439 - Gamifying The Membership Experience with Kimba Cooper-Martin

In this episode, I dive into the exciting world where gaming and memberships collide.

Joined by gamification expert Kimba Cooper-Martin, we explore what gamification really means for online memberships and how you can use playful techniques to build stronger engagement, improve onboarding, and enhance member retention.

We bust myths around gamification being just for fun topics or certain ages, get practical about challenges and best practices, and discuss the real psychology behind why gamification actually works.

Whether your membership feels “serious” or already has a streak of fun, you’ll discover strategies to motivate and delight your community.

In this episode:

• What exactly is gamification, and how is it different from simply adding points, badges, or competitions?
• Why does gamification motivate people, and how do you accommodate different personality types within your membership when designing gamified experiences?
• How can you apply gamification techniques to onboarding, engagement, and retention—but avoid the common pitfalls and keep things ethical and inclusive?
• Is gamification suitable for every type of membership, including so-called “boring” or highly professional fields, and how can you experiment safely without overwhelming your members?

Key Quotes & Takeaways:

"It's everywhere. So we've all played games, we've played conkers, cricket, tiddlywinks, you know, board games, video games, any kind of game you can imagine. And within those games are tools and techniques that are used to encourage you to keep playing, even when you're bored or you're frustrated because you want to get to that next level or you want to beat your opponent."

"Give people an option to opt out if you're going to run competitive things, if you're going to run challenges, you know, some people run like a five day challenge or a 30 day challenge or whatever in their memberships. If you're going to do that kind of thing, absolutely fine. Give people the option to opt in or opt out so they don't have to take part."

"If your membership is doing the same thing it's done for the last five years and you haven't made any changes, then people's minds, even if they want to engage, even if they find the thing really useful, even if it's what they want more than anything, it will naturally disengage because there's other things that are new and challenging and a bigger threat."

"How can you incorporate the senses to change the way that people interact with your membership, which obviously with online memberships sometimes that can be difficult, but you can add in little things here and there to change people's association with stuff."

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