherent way.

Gabe Zicherman, the author of the book Game-Based Marketing, notes that brands have lost the ability to tell consumers what their preference is—instead, consumers defining that preference are now relying on the opinions and calls to actions of their peers.  Social utility has allowed consumers to cooperate and compete with others in their social graph (the map and database of who is connected to whom) and their neighborhood, driving deeper engagement.

Brands can use game mechanics as a system through which they can inspire a call to action.

But, if a game-based marketing program is not properly executed, things can go horribly wrong.

“Video-gamification” of social media marketing has exploded onto the global business scene so fast that brand marketers are scrambling just to separate hype from truth and grasp the basics of this onrushing mega-trend that has turned an industry on its head.

Current media headlines are reminiscent of the ‘90s dot-com bubble.  Venture investors are placing colossal valuations on consumer Internet companies like Facebook, the Web’s largest social networking service turned largest online gaming website, and Zynga, the top social network game developer.

Social gaming is barely three years old, but Zynga and Facebook led a 51 percent surge in the private market valuations of top Web companies in this year’s first quarter, according to Nyppex, a New York-based research and advisory services firm.

Zynga, maker of the Cityville and FarmVille online games, rose 81 percent in value from the fourth quarter to about $8 billion (other sources put that valuation closer to $10 billion). Facebook climbed 57 percent to about $65 billion. Even though other sources put Facebook’s valuation somewhere in the neighborhood of $52 billion—that’s still more than 25 times revenues.  The valuations are based on transactions among institutional investors.

The Wall Street Journal reported in February 2011 that Zynga had revenue of $850 million in 2010, just its third full year, more than triple the year before.  Facebook’s revenue went as high as $2 billion in 2010, its sixth full year.

Not only is revenue exploding, but profits are, too. Through the first nine months of 2010, Facebook made $355 million, meaning it likely made a profit well over $400 million, if not $500 million, for the year. (In contrast, Google’s net income in its sixth year—2003—was $399 million.)  Zynga’s profit was also about $400 million in 2010, only its third full year.

Facebook has become the largest online gaming website on the Internet because, of the 500 million users registered with the service, nearly three-quarters of them play at least one game on a regular basis. Moreover, a majority of the applications on Facebook are games, both small and big.

According to the latest App Data report released April 4, 2011, Zynga dominates the social gaming market with more than 269 million monthly active users across its 55 apps, most of which are gaming properties. Gaming publisher Electronic Arts, with a market capitalization of $6.3 billion, is far behind with 36.4 million monthly active users across its 39 gaming apps. Self-funded CrowdStar follows with its 32.3 million monthly active users across 20 gaming properties.

All the green in the water is attracting some pretty big sharks.

For example, in March 2011, media giant News Corp announced plans to build its own social-gaming business—and it won’t be on the carcass of its social entertainment site MySpace (whose sale or spin-off the company has begun exploring).  Instead, News Corp’s social-games drive would center on Making Fun and IGN, two small companies it bought in the past few years.

It gets even more interesting when you consider that social gaming is part of a larger gamification trend in which businesses of all kinds weave elements of games into applications that otherwise have little to do with typical game playing.  Earlier this month, Bloomberg’s Business Week reported how huge companies like Siemens, SAP, Nissan and Mattel are using game technology to improve how they train workers and design and market products.

The market for all this gamification will grow to $1.6 billion in 2015, from $100 million in 2011, says Wanda Meloni, founder of M2 Research, a consulting firm that researches the gaming industry.  According to a new report from Parks Associates, revenues in the social gaming market will increase to $5 billion between now and 2015.

That’s just a small part of the $28 billion U.S. video game industry, but social gaming is moving up the charts with a bullet, while the rest of the video game industry struggles with its own monetization problems.

All of this begs the question, what does all this online video gaming foment in the social media marketing space mean to brand marketers?  Check back next week as I delve into the implications for brand marketers.

As a consumer, there’s little risk or reason not to participate. Buy the deal for a fraction of the price, and when ready, redeem it. The only downfall is that they do eventually expire, and some, especially the exercise deals, will go unused. Beyond that, group buying is safe and extremely beneficial to consumers looking to save money, as well as people looking for new things to do and new places to try.

The real risk comes on the business’s side. A business offers a service or a product at a fraction of the price, usually at least more than 50 percent off. For example, “Pay $10.00 and get $20.00 of food” at a local restaurant. The deal is posted on the collective buying website and mass blasted to their enormous email list. Consumers now have a limited amount of time to purchase this deal before it expires. By the end of the deal’s time, “X” amount of people have purchased the deal, and then comes the split with the group buying platform that ran the deal. Many site’s split is as large as 50 percent, so businesses are now giving consumers their product or service at 50 percent off, but only received around 25 percent of the value.

Broken down in this manner, this may not sound like a very good deal for the business, but the upsides are that the business now has a large chuck of cash upfront that may be much needed at this time, as well as the exposure and the goal of generating new business. There are definitely pros to participating in a group buying deal, but many business owners are failing to look at the cons, and ending up with negative, unexpected ramifications. Here is the list of things to consider before participating in a group buying deal:

• Do the math. Figure out the entire equation of how much your product or service actually costs you and how much you are coming out ahead, even, or under after the split with the company. Make sure you are not coming out too far under.
• Assess the amount of deals your business can really handle. Each group buying site will allow you to put a cap on the number you want to offer. If you are a small, one-man show, selling 5,000 deals could be impossible to honor before it expires. Businesses have experienced negative backlash on online review sites and lost future customers because coupon buyers were unable to use their deal due in a timely manner because the business was booked solid. Don’t be greedy.
• Decide which company to partner with. There are literally hundreds of options of which company you can run a group buying deal with. If you are a business that can handle high volume, as well as can handle a larger split, one of the big guys such as Groupon or Livingsocial may be the way to go. Amazon recently ran a nationwide deal for $10.00 for $20.00 of products on its site and sold 1,378,938 vouchers. Amazon can handle this kind of volume, your local hair salon cannot. While these large businesses may look tempting, choosing a local, smaller group buying site has its benefits as well. Working with smaller companies means you’ll have a more personal experience and probably a lot more say in the formatting, copy, and delivery of your deal. For instance, Groupon doesn’t show businesses their coupon copy before it is runs. It may also be a great way to run a lower volume deal. Maybe you’re just looking for a little boost and would be happy with 100 deals sold; the smaller guys are a great place to start. Smaller companies will generally also take a smaller split and leave room to negotiate. If you can’t afford a 50/50 split, working with a local site that could go as low as 70/30 may be a better alternative.

Collective buying is one of the biggest trends in the market right now, especially in an economy where 50-70 percent off deals is much needed and appreciated. But as a business you cannot allow yourself to be sucked in without doing the proper research and consideration. Running a group buying deal could be life changing for your business, but it could also be the final nail in the coffin for a struggling business greedily looking to make some quick cash. Remember these tips when considering a group buying deal and you just might see the positive surge in business that you’ve needed.

Why Navigation Is Critical For User Interaction

It’s often the small details that make the biggest impact on your design and not implementing even the smallest change to increase usability can be fatal during the conversion process. Being able to navigate through a site and not be bombarded by links that don’t work or being presented with useless will make your online business more effective.

Many people don’t take the small details in to account or forget about the big picture just because their site looks great and is in a digital environment. You wouldn’t choose a cookie cutter layout for your office or storefront despite the convenience in selecting it, would you? You wouldn’t because your needs are unique. The same goes for your site – users need to navigate outside of the navigation methods imposed by generic layouts.

What Is Good Design?

Tackling the issue of website usability and how it can be implemented effectively, Tanner, our resident blogger at DigitalEYE Media wrote a very extensive post titled “Designing With Usability: How To Make Navigation Easier For Users”. In the post, you can learn what web usability is and how it plays a critical role in how visitors interact with your site along with tips for improving visibility.

There is a reason why great interface designers exist: the need for usable and effective layouts is not only in demand but their work can help your bottom line. If you have a website that is very easy to use, features interactive elements that guide visitors to their destination and is visually appeasing, your website will be the best generator of cash.

The team of Graphic Designers and Web Programmers I work with at DigitalEYE Media take site usability very seriously. Their experience in crafting sites that are very easy to use and effective conversion points sets them apart from the competition. Even more so, my team’s work speaks for itself.

Email was championed as the forward-thinking communication tool of the 90′s. It spawned uninterrupted communication across all continents and brought down one of America’s largest corporations — killer indeed! Email is also a spammer’s heaven despite the legal ramifications. Spam is the scourge of the Internet. It is a one-way facet that disrupts people’s workflows. It’s the most obtrusive form of advertising, yet spammers continue to thrive on unsuspecting recipients. Filters have been created and are continually tweaked but the battle against spam is waged in offices everywhere on a daily basis.
Email is one of the biggest productivity killers and time wasters as people write out epics akin to The Illiad and The Odyssey, that could be condensed in to a sentence or two. Thankfully, there is a solution: Twitter’s Direct Messages and @replies is the email killer we’ve been waiting for; they’re fast, minimalist and won’t assault your inbox with spam.

Twitter Kills Spam With a Click

Has someone sent you a spam-filled Tweet? Block them. Don’t want to be burdened with automated messages? Unfollow them. Twitter makes communication (private or public) simple. Twitter offers the broad reach of emails with the advantages of simplicity by promoting pick-and-choose communication and focusing on whom you really need to talk to. Messaging with Twitter forces you to start a conversation and really be a part of it— spam free, of course.
Twitter Gets Straight to the Point

The best thing about Twitter is its biggest limitation: 140 character messages and updates. If email were built on the idea that a message cannot exceed 140 characters, we wouldn’t have the current epidemic of spam and seemingly endless emails that serve no purpose but to waste the recipient’s time. Twitter’s limitation makes the real purpose of a message shine, instead of it being dimmed by unneeded thoughts.

Email is Too Slow
Despite the advancements in email, it’s still slow compared to Twitter’s @replies and direct messages, which happen instantly. Email must be downloaded and have a high latency when downloaded to a phone. Twitter replies can be delivered as text messages to your phone and if you have a Twitter client on your phone, the message appears instantly.

Twitter’s @replies and direct messages are nirvana for those who thrive on simple, direct forms of communication. Its spam control methods beat email, messages are straight to the point and they’re sent fast. I predict direct messages will soon outnumber emails; Twitter is just that efficient.

When compared to other office suites, in-house hosting and productivity Apps, you’ll find Google Apps cut down on cost and deliver on productivity. It’s extremely easy to set up with your domain and start saving money. Best of all, the Apps store data in their cloud, which makes your documents, contacts, mail and calendars accessible anywhere you have an internet connection.

Google Documents

Google Docs is the web-based competitor to Microsoft Word and it’s free. Your documents are uploaded to Google’s servers making them accessible anywhere you are. Documents such as spreadsheets, presentations and letters can be shared with other Google Apps users instantly.

These documents can also be accessed from any mobile device, so you never have to worry about where your work is saved. Revisions, formatting and group editing are available everywhere Microsoft Word is as well as tons of places it usually isn’t.

Compared to Microsoft Word, Google Docs beats the costly Microsoft App on data syncing, price and productivity.

Google Calendar

Google’s Calendar App once again takes the cloud approach to sharing data. Calendar information is entered via a web interface but you can sync your events, appointments and information to mobile devices instantly. Add an event on your phone, your co-workers can see it seconds later. That is the beauty of Google Calendar- its cloud integration that pushes data from Google’s servers to your computer and phone.

Google Mail

Google Mail is your answer to email hassles. Its powerful spam filter means you won’t be inundated with useless content. You can also access Google Mail with your mobile device and computer to once again sync mail and receive it instantly. The storage space provided is a spacious 7 GB with a guaranteed 99.9% uptime.

Google Apps can cut costs for your business, increase productivity and make your data accessible anywhere. Microsoft’s offerings can’t compete or are too pricey for a business looking for a reliable and cheap productivity suite.

“The Twitter Rule”

If you’re familiar with Twitter, you’re already well aware of the 140-character limitation placed on your Tweets; this limit on your Tweets forces you to get the point across in a brief fashion. Tweets are also presented in a stream, with the most recent Tweets (which are considered the most relevant) appearing at the top. By presenting the most important information first and building upon it with the less important details Twitter users can create a flow in their writing that readers will want to follow.

Rethinking Your Writing

An introduction is the first thing readers see and what they judge your writing on. It presents a problem or a question that can be solved or answered in the post. Keeping things brief allows you to keep your readers’ attention- don’t inundate readers with excessive amounts of information but rather, briefly answer the question or solve the problem you’ve lined out.

Create Interest

Following “The Twitter Rule” will create excellent content that can be executed in a timely manner. It’s extremely easy to integrate “The Twitter Rule” in to your writing. You’ll pique readers’ interests with a when you use description that gets straight to the point and present a problem they (or someone they know) may have. Follow up on it with a way to solve that problem, and the reader will be led through your writing with ease. You’ll keep the reader’s interest and at the end they will be satisfied with the solution; this leads to follow up action as they link back to your writing and promote it within their network.

Interest is accelerated when you keep things brief- limiting the time it takes for your readers to take in information shows understanding of their busy schedules. By creating a Twitter-like description, presenting a problem and answering it succinctly, you’ll save your blog readers’ attention spans and keep them coming back for more time and time again.

What Are Twitter Lists?

Lists allows users to add other Twitter profiles to a centralized location for quick, easy access. You can use this in conduction with your Social media strategy to instantly add more value to your Twitter profile and establish yourself an expert on who’s who in your industry.

Twitter lists are so much more than a simple place to add your favorite followers. Anyone visiting your profile will instantly see which lists you have created and who you would recommend they follow. The great thing about these lists is that they are real, active links that anyone can copy and paste to share outside of Twitter.

Twitter Lists In Action

You’ll need to make Twitter lists public if you really want to take advantage of the feature. A private list is beneficial if you want to follow your family or friends who are wary of being exposed to your list of followers but beyond that, Google will do not index your list which makes using a private list a bad idea.

It’s important you be picky when creating your lists. Just because you’re looking for Twitter profiles on photography doesn’t mean you should add anyone with a camera. Use variety when choosing people to follow. Pick people who take great product shots and some who have an eye for nature. not just photographers who focus on photo-journalism (although including a few of those in your Twitter profile would be great as well). Think of your lists as the cream of the crop when choosing professionals in a given area.