PlayAbly Podcast: Gamifying E-commerce for the Future

PlayAbly Podcast Episode 25: From App Stores to Shopify: What DTC Brands Can Learn from the Mobile Gaming Boom

• PlayAbly • Season 2 • Episode 10

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In this episode of the Playably Podcast, co-founder Angelo joins to break down a major parallel between two digital revolutions: the mobile gaming explosion of the 2010s and today’s Shopify store boom. What does Flappy Bird have in common with high-fiber candy brands? More than you think.

We explore how platforms like Unity and Shopify democratized access—lowering the barrier to entry while flooding the market with copycats and competition. For ecommerce founders and marketers, it’s not enough to launch a store—you need to hook your audience fast, onboard them thoughtfully, and make that first impression unforgettable.

You’ll learn:

  • What DTC brands can steal from the best mobile game onboarding flows
  • Why site speed, brand differentiation, and email/SMS capture are your retention lifelines
  • How shoppable games elevate customer loyalty programs and boost opt-in rates
  • The psychology of “earned discounts” and gamified interactions
  • Why Shopify gamification is your new growth channel

Whether you’re selling high-fiber gummies or luxe skincare, this one’s a masterclass in adapting mobile gaming tactics for ecommerce retention marketing.

👉 Try PlayAbly to power your first touchpoint with fun, on-brand, data-rich games:

Welcome to the PlayAbly Podcast, where we dive into the art and science of gamification, customer engagement, and driving conversions. 

At PlayAbly, we turn passive audiences into active customers through shoppable games and playable experiences that transform how brands connect with their customers. Book your free demo here.

Thanks for tuning in to the PlayAbly Podcast! Ready to engage your customers like never before? PlayAbly creates branded Shoppable Games that drive results. Don’t forget, mention the podcast during your free demo, and get $500 off (book here). Learn more at playably.ai

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Welcome back to the Playably podcast. Joining me is Angelo, our co founder here at Playably. Welcome Angelo. 

Thanks for having me back on the pod. 

So today we are talking about Shopify brands and Shopify stores and  the proliferation of them. For me personally, this really came up because I was shopping for candy that's not bad for you.

And now there are so many options. They're all on Shopify. And before it used to be like, oh, these are all disgusting, except for  one brand that's tolerable. I can have that one. And it's happening everywhere. There's so many stores on Shopify. It's so easy to start a store on Shopify.

We saw this before with unity, democratizing  the mobile app gaming ecosystem, and seeing explosions happening there. Angela, you were there at the forefront of that working with a lot of the gaming companies, a lot of these app companies.

I'd love to hear your thoughts there. 

Yeah, I was there. my first iPhone was the iPhone 3G. I think that was the first one that had 3G So you could use it like it was connected to the Internet. I remember when I first got it.

I was at my first job at cornerstone at the time. I remember looking at the phone. It was like looking at maps or something, and I almost ran into a lady who was like, watch where you're going, that was one of the first times I was just hands down, looking at my phone.

And now, Everyone has neck issues because they're glued to their phone. at Cornerstone, a lot of the people I worked with were data nerds.

when they left Cornerstone, which is litigation consulting a lot of them joined Zynga, or other mobile gaming companies. the apps available at the time, were very simple. there was a game called Vampire made by Zynga.

It was pretty crappy, but I played it and this is probably, I don't know, like 2010, 2011. I joined Unity in 2014, Unity was a game engine that made it easier for game developers to publish on Apple and Google. Unity's slogan was to democratize game development.

what we saw was a deluge of gaming apps in the app store. because Unity made it really easy to create these games and, distribute them to millions of people via the app store. 

For better or for worse, because not all the games were very quality games, just like the apps.

I think we saw a lot of apps at the beginning of the smartphones were really cool, like the beer drinking and the mustache. And then it was like, what is the point of this So democratizing for  good or  worst. 

Democratizing, basically lowers the barrier to entry.

you have all these apps on the marketplace now on the app store. But because there's more apps it means more competition. it wasn't enough just to have a pretty app. game developers. had to invest heavily in the onboarding on the user experience to ensure that if they got downloaded amidst the competition they were able to keep the person engaged past the tutorial and keep playing if you're able to get someone to stay and keep coming back multiple days, they're more likely to spend 

It's still true for a bunch of free to play games. And that's something I have seen at unity and something we're seeing Right now with smb brands on shopify being able to bring e commerce stores online shopify democratized access to building your own e commerce store.

There's so many different stores for healthy candy. What is healthy candy, by the way? 

Oh, it's like candy. It says it's 60 percent less sugar. It gives you 30 grams of fiber. It tastes good. it's a big game changer because I smoke and when I smoke, I like to eat candy.

And I can eat a whole bag of candy and not feel bad. 

Wait, there's high fiber candy? 

Yes. it's tasty. I'll send you some. 

Is there a brand that you want to shout out and build a game for? 

I shouted them out previously. They have not contacted us, but Rotten.

is my favorite right now. They are absolutely delicious. We will build you a gummy game. We will build you a sour game. Whatever you want, we will build for you. I love your product. I'm on subscription with them. I'm on subscription with nothing, but I am on subscription with this gummy candy company.

Okay, rotten gummies. Are they also high in fiber? 

They are,  

Perfect. it's crazy if you think about it, the great thing about e commerce is it's run by a lot of founders, who solved a problem they had for any niche product or problem there's probably someone who had that problem and figured out a product to solve it. Shopify made it easier for stores to come online people with niche  niche product who 10 years ago didn't have a distribution channel, can now get. started easily with funding for products like   fiber gummies, They can set up an e commerce shop quickly.

the barrier to entry is low leading to more exciting products. But there are now many different types of candies, like healthy candy a vertical that didn't exist before So many brands are competing. in the same way that game developers had to adapt make sure they. Had proper data tracking and people had a great onboarding experience I think Shopify brands have to think similarly. It's not enough to get people on their store.

What are you doing to get them to not bounce? engage make a purchase join your email program and eventually make a repeat purchase. 

It's actually even worse. I would say that the gaming app explosion, just because. There's not only the people who come up with the niche product, there's the people who are copycats, who are dropshippers, who, are in it for the money.

I think during the pandemic, especially, it was like, oh, all these e commerce stores are making money. And so the people who were more risk averse, who didn't start a store right away. waited, saw more people make money and then jumped into it. So it just went from gradually increasing to exploding all over the place.

And now, you're right. advertising costs are at an all time high. People's attention spans are at an all time low how do you attract people to your page? How do you get them to like you and trust you and then how do you get them to buy and keep buying? I think are all very pertinent questions.

So what worked for the mobile apps? What should the stores be doing right now? 

Yeah, it was funny that you mentioned copycats because the first thing that came to mind was Flappy Bird? there's Flappy Bird, a Unity game and then people made a bunch of copycats for Flappy Bird.

 

broke our analytics, at Unity, because it was so popular and nobody expected it to be. It broke everything. 

I remember those days. It was like five people. What was the other one? Crossy Road. Those were good times, golden era of mobile games, what good game developers did is that, number one, they always had the analytics instrumented I remember if you can get people to complete the onboarding or in games, it's the tutorial, right?

What is the first level that they have to complete to understand the game mechanics and then keep playing. There's a significant correlation to if someone is able, if they don't complete the tutorial They're never going to do it again. And so you can think of the same way with Shopify brands where, if people are coming to your store, you paid so much money to Facebook or Google or Tik Tok, and then they come to your store and it's a very jarring experience or they see a pop up or they are turned off by it.

They're not going to come back. So that sense of first impressions really does matter. So what we think about at Playably is like, what is that first experience that matches a brand that will get someone to interact? people have really low attention spans.

I think you only have eight seconds to grab someone's attention. So what's more attention grabbing? A standard welcome pop up or a fun interactive game that shows you. Cool stuff about the brand is fun and engaging and looks visually appealing. The game is always going to win because we know from gaming that people like games we do a really good job of having talented game designers and game developers on the team so that the games feel very much like they're a part 

of 



It's not an afterthought that you just added. It's part of the brand and helps elevate the brand story. 

 And it allows the brand more time with the consumer who came in off the ad click or the referral to be able to sell them , teach them more about the brand through the game or say, this is something that differentiates us or just be, we're a fun, awesome brand and here's a discount that you earned.

Instead of just, some random spin on the wheel. 

Yeah, exactly, because, we talked about how it's so tough and there's so much competition that if you're in it, the only really successful D2C brands are ones that have been able to actually build a brand, right?

You have to build a relationship with the customer. The customer wants to be part of your brand story, because that's what's going to get them to stay and keep spending, otherwise you're just spending a lot of money on Facebook and Google to acquire this person who's only going to spend once, if they only spend once and never interact with your content or other people, then you're just losing money.

Yeah, and I do want to point out that the reason that we're saying on Shopify stores and not just ecommerce stores is because I don't know how many companies we've moved over to Shopify from a different platform just to increase their site speed. The page doesn't load, you're going to bounce right away and they won't even get to the wheel or the game.

They're going to leave and they are never gonna come back because they are gonna think that you are giving them a virus. So make sure your site speed is on point. that's number one. . 

 I'm on Instagram but I'm also on TikTok.

people are accustomed to having things served to them quickly, I don't think I've ever had a loading screen, but if I had a loading screen, that would be really annoying. it's the same with any new games or apps that I download, if there's a loading screen, that takes too long, then I immediately will not.

I probably will delete it. I actually forget to delete apps all the time. if it takes too long, then that's not a great first time user experience. if your site speed is really slow, And the first thing is a jarring pop up or something that doesn't tie into the ad or influencer that  sent them there, those are all things that cause you to not have a great first.

experience. it's very hard to get them back. 

Yes. Unless you have a great IP. Pokemon used to crash all the time at the beginning, just overloading the servers. the amount of times I saw made with unity at the beginning it's how I got a job at unity 

I looked it up. I was like, are they hiring? And they were, so then I was able to get hired. Thanks to our great CEO and founder over here at Playably, John Chang who took a chance. On a new girl, the site speed, is really important for the stores, and also, being able to bring people back, because, with mobile games, it was the notification, of, Hey, did you play today?

Hey, here's a new reward. What are the things like that for econ? 

Yeah, it's a little bit harder in ETHON because, with the app, if you enable push notifications, there's a way for the app to contact you and get you to come back. And then actually apps, especially gaming apps, do a great job with having streaks, right?

So there's different rewards that you get, especially if you log in every day. So the name of the game is retention. I just had a LinkedIn post about your sticky ratio, which is a percentage of users that are coming back on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis. And so it's easier in games and mobile apps because you have that push notification.

assuming that user allows it. they can get notified. And you can take it back to the app. for shopper brands or e commerce, it's a lot harder. that's why it's really important that you're in that first touch. that first experience. You're able to get either the SMS or their email so you're able to reach out through your life cycle marketing, 

That's so true. I had an abandoned cart from rotten and they sent me a text like, Hey, your cart is abandoned. I didn't buy it. They sent me again, Hey, your cart is abandoned. Here's an extra 20 percent off or 30 percent off. And I was like, Oh, shoot, I'll just buy it. they actually had a thing where it was like, just say yes text message and it'll process the checkout for you.

And we'll use the card on file and everything. There’s no friction. That's super easy. I am a discount shopper. So give me a discount and I'll buy it. I will always buy it. knowing who your audience is, being able to serve them the right reward or breadcrumb to bring them back to your site or make that purchase, is what’s so important.

Yeah. the great thing about our games is a lot of times we just match the welcome discount. you get it for free, you just give an email, with our discount. do something.

you have to play a game, whether that's Plinko Tinder or, other cool games we have. it's really hard to get people to do anything. But the fact that our games are fun and engaging, which is like a  is it has to be fun or people won't complete it.

But if they can play the game, our games are also designed with, what is the data that the brand wants to collect? there's ways that we could evaluate okay, Kajal likes these type of gummies. She's a discount shopper. Let's feed that into personalization so that we know we can make the shopping experience better for her in the future.

The fact that the games are able to get people to do something, we've seen higher opt in rates because they feel like they've earned the reward. So we're getting higher opt in rates into email and SMS. And we're also getting a lot of data that helps you personalize the journey even further because I think in a world where everyone's used to algorithmic content, 

For 10 scrolls. And I don't see any Taylor content. I'm like, Where's my Taylor content? And the same way that people are conditioned to algorithmic content, I think people are also conditioned by me, just with personalization, basically. So the cool thing that our games do is they help you collect the data that powers the personalization.

Plus I feel so much better about giving my email when I earned a discount It's Oh, I earned this. I want to definitely make sure my discount is sent to me.

And I feel good because I won and I'm a person who likes to win. That gives me my little hit of serotonin. And I already have a positive experience with the brand. I'm getting this discount, which is the same discount that people are normally offering, but it means more to me. therefore I think I'm more apt to use it psychologically.

I believe that's true. 

Oh, yeah, it's true. In games, we talk about how games are like behavioral economics or psychology, if you ask someone to do something, when they do it, it's like having skin in the game I think there's a dating analogy.

when you're dating someone, if you ask someone to do something and then they do it, they like you more. 

Oh yeah. 

it's been a while since I'm pretty sure this is a thing where if you ask someone to do something like, Help me repot some of my plants They like you more out of it. So I think there's something also with games where we're like, yeah, we're asking you to do something.

maybe that's why it works because if they do something and have an enjoyable experience doing it. Then that's why they fall in love with you.  



If you could just give one piece of advice to people coming out of This podcast, this notion of learning from the mobile game explosion, what would it be? 

Check out our Shopify app because we have games that help you engage your customers, make that first touch more exciting, and collect critical data for personalization. 

The Playably app is here . You'll can put in your own branding, your own colors,  get a game on your site live. Super fast in minutes and get the gamification going. Thanks Angela for joining. And this is the Playably podcast. Stay tuned for the next episode.