One of the biggest mistakes that people make when designing engagement with gamification is to assume that cash (or stuff) is the ultimate reward. Time and time again, evidence shows that tangible rewards have serious deficits in an incentive scheme.
Limitations include:
They Can Turn Users Off: If your rewards don’t look good in the first few minutes, you’re liable to lose more users than if you had never included rewards in the first place.
They Are Expensive: Obviously, physical rewards cost money – even if they’re donated, administration and fulfillment rarely happen for free.
Or They Are Too Cheap: users respond to cheap rewards just like they respond to cheap stuff in the real world: with limited interest. The $5 gift cert or trucker cap isn’t a panacea
It Rarely Motivates Better Than Chance: Unless you are offering large sums of money in a sweepstakes or casino, small dollar rewards tend not to motivate better than virtual items.
So what is the right reward schema? I have a simple approach that I’ve been using with partners that – in most cases – will produce the optimal results. The mnemonic is easy to remember: SAPS.
Status
Access
Power
Stuff
It’s what customers really want, in that order. And this list is also prioritized by “most sticky” and “cheapest to fulfill”. Some more elaboration on the SAPS idea:
Status is relatively obvious, and well-explained as a reward in my book, Game-Based Marketing.
Access rewards give users the opportunity to interact in a private or special way with your company or service. For example, an access reward might be to give top players the opportunity to earn a dinner with your company’s CEO – or a tour of your offices. Conversely, you might give social shopping “achievers” a 5 minute head start on deals on your website.
Power rewards specifically entitle players to “get one over” on others. This might be in the form of a moderator position (if on a forum or interactive site, say), or to change the way your site/application operates (usually best in a virtual world scenario).
And last/least in the model is stuff. Only once you’ve exhausted all the other options should you consider including stuff in your gamification design. Obviously, if you have amazing giveaways (and lots of cash to back it up), I highly recommend sharing the wealth.
But if you’re like most companies – especially start-ups – and you’re resource constrained, but looking for a way to create engagement, let SAPS be your guide.
[…] aren’t often cash, he thinks, unless the money is really good. His acronym for incentives is SAPS, which stands for status, access, power and […]
[…] common framework used in gamification to think about users’ desires, in order of priority is Status, Access, Power and Stuff, or SAPS for short. A more comprehensive approach that focused on these longer-term motivators (the SAP in SAPS) would […]
It’s really surprising how so many people immediately want to go to “Stuff” – real or virtual. I think people underestimate the value of Status, Access, and Power. All too often people want to jump right in to “stuff” without considering the other options.
Unless your reward system is heavily backed by real dollars real “stuff” is not an affordable way to do things. Virtual goods may become a bit too much to manage if too many sites start to use them, not to mention they require a much larger investment to create and be able to display in a meaningful way.
[…] access, power and stuff are “what customers really want, in that order,” Zichermann said in his blog. “And this list is also prioritized by ‘most sticky’ and ‘cheapest to […]
[…] wants SAPS. Status, Access, Power and Stuff. And in that […]
[…] but Gabe Zichermann, who asserts that game designers think of everything in terms of motivation, rejects this notion and instead proposes a SAPS (Status, Access, Power, Stuff) framework . Under this viewpoint, to […]
[…] Gamification uses game play mechanics to applications that are not games and aims to encourage positive behavior through incentives. One common trait found in games and typical of gamification is the implementation of gradual rewards to the user. This reward-based model is typically referred to as the SAPS model: […]
[…] SAPS is for grabs. It’s Zichermann’s personal pet theory, coined around 2010. There’s no research behind it. No data to back it up. And it’s woefully incomplete […]
[…] a larger audience of paying users and extend purchase activity. Consider how Gabe Zichermann’s SAPS model can be applied by tapping into players’ desire for: Status: e.g. avatar customization, limited or […]
[…] Læs mere på http://gamification.co/2010/10/18/cash-is-for-saps/ […]
[…] and some principles of reward strategy (in order of most to least […]
[…] website links to inspirational videos, a free massage etc. The contents were based on the four elements that motivate people to play: Status, Access, Power and Stuff. And yes, stuff was the easiest to […]
[…] away with traditional earn and burn and focused instead on delivering non-tangible rewards using my SAPS model of Status, Access, Power, and Stuff […]
This is a perfect reference for either loyalty or brand ambassadorship program.
Dead link: Game-Based Marketing
[…] rewards. When I was doing my research, as I prepared to transform my class, I came across an article by Gabe Zicherman. In it, he says he likes to use a marketing reward schema called SAPS: Status, Access, Power, […]
I really like this framework on the SAPS model. It really breaks down some complex concepts and is useful outside of gamification too. (works very well in my niche: crowdfunding)
Thanks Gabe!
. “If you can’t explain it simply, you probably don’t understand it will enough” –
[…] from gamification expert Gabe Zichermann’s “SAPS” model, there are four levels of recognition and rewards you should build into your program, from most […]
[…] do this, I followed Gabe Zichermann’s framework based on four powerful motivators – Status, Access, Power and Stuff. In short, this is called the […]
[…] Fig. 4 – Gabe Zichermann’s SAPS (adapted from: http://www.gamification.co/2010/10/18/cash-is-for-saps/) […]
[…] do this, I followed Gabe Zichermann’s framework based on four powerful motivators – Status, Access, Power and Stuff. In short, this is called the […]
[…] from gamification expert Gabe Zichermann’s “SAPS” model, there are four levels of recognition and rewards you should build into your program, from most […]
[…] via Cash is for SAPS | Gamification Blog. […]
[…] access, power and stuff are “what customers really want, in that order,” Zichermann said in his blog. “And this list is also prioritized by ‘most sticky’ and ‘cheapest to […]
[…] I will talk about how powerful a class store can be when properly stocked with awesome items (not stuff!) for students to buy. In the meantime, know that having your badges turn into class currency will […]
Great article. Would be interested to find out more about why in the priority order of SAPS.
[…] and discovery can be a powerful motivator to share and invite friends. Gabe Zichermann identifies four main levers to compel user action in a gamified environment: status, access, power and stuff. The motivators of access and power can […]
[…] perfiles más motivados por elementos externos, por ello en el diseño consideramos el modelo SAPS acuñado por Gabe Zichermann, ofreciendo distintos tipos de […]
[…] Gamification.co: SAPS […]
[…] -Trading Status for Stuff- According to Gabe Zichermann, the most powerful motivator of players in games is Status, e.g. experience points or levels. Some […]
[…] Gamification often times gets a bad rep because of its misuse over the past few years but when done right, it can make ‘meh’ products remarkable. Turntable.fm taps into all four components of Gabe Zichermann’s SAPS model (see http://gamification.co/2010/10/1… […]
[…] it comes to looking at rewarding players in IamP’s systems I like to keep in mind the SAPS model created by Gabe Zichermann. SAPS: Status, Access, Power and Stuff. It’s a hierarchy for […]
[…] from gamification expert Gabe Zichermann’s “SAPS” model, there are four levels of recognition and rewards you should build into your program, from most […]
[…] *http://www.gamification.co/2010/10/18/cash-is-for-saps/ […]