Bill SabramLead Game Designer

20 June 2014

Games for Health Conference

Engagement is the first metric:

How game design enriches

5 well-being products

bill@meyouhealth.com@billsabram

Gamification is the use of game thinking and game mechanics in non-game contexts to engage users in solving problems.

Game-if-a-what?

Marketing & beyondConferences, workshops and certifications

Loyalty Programs1979 1st frequent flyer program

Crowd sourcing2011 retroviral protease in 10 days?!

19 years of professional game design Industrial Design at Carnegie Mellon University. An incredible journey from museum /exhibit design -> game design -> contract design -> behavior change design at a healthcare start up.

About me

Board, dice, card gamesBuffy the Vampire Slayer, Pokémon + more

Social gamesiPhone , Facebook, pedometers

Hand-held electronic gamesTalking games for preschoolers + beyond

In 2009, Healthways re-imagined online health and well-being interventions. MeYou Health develops and delivers next generation wellness and well-being solutions.

About us

Open social designInterventions for all your social connections

Person-centered designRealistic, convenient, immediate, genuine

Privacy + engagementProtect PHI while enabling engagement across social networks, email and SMS.

A conversation in three parts:1. Gamifying Well-Being2. Daily Challenge3. Walkadoo

structure

Research + my insights Failures + your ideas

What are these programs? What is success?

Small healthy actions. Health improvement is inherently long-term. Sustained engagement is a success.

Gamifying

Well-being

90+ Day RetentionPercentage of users who return to the

DC sight at 90 days and beyond:

3 types of touches:1. Visit website, 2. Complete a challenge or

3. Read a challenge email or reminder.

70.7%

Begin by defining the core action.Why? It is a question of time.

Design for engagement

Do the actionPress the Done button

How much time do you expect a typical user to spend with your app? Craft an experience to this time window. Then halve it!

Complete your cardWalk and offload your steps

Find your 200Eat 200 less calories today

More social more impact

• Pragmatic Randomized Control Trial

• 1,502 individuals recruited and randomized

• Well-being assessed at enrollment, 30 and 90 days

• Control = Weekly e-newsletter

Results published in The American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

Points. Levels. Badges. These are standard in gamification. When done well, they are very powerful.

Show progress

Stamps + BadgesThey are a visual road map.

LevelsOwn your achievements and gain status.

Points are feedback.They are just like any other motivational

message. But they are also currency!

I built four separate systems around basic actions for similar point events.Large point events denote large challenge. High levels convey status.

An economy

of points

A hunch Validated

Balance your point economies across multiple products. One of

our customers uses participant levels to quickly assess how

engaged users are in Daily Challenge and Walkadoo.

Daily challenge

• Small actions delivered daily.

• Multiple tracks of content across all the elements of well-being

• Gamified elements of exploration, achievement, socializing and mild competition.

• Optimized for mobile web and an iPhone app.

Your daily action

• Small actions delivered daily.

• Multiple tracks of content across all the elements of well-being

• Gamified elements of exploration, achievement, socializing and mild competition.

• Optimized for mobile web and an iPhone app.

7 am email

4pm reminder

50+ tracks from all domains of well-beingCycle into 28 days of specialized challenges

Tracks for everyone

FreemiumJoin for free, earn premium content

Build the minimum viable solution. Deploy it. Your clients will request smart improvements.

Virtual CurrencyPoints -> tokens -> keys -> tracks

The method to this madness!

Unlock TracksYou hold the key!

(earned, given or gifted)

What is success?

How do you know if you’ve succeeded?Establish mutually agreed upon terms.

We chose engagement• Unique visitors• Return visits• Sustained engagement

Something new

Unheard of numbersHard to believe. But true.

Unexplained behaviorThe Others

The reason?We suspect it’s the light

touch

My favorite:

5-Day pacts

My storyMax 25 day streak ballooned to 125 day streak with 5-day pacts

It felt really goodI was astonished. Bursts of

engagement with all my friends!

However…I found that giant streaks corrupt. It wants to live!

Empower the relationships between

your users.

Walkadoo

• Receive realistic, custom, daily step goals. Walkadoo adapts to your walking!

• Create derbies with friends to race and compete.

• Supports the Walkadoo Pebble, Fitbit, Jawbone UP and Moves app.

Make it social

• Answer the daily Walkie Talkie and get the conversation going.

• Learn some fun facts about walking.

• Allow genuine stories to emerge around the walking theme.

• Notice the different card! All or Nothing step cards are rare and worth double points.

Your daily email + SMS

• Learn today’s card.

• Call to Action (CTA) for today’s WalkieTalkie.

• Recap of yesterday.

• Mobile technology amplifies the power and ease of today’s healthy action.

Build experiences

Walkadoo is not about pedometers.We are building awareness, validating people’s movement, and motivating them to engage.

Keep a book of your big ideas. Then simplify them mercilessly. “Fail fast” as you build weekly sprints.

“I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.” ― Thomas Edison

What is success?

We chose card completions• “The algorithm is the intervention.” – Nat Cob, M.D., MYH Chief Medical Officer• Pilots with control group later this year!

Measure your core actions. Design for a future clinical trial.

Give ‘em what they want… Kinda

• Eureka moment from our research: People walk about the same each week.

• This made step competitions demoralizing; we wanted to allow folks with different activity levels to compete in a light and playful way.

• The Point Derby was born! Games, rules and “luck of the draw” lets people fail gracefully.

Some examples of our epic failures.Information design is difficult and other blunders from the world of gamification.

Walka-fail

Daily promptsThe expiration date

problem.

Chips!Bonus spins often feel

desperate.

Too. Much.Awesome.Too.Fast.“Bill, please.Simplify!”-MichaelStratmann,IndustrialDesign Professor

Moar Walka-fail

Core experience + time = end gameDefine your end game before your super users go over the cliff. Plan now, not later.

What’s it all mean?

Daily ChallengeComplete challenges. Earn points. Grow a tree.

Over and over. Until it’s golden.

WalkadooComplete cards. Earn points. Answer Walkie

Talkies. Earn levels. Then what?

?

Walkadoo has an outback journey look + feel.What could you experience as you progress through the product? Support theme + core.

Progression Recycle when possible!

Social game reusedMy art will go on?

Bill SabramLead Game Designer

bill@meyouhealth.com@billsabram

Thank you!

20 June 2014

Games for Health Conference

Engagement is the first metric:

How game design enriches

5 well-being products