Gamification technology is the new big thing in interactive digital media. Gamification is revolutionizing business and medicine with the incorporation of interactive entertainment and competition into marketing and training initiatives. By actively engaging consumers, workers, and clinicians in this way, businesses and organizations can increase leads, improve efficiency in the collection of data, retain more loyal customers and clients, and train people on new skills and procedures. These benefits are accrued through the careful utilization of the full power of interactive digital multimedia technologies. Gamification techniques work by applying the design elements, mechanics, and underlying strategies of digital games to captivate user attention; the potential benefits to businesses and organizations are nearly unlimited.
The Gamification Philosophy at DDA
DDA has been developing a variety of interactive and online presentations that represent a gamified approach to technological design and development since the mid 1990s. Learn & Enjoy, for example, is a series of original online interactive games and experiences designed to demonstrate DDA’s diverse capabilities and services. These exemplify DDA’s ability to enhance the retention of information through the judicious use of entertainment elements devised to affect a greater level of user engagement. DDA used a similar approach in developing its proprietary Onlivemation™, which combines live video, 2D animation, and interactive web development to create memorable interactive experiences.
DDA has also pioneered multimedia, having developed its Synchronized Media™ technology to combine and coordinate video, animation, text, and images. DDA’s SmartSite™ technology combines this Synchronized Media with interactive web development to create a truly involving experience that captures the user’s attention and keeps it. Perhaps most exemplary of DDA’s gamification techniques is its virtual medical simulations, which combine video, voice-over narration, animation, virtual reality, and more for an interactive, immersive experience that truly needs to be seen and experienced to be understood. Indeed, elements of gamification design have found their way into many of the projects that DDA has delivered to both corporate and medical clients over the years, be they eLearning platforms, online and mobile applications, interactive online presentations, virtual medical simulations, and more. Please see the DDA Timeline and DDA Firsts for even more examples of DDA’s innovative use of gamification technologies.
Blissful Productivity
To illustrate the incredible advance that gamification represents, consider the amount of “work” people take up when they participate in interactive digital game play, whether alone or with others. Some players, for example, may put in so many hours into a game such as World of Warcraft that once totaled would equal the amount of time spent at a part-time job. This is not inconsequential; the average business would kill for this kind of concentrated focus among their customers. Commanding such attention from clinicians has proven nearly impossible, despite tons of efforts by medical organizations to innovate new eLearning methods that effectively do so. By utilizing game mechanics, both businesses and medical organizations can captivate audiences in a similar manner, and the data is increasingly clear that the return on such investments in technologies can be tremendous.
Motivating Behavior through Gamification
Gamification works so well to attract, engage, and retain people’s attention by tapping into key human desires common to us all, including for the following:
Reward
Status
Achievement
Self-expression
Competition
Altruism
Rewards encourage repeated behaviors by having desirable outcomes follow the successful completion of a challenge. This is such a powerful motivator that oftentimes the completion of a challenge is reward enough alone. The desire for status can also help initiate specific actions among people due to the inherent desirability of the acknowledgement and respect of others. Others are motivated simply by the pure joy of achieving a positive outcome after completing a particular feat.
Gamification platforms also motivate individuals by utilizing the value they place on their interaction with others. People may compete for virtual currency, for example, to virtually accumulate their own unique stock of virtual goods. Avatars are another good example of the use of self-expression to encourage engagement. Some people are motivated most strongly to compete with others and thereby demonstrate the superiority of their particular skills. Still others are motivated in a nearly opposite fashion, desiring to give virtual gifts and the like for the betterment of those they care about. No matter what the particular incentive is, gamification gives companies and organizations the power to engage target audiences more substantially than they ever have before.
Whether your company or organization needs to ensure maximum engagement with customers, students, clinicians, patients, employees, or clientele, be sure to turn to the gamification developers at DDA Games who have been pioneering advancements in gamification technology before it even became a buzzword: contact DDA Games today.
