PlayAbly Podcast Episode 9: Black Friday Strategy Part 1

Black Friday Episode 1 of a 3 Part Series

In this episode, Angelo and Kajal dive into practical ways brands can harness gamification to boost holiday sales and engagement.

From advent calendars to streaks, learn how interactive experiences and themed content keep customers returning.

Discover how ecommerce gamification can help your brand stand out this season and why creating an experience beyond the sale is key. 

Plus, hear insights from recent client projects and the trends coming out of ShopTalk for Black Friday and beyond.

Welcome to the PlayAbly Podcast! This episode is brought to you by PlayAbly Ads, where we turn your marketing into an interactive, game-based experience that engages customers and boosts conversions. And here’s something special—mention this podcast when you book a free demo on our website, and you’ll get your first month free! Visit playably.ai to learn more and schedule your demo.

Thanks for tuning in to the PlayAbly Podcast! Ready to engage your customers like never before? PlayAbly turns your website into an interactive experience that drives results. Don’t forget, mention the podcast during your free demo, and get your first month free! Book now at playably.ai

Get Your First Month of PlayAbly free when you mention this Podcast during your free PlayAbly Demo - learn how gamification can improve your ecommerce shop at www.playably.ai

Transcript

PlayAbly Podcast Episode 9: Black Friday Stategy Part 1

[00:00:00] 

Kajal: Thanks for tuning in to the new episode of Playably Podcast. We have Angelo back with us today. Angelo, how's it going? 

Angelo: going great, Kajal. Excited for this podcast and for this nice autumn weather. I was walking through Central Park and leaves were falling down like pieces into place.

Kajal: I'm in Hawaii, so it's still 80 degrees here. I know you've been talking to clients a lot. We've had a lot of interest coming out of shop talk about games and what people can do for black Friday and the holidays coming up. I think you have some good ideas there. So what should businesses be doing for this holiday season?

Angelo: one thing businesses can learn from gaming is the concept of LiveOps, or Live Operations, which involves ongoing development and content creation even after the initial launch. For example, in games, you often see new content around Halloween, and Christmas time. Do you ever play any MMORPGs? 

Kajal: My only RPGs were like Super Mario, [00:01:00] and 

Angelo: Okay, that's the Super Mario RPG. That's a good game. The only MMORPG that I played, and this is before I started working startups because now I don't have the time it was Final Fantasy 14.

around the holiday season, like November, December, they start introducing themed content. The game developers introduce, live ops by introducing themed or seasonal content. One thing that I noticed is linkedin's been making a huge push on games and one fun thing they did For Halloween is with the game that I'm addicted to.

It's called Tango. You should play it. It's like Minesweeper meets Sudoku. it's really fun. for Halloween they changed, the icons from suns and moons. to ghosts and pumpkins. It’s a fun treat. That brings up the holiday spirit and surprises your existing customers.

a lot of brands are thinking about how retain customers. introducing, simple new content or holiday themed content that breaks up the normal newsletters is a fun way to keep your customers engaged.

Kajal: I definitely think so and going beyond the Black Friday sale, holiday sale and going a bit further with that is always [00:02:00] appreciated. Also I have played, that Simpsons tap game where you build the Springfield town. Oh they had drops and releases for characters and buildings and then holiday stuff like snow during the winter.

Angelo: Oh, yeah, that's a great point. Speaking of snow and winter, one thing you could try to do for your website is update the theme. we're getting into November, Halloween is over when does the Mariah Carey? All I want for Christmas start? 

Is it now or is it after Thanksgiving? 

Kajal: that's the big debate whether or not people are allowed to start now. Though I have seen a lot of Christmas decoration people already on Instagram. 

Angelo: Yeah, just updating your homepage by having a themed banner. I was at an event where they were talking about how one fun thing you could do for the holidays, is introduce simple graphics like that or visual cues to highlight the season could be a fun way to, update the content, keep it current and also keep your customers engaged. [00:03:00] For one brand that we're working with, Jones, New York.

They are trying to sell a lot of sweaters and cardigans because it's autumn So what we're doing for them is building an experience. it'll be an autumn themed advent calendar with references to pumpkin spice latte and autumn in the crisp winter air the idea is that if you can get people excited about, a certain theme or holiday they are spending more time with you and are more likely to Make a purchase 

Kajal: I love the advent calendars that we've been making for our clients.

they're adorable and really bespoke to the brand. we've seen such great performance from it because it keeps, their customers coming back every day to log in or every week to see what the next box is. it's awesome to see it working. 

Angelo: that brings me to the next thing I want to talk about gamification lessons brands can apply.

introducing the idea of streaks. I was meeting with a brand today, they sell fireworks and we asked our contact, said, she doesn't play games, but she's on Duolingo. I asked her what her streak was and it was 654 days.

Kajal: I never made it that far in a streak. I [00:04:00] usually pick it up right before I need to travel and then I forget all about it. But I think my Reddit streak is actually pretty long. 

Angelo: what's your Reddit streak? 

Kajal: I don't want to share because that's probably just not something that I want out in the world.

But definitely over a hundred days for posting. 

Angelo: Is that how the red streak works? 

Kajal: Yeah, it doesn't have to be a separate topic. You can just be commenting. if you have a post somewhere, then it pops up on the app and it's Oh, this is your new updated streak.

And then I think they give you something for it, but I don't know what it is. 

Angelo: there's a lot of companies that are incorporating streaks. I think streaks are fun in a couple ways. One is that it becomes a habit. So I have friends who help each other playing Wordle, they're in a group chat and they play Wordle and send the Wordle out every day, so every day, they want to keep the streak going, but also because they've invested the time into it, it becomes a habit, Even though they might not be getting rewarded with oh, you just hit your 100th streak, it's a part of their routine, it's a part of the habit that they're doing it every day, so they get some sort of, enjoyment from that. I think [00:05:00] the other thing about Streaks is that there's a lot of fun ways out with the advent calendar.

Some people think of the advent calendar as just a countdown to Christmas and like here are the different gifts that you can get each day. But what we're seeing in talking and working with all these brands is that there's a lot of different ways that Streaks and advent calendars could be used to build excitement.

For one brand that we're working with, they sell a very expensive mud mixer and have a pretty long Black friday promo period from november. until the first week of december all their marketing will be pushed towards this one big black friday offer for this high aov item we suggested to them that there might be some customers who procrastinate we thought it would be a great idea to use this advent calendar concept, to get people to, do a streak.

And as a reward for that streak, they could unlock a Black Friday deal that they missed out. We can gamify it in a way where, they're incentivized to complete the streak. So they can get that deal they missed out on. 

Kajal: That second chance. It always makes me feel a little better if you're like, oh, yeah, I'll do it this time. 

Angelo: Yeah, exactly So for people who missed out or really wanted it, but [00:06:00] needed a little more nudging. I think gamification and this advent calendar streak is a great way to do that the other thing we’re doing is When we work with brands we try to think about how we can incorporate gamification to solve their specific problems or to illustrate concepts like safety, safety is very important.

safety might not be the most interesting topic one of the things we do is think about how we can create a game that illustrates that concept. for the company we're building this Black Friday deal calendar, for, we're going to look at their FAQs and read all the common customer questions we'll incorporate those into fun games so that as people complete each day, they're learning more about the product, by the end do they know about the product, but we've guided their journey and they're ready to buy because we've given them this offer, in exchange for completing the full streak.

Kajal: Now that's interesting. I love the idea of using games to educate, especially cause I've seen a lot of our clients with just a ton of texts on their homepage, on their product pages. there's so much they want to say about the product or it's a complicated product.

That's not easy to explain or not [00:07:00] common knowledge. And I feel like this is one of those ways to really clean up your website. 

Angelo: Yeah, totally. there's a lot of brands, especially if it's a highly technical product or a product that's hard to explain. we're working with a, water ionizer company.

apparently there's over a hundred different use cases for how ionized water can benefit your life. most people aren't going to read through a hundred page ebook, but they might play a game where they guess the different ways, ionized water can, help as I learned recently, if you use it to bathe your pet your pet smells better.

Kajal: I love that. 

Angelo: You 

Kajal: recently hit a streak of your own, right? 

Angelo: Yes, I just completed the Barry's, birthday challenge, the choice was 20, classes in, 30 days, and I did the 20 classes in 30 days, I got a $90 gift card, and a pair of, bomba socks, that was the top prize.

if you did eight classes, it was a $30 gift card. We implement streaks in our advent calendars is with multiple rewards, if you complete three out of [00:08:00] seven days, you get a lower prize, but if you complete all seven days, you get a great big grand prize.

Using that as a way to get people to complete each day. we're data nerds we track all this data. we're measuring how many people are going through each day, what content is resonating.

We're always A/B testing. We're always learning. we try to get as many people through the, streak as possible because, we know that if we're able to get them through with fun and engaging content. And if they're coming back every day, the likelihood that they wouldn't chop is very low.

Kajal: The barrier to that is really just getting them to do it to start. 'cause they know that once you start something, you're more likely to continue it as well. Exactly. So I think the bespoke idea of having something like an advent calendar is just a great option. It's not something we see a lot in, the online space.

We see in-person advent calendars. I know that I get my jam one, and I've done the wine and beer ones before. Have you done any? 

Angelo: I have not, though the [00:09:00] jam one sounds fun. 

Kajal: Laurel, anything else that you could think of on this topic before we close out? 

Angelo: We just came off of a really hot chop talk where we had almost 30 follow up meetings. We're having those follow up meetings right now, and the thing that's been coming up is how can you use gamification to keep On top of mind with, your customers compared to gaming, where there are mechanisms to get the player back into the game, especially if it's a mobile game, they can send you a push notification, and the game itself might have, some mechanics where you get rewards for coming back every day.

It's very rare to get that same type of experience with online shopping, or with e commerce where most people aren't going to the website every day. And so incorporating gamification, incorporating these fun ways to engage and retain your audience, either through fun theme content or advent calendars that give people a reason to keep coming back and reward them for coming back, is a great way to leverage gamification to, make more money.

Speaking of making money, one of the offers that we have is, [00:10:00] if you book a call with us. Go to our website and book a call directly with us. if you mention the Playably podcast, we'll give you a free demo and you can see, what an advent calendar will look like for you.

Kajal: Love it. Always great having you on