Global Gamification Market Study Shows Driving Need to Engage Consumers

TechNavio, a research wing of Infinity Research, released a 40-page marketing report in November 2012.  The study examines the expected role of Gamification in the North American, European and Pacific Rim areas. The purpose of the research was “to aid decision makers’ understanding of the present and future landscape of the market.”

And the landscape’s terrain is populated by social media and networking.

The market report projects that worldwide dominance of social media and other networking sites (e.g., Facebook and LinkedIn) will continue. Further, social networking, collaboration and sharing of content continue to “gain traction in the global Gamification market.”

Businesses worldwide are expected to hop on board the Gamification train.

As social media marketing begins to spread as an enormously cost-effective market outreach and advertising platform, look for social networks to add Gamification apps to attract and engage their customers. Why? Because social network applications with Gamification apps are more engaging to customers “in a collaborative and meaningful conversation in real time.” In short, they are simply more fun and interesting–and occurs in the present.

Businesses need to work on customer engagement.

What’s driving the global Gamification trend is that, as e-commerce becomes more and more robust and popular, businesses need to work more on transforming customer participation from passive to active.

What does Gamification do for the business? As customers become active participants in Gamification apps, the enterprise gleans, among other things, real-time insight and information on just what the customers want to buy now and in the future. It’s all about marketing strategies and bringing the products to the forefront by continually engaging the consumer.

So many options, but what is the solution?

The report does not cite any quick fixes in achieving more customer engagement. Global Gamification is but one of the tools available to marketers in the volatile world of e-commerce. However, Gamification will remain in the mix of the wide variety of solutions as the world business leaders continue to cope with challenges and the flow and ebb of e-commerce.

Nevertheless, the future of Gamification in marketing and advertising is bright. One researcher, Mind Commerce, predicts that the Gamification product market will reach $3.6 billion in the next five years. They also estimate that within that same time period, 80 percent of Global 2000 enterprises will use Gamification apps or processes.

Embedding gaming in marketing and advertising will continue to follow the upward trend of social networking. Gamification is definitely a promising strategy to increase customer interaction and loyalty.

 Image by bengarrison