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MACROTREND: ROI Anxiety

How much is all of my social media activity/data worth? Companies have made and are still making huge expenditures with no particular clear rubric for interpretation

Here, we can look at the question “what is a meaningful online interaction?” on a business level, with meaningful having sharp financial overtones.

MACROTREND: Gamify Loyalty

The future of social games / location-based check-in platforms is loyalty, not social competition or status.

EXAMPLES

• Foursquare/American Express deal: at select merchants, you can now check-in with foursquare, pay with your American Express card, and see savings automatically credited to your account. There’s no cutting out coupons or showing your phone to the cashier. • Google acquired Punchd, an app that replaces loyalty punchcards. Integrates with Google Wallet, see #cashless • Cardmobili is an app that collects and manages all of your loyalty programs so you don’t need to carry cards • Loopt is a GPS-based social network similar to Foursquare. Loopt Star encourages users to compete for rewards from retailers

DRIVERS

• Crowded deals space – what will grease the transition from one-off deals to sustained loyalty? • Question of what will keep people engaged in gaming, as industry explodes • Complicated loyalty programs whose benefits are difficult to redeem • “Discounts are the most compelling incentives for winning a challenge, followed by ‘Social Action’ and ‘Points Towards Loyalty Program’. Only 1-in-4 said that ‘Status in the Community’ was a very compelling incentive” Saatchi Gamification Study • #GPSeverything, widespread love of badges. • “Latin Americans spend circa USD 10 billion a year on gaming and gambling. Experts estimate than in 10 years the whole region’s external debt could be paid with the money generated from the gaming and gambling industry.” Source: Gaming Industry Wire, July 2010 • “58.6 million Americans have played a game on a social network in the last three months.” Source: Newsweek, September 2010 • “67% of US households play computer or video games. 40% of all game players are women. The average gamer is 34 years old and has been playing for 12 years. In 2010, 26% of Americans over the age of 50 play video games.” ESA 2010

IMPLICATIONS

• Deals get so good and so concentrated within gaming that huge numbers are compelled to join, play, and share their personal locations and information purely not to miss out. Major behavioral shift, replaces coupon clipping entirely. See #IdentityPatrol • Massive data source that needs to be mined • Amex/Foursquare as solution to ROI problem? See #ROIAnxiety