4 Questions with BigDoor

Kristina: There is a lot of buzz around gamification, but not many have talked about the long term effects that it can have. Can you speak to how gamification can build loyalty for a brand?

Keith Smith, BigDoor CEO: Gamification can certainly build out loyalty and deepen brand affinity. At BigDoor we've created a framework based four key performance indicators: Frequency, Engagement, Virality and Revenue.
Frequency - Online publishers want users to come back to their sites more often
Engagement - Online publishers want people to stay on their sites longer
Virality - Online publishers want visitors to the site share and tell their friends about the site

And ultimately, online publishers want to create a revenue stream with their site. These four KPI's really drive that engagement and help build brand loyalty.

Kristina: How do brands make the switch from using gamification to drive traffic or build on-site time to a full-fledged loyalty program?

Keith: Just adding points, badges and leaderboards isn't enough. Those deeper brand loyalty experiences are created when users are able to earn rewards that are highly valuable to them and that are authentic and core to the overall experience on the site. Quests (which are part of our Engagement Economy) are a great example of a way to really engage users throughout the site and help develop that brand affinity. Another example of driving traffic and increasing loyalty would be through the BigDoor Rewards Center.

Kristina: What are your top 2-3 tips for 'gamifying' a website?

Keith: Be sure you have an active community already in place before you consider adding gamification elements. Our partnership with Major League Baseball is a great example this - MLB.com already had a deeply engaged community of baseball fans. When they wanted to increase traffic to the Game Day section of their site by implementing a system in which users could earn player badges during live games. To date we have awarded more than 4 million badges on MLB.com. I'd add that if you are going to gamify a website be sure you have a built-in social referral program. Again what is really going to create that Virality on a site is the use of Share and allowing users to share with their network and awarding points for sharing referrals.

Kristina: Tell me about BigDoor's platform.

Keith: BigDoor is a gamified loyalty platform that helps companies increase traffic to their site and revenue through social rewards. We use gamfication to power social engagement for over 300 partners. Our technology is open, flexible and our API is secure and powerful enough to scale solutions for all types of implementations. now we are in a private beta with our Engagement Economy - a way for online publishers to add optional gamification elements that help extend their program and brand into an even larger audience for both user acquisition and increased monetization opportunities.

Tags: Big Door, gamification, loyalty marketing, online advertising, social marketing, social media