Gamified skier content gathering? I’m digging Cache the Jay.
Gregg Blanchard /
Last year I started to learn German. So, as millions of folks do, I downloaded the Duolingo app and, aside from learning critically important phrases like “das brot ist zu lecker” (the bread is too delicious), I was also re-introduced to the world of gamification, something I hadn’t had a front row view of for a while.
Then I wanted to brush up on some math, so I tried Brilliant. Interestingly, I was greeted by the same ideas of carrots and steps and fun and rewards as I’d had in Duolingo. Six months ago my son got me into chess again after a traumatic childhood of rarely winning a game against my bigger, older, and smarter brother. On the Chess.com app, I once again found these same game mechanics in place.
These examples are on the far end of the spectrum for gamification where there are layers and layers of rewards and tiers in place to always keep a balance between hits of dopamine and a carrot always out of reach. There is still power, however, closer to the middle where maybe there’s a single, meaningful layer. It’s just one resorts don’t tap into very often.
Jay Peak, however, just cracked open this playbook again and I really like the setup. Here’s how it works.
First, a series of visual prompts. These cover everything from creating something new (a Jay Peak haiku) to digging through photos from last season to find a “photo that will make people wish they were here.”
Second, a unique, exclusive reward. This is a bit of a lift, even for an engaged resort community like Jay’s, so they’ve given folks a big enough reason to gather and submit all nine of these prompts. In this case, it’s a sassy custom set of Jay skis or a board.
That’s it, two steps. Games don’t have to be complicated.
Now, this little game alone is a great way to get your skiers to reflect on the season and stay engaged and the seasons change, but there’s one asterisk on the CTA at the bottom of this page that should not be overlooked:
*Submissions can be used for Jay Peak social media promotions.
To me, this suggests that this little game is not the point. This game is the means to an end. Jay has a marketing strategy they’re planning that needs specific content to work. That content is stuff that only their guests can create. They know from experience that little games like this are great at driving behavior. So they’ve created a game that helps them gather that content.
I think that’s a great point to end with. Games for the sake of games are fine. There’s nothing wrong with that. But games that are designed to also solve a larger need that’s part of a bigger strategy?
That’s even better.
Nice work as always, Jay Peak team.