With 200+ game mechanic variations, CataBoom's Catapult platform offers infinite configurations to meet your marketing and loyalty needs. But it's always interesting to learn which popular game mechanics our experts prefer!
Our head of product development, Chris Kersey, has his hands on every successful gamification mechanic that CataBoom produces, and he has thoughts about the ones that have shown versatility in the marketplace.
Kersey, who initially joined CataBoom in 2016 to manage delivery, took over his current role in 2020. When not busy pushing the limits of Catapult and our good game mechanics to expand the model of what gamification can be, Chris serves as the liaison between marketing, sales, and development, giving him a unique vantage point in the gamification industry.
Although it is challenging to pick a favorite game among all he has been part of building, Chris has a soft spot for some of our classics, including the traditional Collect and Win.
Drawing on the same concept as iconic campaigns like McDonald's Monopoly, customers are programmed to inherently respond to Collect and Win, making it a simple concept to understand. And it's surprisingly adaptable, too.
"Numerous clients have leveraged our ability to connect different mechanics together to create an integrated Collect and Win experience, but external events like making a purchase, downloading an app, or creating an account can also trigger our collect and redeem webhooks to extend the capabilities in a ton of different directions," explains Chris. “These capabilities are available right out of the box."
Another good game mechanic Chris appreciates for its flexibility is CataBoom's wack-a-mole-inspired Burrow Bust, a mechanic Chris describes as "challenging, but never frustrating."
"Adjusting time and speed settings can make this game a lot of fun," says Chris. "For example, you could chain several of the same mechanic together, each with slightly different settings, so participants can play it several times, with each time getting more challenging. We’ve seen examples where people love to post and share about it on social, too".
Video is one not-so-obvious option in successful gamification that offers great traction while assuring a player engages with your content.
"We can lock down the video mechanic so it's only visible from within the campaign, as well as setting it up to require a minimum percentage of content watched before any call-to-action options are presented—no scrubbing allowed!" According to Chris, it's also an interesting mechanic to use as an interstitial. By injecting a ten or 20-second video ad that must be watched between other mechanics, video can be a clever way to string different games together. One variation of our video mechanic offers a feature where additional images or text content can be displayed under the video at specific times to reinforce brand messaging or provide different jump-off points.
One of CataBoom's Puzzle Games that Chris finds particularly adaptable for marketing campaigns offers unstrict match options. By allowing the participant to place pieces in any order they choose, Chris envisions the Puzzle being particularly effective for gathering preference data. For example, allowing travelers to align top travel choices in the order they prefer: a good seat, free baggage, comped drinks, short airport waits, available destinations, and so on.
"You can use it as a poll," he explains. "And it's image based, allowing extensive freedom in the look and feel of the design to accentuate branding while providing an interactive experience to collect valuable customer data. It's all about you, the consumer, in an active way."
Lastly, Chris particularly likes a few designs of some of our most popular game mechanics for their adaptability and clever usages. Created by CataBoom’s director of creative Scott Monaco, these concepts take something as familiar as a slot machine or spinner but present each in a unique context.
For example, a Spin to Win crafted for a video game company featured runes relating to a specific element in their video game. A color chip-themed design for a paint company added a vivid twist to our Slot Machine, and a holiday-themed campaign was even more engaging with the Slot icons featured as patterns for an ugly Christmas sweater.
He says, "Our support for transparency and overlay enables designers to create very different design results. Because our mechanics can be completely reskinned, it gives art directors in every industry a lot of flexibility in terms of how the mechanics look and feel. Scott is a master at this."
It may not be an obvious choice to have a spinner "land" on different buildings around the globe for a tourism promotion game. Still, by taking the capabilities of a good game mechanic and thinking outside the box, the possibilities are truly endless.
If you want to boost your next marketing or loyalty campaign with popular game mechanics, contact our experts at CataBoom and see what they can envision to elevate your brand above the ordinary today!
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