I recently sat down with Veer Gidwaney, founder and CEO of DailyFeats, to discuss some of the ways that the company is helping to “get people to achieve their maximum potential every single day” using gamification, points, and badges (or in this case “feats”).
We introduced DailyFeats earlier in our blog, but some of the most interesting ideas have yet to be explored: specifically, the site’s partnerships and how they are helping players achieve their goals. Partners include non-profits like the SETI Institute and the World Wildlife Fund, as well as for-profit companies like Monster.com and iTunes. At the most basic level, brands and businesses can sponsor “feats” or provide rewards, but these simple actions encourage participants to help themselves, help others, and do good.
Veer explained DailyFeat’s partnerships, “When we work with big brands, we go through an extensive integration and deployment process with them. One component is figuring out the positive actions that help reflect their brand purpose.” To clear the air, participants, or “featers” do not get points like in old-school loyalty schemes or frequent flier plans. DailyFeats is not a platform for “buy ten get one free” or getting gold status on Conglomerate Airlines. Instead, DailyFeats helps organizations identify the core positive actions that “featers” are working towards even before they purchase a product or engage with a non-profit.
This may sound like the next level of marketing’s intrusion in our lives, and gamification has received some criticism recently for its roots in the marketing world. The truth is that products, brands, and institutions are a very large component of our personal journeys and goals, and occasionally provide helpful steps along the path towards a better career, education, health, or civic responsibility. Veer gave me more information on how these partnerships developed,
“We didn’t sit down one day and say, ‘Let’s make a really cool brand platform, and positive action is a great way to do it.’ No. It was the exact opposite. Our belief is that the biggest social problems we have are going to be solved by people changing their behaviors. That is our fundamental belief. But we have a second belief: if you are going to do that at any scale that matters you have to find a way to involve the companies that have the megaphones, both for-profit and non-profit, that talk to people everyday because they have more reach than we do. We’ve just come up a way that brings those together really elegantly, I think.”
Veer is building positive interactions by connecting people with brands outside of a black-and-white cash exchange. This works not only to motivate individuals, but also the brands themselves. Companies and institutions must consider the individual motivations of each and every constituent, client, and customer in order to truly engage with them. Constituents may not have a direct say in the actions of the institutions, but DailyFeats acts on both ends to bring the two a little closer together for the purpose of accomplishing our goals as individuals and as a society.
