Up Your Marketing Luck: Gamification Tactics From Winning Brands

Add a Good Luck Charm to Your Marketing

St. Patrick’s Day is just around the corner, which means luck, leprechauns, and four-leaf clovers are on the brain. While not everyone celebrates the holiday, St. Patrick’s Day offers marketers another opportunity to make every day with their customers a special one, and use a little Irish luck to power effective gamified messaging.

Catch a glimpse of how Minnesota Timberwolves, Dunkin’, Origins, Outdoorsy, and The Vitamin Shoppe  gamify the inbox to drive quick quick-wins across campaigns and lasting customer engagement.

Minnesota Timberwolves’ Animated Contest

The Minnesota Timberwolves made the most of St. Patrick’s Day in their “Spin to Win” campaign, where fans of the basketball team got the chance to win eight diverse prizes. Using Movable Ink’s targeting rules, the dynamic campaign randomly displayed different offers based on the audience.

Once the contest came to a close, a new default image automatically displayed to ensure that fans always had an up-to-date experience.

Dunkin’s Year-in-Review Poll

Dunkin's 2023 year-in-review proved that ringing in the spirit the new year was a success. The brand included a "Battle of the Beverages" live poll into this email where loyalty members ultimately voted that the  Irish Creme Iced Coffee was the best-loved drink of the year. Not only did the poll give Dunkin’ the inside scoop on what menu items their customers loved most, it also collected zero-party data to help target future personalized marketing content.

Origin’s Purchasing Power Poll

Origins also got the live poll memo, leveraging  gamification for their self-care focused email. The poll asked customers whether their skin, body, or self needed the most TLC, along with a product that matched their individual needs. Once customers clicked on the product that caught their eye, they were redirected to its landing page to make it easy to purchase. To further enhance the experience, the percentage of clicks for each option was layered underneath the products—and just like Dunkin’, Origins could use the customer data to power relevant retargeting experiences.

Outdoorsy's Promo Play

Outdoorsy added a little something extra to the traditional scratch-off with a peel n’ reveal offer. In their gamified campaign, Outdoorsy sent tailored experiences to two different audiences for their winter promotions. Customers that previously booked with Outdoorsy got a “Refer a Friend” offer, while those who had yet to book received an exclusive 10% off discount. With this simple, engaging touch, the team saw unparalleled success: a 33% increase in revenue for the “Refer a Friend” deployment and a 9.7x lift in revenue via the discount offer. 

The Vitamin Shoppe’s Break-Out Brackets

Using the excitement of March Madness, The Vitamin Shoppe hosts a “Battle of the Brands” bracket every year to drive engagement and product awareness. Combining the power of polling and scratch-offs, this campaign automatically updates as customers vote and results from each round come in. To finish off the 2023 edition of the campaign, The Vitamin Shoppe also sent a scratch-off that revealed a discount for items from the ultimate competition winner.

Time to Try Your Marketing Luck

By adding automated gamified wins, marketers can surprise, delight, and engage customers every day of the year. Take a peek at the resources below to learn how you can implement these tactics into every campaign to drive lasting success.