On Gamification at SIME

SIME 2011 was a flurry of great speaker on a wide area of subjects. While the set theme for SIME was “Passion Wins” another theme running through the conference was going mobile. Gamification was subtly introduced to the SIME audience in a panel on Gamification and marketing. Possibly to set the stage for a larger presence next year.

But what exactly is Gamification and how does it tie in with SIME 2011?
Gamification is the process of using game mechanics in non-game products and services. I am not talking about  3D characters or scoring points here however. Games have matured in relative obscurity thought the years to become one of the worlds largest entertainment forms, aimed mostly at adults. The foundations of what makes a good game are similar and equally complex as what makes a great brand. The psychology or rewards have been used in training and products over the years, but only games have really delved deep and explored the territory. Pacing and storytelling in a product where there is no story is also only really explored in the games industry. Science and design based on concepts like these are migrating from games into “normal” products.

This is Gamification. And oddly, ties in excellently to SIMEs central theme.

The Passion of Gamification
Passion Wins. That theme was presented by Ola in his welcoming speech and it was central to almost all the talks at SIME. From presentations from promising startups, among them iZettle - the mobile payment solution, to using brain scans for better marketing there was not a presenter on stage that lacked passion. But how do we reach passion in our users or customers? While every panel spoke of the importance to engage users and inspire passion there was only one that talked about how thats done.

Panel on Gamificiation
A panel consisting of Elísabet Grétarsdóttir, Eve Online, Johan Sjöberg, founder Starstable, and Robin Teigland, Stockholm School of Economics, joined Ola on stage to discuss the most popular buzzword of the day.

The panel wasn’t that impressed with the term Gamification for starters. Elisabet described it as working with motivation in marketing to engage the audience, hopefully getting them to participate. Johan joined in saying that the term might be a misnomer, that the term Playification might be more appropriate. Since the focus is on engagement but not at all games.

“we are playful creatures” - Elísabet Grétarsdóttir, SIME 2011

The panel was in agreement that playfulness was important for humans, adding fun to anything should be possible. The panel highlighted experiments with gamification in education and Elisabet even made a pitch to add creative interaction in the fashion industry.

If we are playful creatures, play should be a great way to engage our users. Right?

Going mobile with gamification
As I mentioned earlier another trend runnings through the entire conference was going mobile. Google spoke of being a mobile first company, Ericsson spoke about communicating in a world where every device is interconnected. But what does this have to do with gamification?

Throughout SIME we heard speakers talk about new paradigms and the web/app divide. Essentially mobile web is taking over and has a different set or boundaries than the desktop web. So how to we make sure our mobile interfaces are good enough and engaging users? You know where I’m going with this aren’t you?

Mobile interfaces is a perfect place to start adding the fun.

Summing up gamification at SIME 2011
The passion at SIME was amazing. The energy was great. The game we played at the conference, bad. Basically we’re all looking into how to engage and interact with people through digital mediums. The only industry that has really done it is the games industry. Moving their knowledge to the rest of the web is gamification. Elisabet doesn’t think it’s through external motivation. Ola thinks it might have something to do with horses.

The only thing we know is: however it’s done, it’s going mobile.

Jesper Bylund is a Game Designer / Interaction Designer who blogs about Gamification on Adding the Fun.com

The future of payments

Passion wins was the official mantra for the SIME conference of 2011, and that is exactly why I love this kind of events. You could almost touch the passion when Jacob de Geer entered the stage at shared his story about his latest startup, iZettle.

Jacobs wife, who sell spectacles, asked for his help when she needed to charge her customers by credit card at trade shows, but did not want to buy an expensive card machine.  He did some Googeling around it and did find a company in the US, but who couldn’t give any help until about 3 years. Jacob continued to scan the market and realized that there was a need.

There is a new way to charge, for individuals, non-profits and small businesses, and by connecting the iZettle chip card reader with an iPhone or iPad everyone can charge by credit cards. Since the iZettle was released in August the retail outlets that accept credit cards increased by 5% in Sweden, and they already have 12 000 users, of whom 60% are private individuals, according to Jacob the Geer.

Bonus tip! Drink the best coffee in Stockholm an pay with an iZettle on Cocovaja.

Highlights

Jan Marsalek from Wirecard gave the participants in the workshop Pay Day his insight about the online payment highlights for today and tomorrow:

Trend: convergence

Integration of mobile, payment card issuing, coupons and loyalty. The e-commerce and m-commerce is comming closer together and the point of sale becomes one.

Local is the new global

More countries are launching their own local credit cards and the number of national payment schemes keeps increasing. With more local credit cards, the revenue maintains in the country. The use of as MasterCard and Visa decreases.

Mobile – the hottest topic in payments

Today is the leading mobile payment method is by premium SMS,  but we will see considerably more solutions within the mobile together with Google wallet, Isis and mpass.

The ecosystem of tomorrow

Within ten years it will still be a broad ecosystem of payment solutions as the situation is today. The major difference is that we will use our mobile for 50-60% of our purchases, and the rest will still be a mix of credit card and invoices.

Creating for Mobile – Day 2 and round-up of SIME

For day two of SIME, and as a round-up of the whole conference from a mobile perspective, I thought I’d focus on creating in the mobile arena, and bring up some of the interesting tid-bits from our day.

The first presenter that really grabbed everyone’s attention during the day was 12-year old Puck Meerburg, founder of Puckipedia. He’s a young, very curious kid who has single-handeldly created and released 2 apps to the Apple AppStore, learning English in the process to be able to understand the programming language. Interesting is that an American kid, Thomas Suarez, also 12, just circulated the web for having done exactly the same thing, and speaking at TEDx like a pro. This is just incredible, and says a lot about how easy it is to get into digital creation today if you’re curious enough and don’t see limitations. I also think it says everything about the mobile field. It’s so accessible and tangible, you feel apps are more of an object than software, which makes the concept less abstract to young people. And mobile is simple, it’s about doing small things in a delightful way, which is very easy to get in to. Have there been other young kids creating their own apps for desktop computers before? Definitely. But most probably not as many, and definitely not reaching out to as many people as these kids are today.

The day’s other big mobile evangelists were Maks Giordano, a digital guru now running a mobile agency, and Leif Eliasson, mobile expert at TradeDoubler. Leif is a numbers guy, once again showing the stats on why mobile is on track to outgrow desktop computing within the not too distant future. Maks is a Creative, and presented some great examples of interesting things that are being done on mobile that I’ll present you with below. What both of these people mentioned though, and also Zennström, Hjalmar, and a lot of other speakers at this years event, is that today, right now more than ever, all the bits are in place for truly great services and marketing to be created on mobile. We have the right hardware at a mass consumer price point, we have the software distribution ecosystem, we have the payment solutions, we have the networks and the bandwith, and most of all we now have the users.

But, this doesn’t mean you don’t have to think hard when you start creating for the mobile space. On the contrary, it’s important to really have mobile mindset when creating, and remember that it’s all about context. And also, something isn’t “fun” just because it’s in a mobile space, but contrarily we are more inclined to get tired your campaign or service if you’re not making it easy enough.

Here are some companies that have gotten it right:

• Heineken Star Player, an app that taps into people’s multitasking behavior when watching football (ie soccer) games, and for doing it right they’ve gained the opportunity to have a whole 90 minutes of brand interaction with it’s users.
• Nike+, a mobile app that helps you get your running going. The app, apart from being great in and by itself is probably the best example out there of how to leverage mobile and social networks to add value to your brand.
• Chase QuickDeposit, an app from the bank Chase, that has enabled it’s customers to cash their checks (US company, obviously) from anywhere just by photographing them with the app. It’s also worth noting that Swedish banks have enabled paying bills using their apps and the phone’s camera, but the user experience is unfortunately very bad, which is inhibiting adoption.
• Target, the US retailer has made great apps for iPhone and iPad that are shopping companions that help make shopping at Target more pleasant experience. Here the execution is of greater importance more than the concept, and Target got it right, giving them high App Store ratings which is unusual for a marketing app.
• Jamie Oliver has a set of apps that align perfectly with his brand, making cooking a pleasant experience, and recommending his favorite restaurants.
• Northface in China launched a location based game where you could claim land, which is totally in line with the explorer mentality of the brand, and the winner had placed over 4000 flags over all of China.
• Google Wallet, Google’s initiative to let you make your phone your wallet. This is happening, it’s just a matter of who will rule, and Google is a good canditate to say the least, going down the NFC path for money transactions.
• Tesco in Korea, launched Homeplus Subway Virtual Store where they put up virtual stores in subway stations where you can shop using your phone, scanning QR-codes on life-size grocery shelves while waiting for your train, and having the groceries delivered to your home when getting back from work. Genius, and the only really good use of QR-codes to date.
• There are several price comparison apps, like Prisjakt, where you can scan the barcode of a product anywhere and quickly receive a list of where you can get the item at the lowest price. Retailers – be worried.
• Mobile makes the perfect companion for house/apartment shopping, where Zillow and Trulia on the US market are among the most prominent, telling you what’s for sale around you, letting you peek in before you go in, and telling you if the price is reasonable, all on the go.
• Rabble, a Swedish app that provides digital redeemable coupons based on you location. Providing cheap marketing opportunities for local businesses.

Some other examples Maks mentions, it think fail in the fact that they’re gimmicks, and don’t deliver any real value to the end users in the long run. These apps will be removed very quickly from the users phones after the novelty has worn off and waste the potential you have of making truly meaningful long running relationships with your users or customers.

• Beck, the beer brand, has an app that helps you get home safe from a night out. It automatically calls a cab for you to get home if you don’t pass the in-app sobriety test.
• Axe Auto Romeo, an app that helps you stay on good foot with all your girl acquaintances, gained of course because of the “Axe effect”, by sending the girls your not with texts while you’re on dates.
• IKEA Interactive Catalogue, which lets you test placing IKEA furniture in pictures of your home using augmented reality. See the video at the bottom of the linked page to get an idea of how it works.
• Ebay launched an app that tries to deflect the biggest problem with buying glasses online; you don’t know how they will look on. Using augmented reality technology, you can try their glasses on live using you mobile phone. (Interesting to note is that Favoptic launched this concept long before Ebay on our advice, but their execution was just not up to par)

These are all interesting examples of what can be done with the technology that exists today in mobile. Only your imagination sets the boundaries. But I would really like to stress the importance of thinking about the bigger perspective when working in mobile, and make something truly engaging, that adds real value in the lives to your target group. It’s always possible, and if not taken advantage of you waste a big opportunity in working with mobile, or even the digital space at large. It might require a bigger budget in the short run, but will keep on giving long after your usual “campaign period”.

To send you off, I would like to bring up, a very relevant question was posed at the M-Commerce workshop that I feel didn’t get a good answer. Why, when mobile is showing such large numbers in adoption, is it still such a small part of the digital commerce? I think it’s quite obvious why. A minute part of businesses have yet to adapt to mobile. When we’re talking about companies and services that have been rethought for mobile, we’re talking about very small percentages. How much business do you think a retail store would make if it had locked doors or a 1 m ceiling height, next to a normal one? We have to get to work adapting if we want to get that business.

And lastly, a BIG thanks to SIME and everyone behind it for inviting us to cover our passion, and for being such great hosts for the bloggers this year. Really hope we get the opportunity again. Now back to creating great useful and valued mobile experiences. And keep in touch if you want to hear more.

Day one at SIME, a mobile perspective

This week, MobileApps and me, Christoffer, have been selected to watch the mobile space at SIME Stockholm, the largest conference in IT and media in Scandinavia. We are very excited about it, and since we’re watching the mobile space closely anyway, we thought it would be a really good opportunity to share our thoughts here on our blog.

The first day at SIME Stockholm has delivered some great shows and presentations, and a lot of it touching on, or being directly about the mobile field. We thought we’d summarize it all with the one all-encompassing key take-away:

We’re going mobile, and there is no turning back

First of all, it’s evident already today, that if you’re mindset isn’t in mobile, you’re doing it wrong. How do we know this? Just look at the two biggest actors in the digital field today: Google and Facebook. Google, shifted their main focus on to mobile last year. Now everything they do is mobile first. Facebook, they have already today just under 50% of their 800 million users accessing Facebook on their mobile phones. The shift to mobile has already started to happen in a huge way.

We also heard a lot of other interesting stats, spottings, and predictions from the speakers, supporting the mobile trend:

• Mobile searches have increased 4-5 time under the last year alone
• 30% of all restaurant searches are done on mobile phones (a big stat considering how many non-mobile optimized, or even Flash(!) restaurant sites that are out there. Here’s a great exception by the way)
• 79% of Smartphone users use a smartphone to help with shopping and 70 percent use phone in store.
• Youtube has 200 million playbacks from phones per day (up from 100M a year ago)
• 550.000 new Android Smartphones are activated per day (and Apple is adding another 200.000 iPhones to that)
• Two of this years biggest conference stars iZettle and Wrapp, are businesses completely focused around mobile
• All TV discussions are surrounding the interaction between TV and the mobile devices taking up more and more of the watchers attention
• The biggest websites in Sweden are all seeing exponential growth in mobile visitors, with Aftonbladet, Sweden’s most visited website, predicting mobile surpassing desktop in 1-2 years

The big disparity here is that with all this mobile web usage, very few websites are actually optimized for mobile use. Of advertisers, less than 25% have a mobile optimized site, even sometimes linking to it through campaigns geared towards mobile users. This is why Google has launched a mobile initiative, GO MO, helping businesses go mobile. The initiative is great and we of course love the push from Google telling people to go mobile. When you’ve visited the site and seen what you should do, contact an experienced developer like us to help you get sorted out.

MobisleApps view, that’s supported by what we heard at SIME today, is that mobile is indeed where all digital communication is headed, and we think it’s quite evident. The era where we had to sit down in front of a desk, screen and a keyboard to do everyday interactions was just a phase, forced by the limitations of technology. While we might want to do certain high concentration tasks in a controlled desktop environment, we think the barrier for what these are is being erased, and everything else is just very unnatural to do on a PC on a desktop. Period.

Welcome to SIME Stockholm at Cirkus!

SIME Stockholm App and Mobile Site

Download our SIME App for the iPhone or use our mobile site m.sime.nu. Be the “King match maker” by using the in-built match making tool on our app. If you have not opted in to be part of it, you can do so from your app by clicking on the “more” tab

Do you have questions to ask to the speakers on main stage?

SMS +46 766 861 261 or tweet away with the hashtag #asksime

Want to know which workshops you are attending?

SMS +46 766 861 586 your ‘First name Last name’ (as on the badge) to get your workshop schedule. If still in doubt, proceed to the workshop center. Most workshops are sold out and we recommend you show yourself at your registered workshops on time to grab your seat!

Find hidden QR codes, collect titles and prizes

Participate in our very own SIME Engage game powered by MEC Global. Scan QR codes with your phone (you can use the app “Scan” for the iPhone or “Barcode Scanner” for the Android) around the venue, collect points, cool titles and win prizes from MEC and Aftonbladet!

SIME’s official channels

Follow us on Facebook at facebook.com/simeconference or twitter @simeblog. And last but not the least the Wi-fi code is ‘PASSION WINS’

We hope you have an inspiring SIME Stockholm!

“SIME is like Christmas for the Nordic digital industry” – Johan Siwers

Below is a guest post by Johan Siwers who makes a recollection with a trip down memory lane from the time of ‘SIME Genesis’ to today. Johan is one of the online industry veterans, former MD of Match.com in the Nordics, and has over the past 15 years been involved in breaking ground for a wide range of media and online media ventures within companies like Kinnevik, Spray, Shibsted and InterActive Corp (IAC). And most importantly a credited SIME Junkie. He is one of our favorite writers at the blog with some of his previous posts here and here

Finally it is SIME time again. For anyone involved in the online scene, this is our Christmas, our time to celebrate the great industry we are representing. It is now 15 years since SIME kick started the Scandinavian industry around the Internet by putting the people, the companies and the ideas in the limelight.

Some of us recall where things stood back then. There was the report made by the agency Projektor, predicting that in 1997 online advertising would reach 300 million SEK in turn over, receiving nothing but laughter in response. Earlier this year IRM announced that the online media is the second largest media in Sweden, reaching a turnover of 5,7 billion SEK in 2010.

There was Spray challenging the traditional players proclaiming that the online media was superior to more or less anything else. But the early products such as the Citinavigator, the citiguide Rival or the directory/search service punkt.se did not have any material impact on the world outside of the core online community. This fall Google received the award for “best media in Sweden”, taking over the spot TV4 has subscribed to for some years.

There was SIME being bold and brave when setting up – and filling up – SIME at the classic location Cirkus at Djurgården. When SIME now some years later returns to Cirkus, it is to confirm it’s position as a grown up industry. Still yet being a teenager with passion, ambitions and adventures at the horizon.

Over the years SIME has always been there, bringing the world to Scandinavia – and Scandinavia to the world. The list of influential people that has been visiting – and returning year after year – is nothing less than impressive. SIME has been inspiring us all by sharing stories about success as well as lessons to be learnt by failure. The SIME co-founders, Ola and Christoffer, have raised the bar – in more than one sense – and become a symbol for the passion many of us feel about the industry we are in.

In my role as the Chairman of IAB Sweden, the global industry organization for the online industry, I am happy to be a supporting partner of SIME this year. The members behind IAB are long time visitors at SIME, and we see SIME as a platform for a dialog with You and the rest of the industry. We are passionate about strengthening the online industry and to grow the share of the online media in the eyes of advertisers, agencies and media owners.

IAB, just like SIME, relies on the trust we can get from the industry. We believe the challenges ahead in an ever changing industry calls for a strong industry organization. That is why we are taking the lead in important questions for us all, for example:

1. Our task forces within Mobile, Legal or Search
2. Establishing a framework for the cookie regulation debate,
3. Industry research, with reports like AdEx2011, covering the development in 25+ markets in Europe
4. And ongoing seminars within areas such as search, mobile and social media

Scandic is taking in the Bloggers

If you’re a blogger you’ve got basic needs: An Internet connection and a power chord. But when the cold November night lays down over Stockholm, you’ll need more than your laptop to keep you warm. That’s why we are happy to announce that Scandic steps in as a supporting partner during SIME and will host our long way friends of the theme blogger team.

Scandic is the Nordic region’s leading hotel chain with hotels in ten countries and their goal is to help guests to recharge their batteries and to reinvigorate energy.

A message from Scandic

- We want to be more than just a hotel, we want to be a place where people come together, meet and be inspired, whether they are visiting Scandic in business or for pleasure.

During SIME in Stockholm, we look forward to receiving you at Scandic Hasselbacken, which is our hotel right next to Circus. Here you can enjoy the sea view while having a drink in the Lobby Bar.

Our newest pride is the flagship Scandic Grand Central on Kungsgatan in Stockholm. Please visit us during the week, or click here to see pictures of the hotel.

Best regards,

Scandic Hotels

Bloggers at #SIME11: Jesper Bylund – Gamification

Jesper is the theme blogger who’ll be dedicated to cover the wonderful field of Gamification at SIME Stockholm next week. Beyond blogger, Jesper is known as User Experience designer with a fondness for web, gadgets and games, as well as appreciated web ninja at Futurniture.

What are you passionate about in the digital space?

– Relationships! Right now we’re seeing a leap in digital communication as technology has become interwoven into most peoples lives. This is affecting every relationship, between friends, between companies and customers, between countries and their inhabitants. Ubiquitous sharing and communication is changing everything and the new types of relationships that we’re starting to see emerge are amazing. With my background in games I’ve been looking into new social structures for years and it’s exciting to see core audience behavior happening with mainstream customers to some of the worlds largest brands.

What do you expect from this year’s SIME?

– I expect a lot of smart people to share their thoughts, agree and disagree, to start to shape things to come! I’m especially looking forward to the discussions after Elísabet Grétarsdóttir (CCP Games) takes the stage.

Keep track of  Jesper!

Visit his blog at jesperbylund.com and start following Jesper on Twitter where he goes by the handle @JesperBylund.

This is the first time Jesper is attending SIME Conferences and therefor we’re extra happy to welcome him – especially as theme blogger!

If you want to go to SIME Stockholm 2011, but haven’t got a ticket, you are still in luck. The registration is still open, but the tickets are starting to run short, so hurry up and sign up for this years conference!

Bloggers at #SIME11: Ulrika Schreil – Brands/Social Branding

Ulrika will be the theme blogger to follow if you’re interested in updates within the filed of Brands and Social Branding at SIME 11. Ulrika is, among other things, into digital music and tech thingies made by Apple and when not blogging she works as Web Strategist at Cloud Nine.

What are you passionate about in the digital space?

– Sharing is caring! I love how the www lets everyone take part in each other’s learnings and findings. Read a blog, follow  discussions, retweet, +1, bookmark, share, like, republish, etc. In the digital era, information is easy to access. If you are truly interested in something, it’s there for you to indulge in, explore and develop. In the long run, share your views and throw back opinions, and the digital communication circle is closed.

What do you expect from this year’s SIME?

– I look forward to meet, listen to and connect with inspiring people. To be suprised and amazed by the speakers and of course share my thoughts and views about brands and social branding online. The agenda is great, and I particulary look forward listening to Rikard Steiber, Dwight Witherspoon, Erinn Marzo, Krister Karjalainen and of course, tomorrow’s superstars.

Keep track of  Ulrika!

Visit her blog at schreil.com and start following Ulrika on Twitter where she goes by the handle @ullemon.

Ulrika has attended SIME Conferences before and we’re thrilled to see her again, especially as one of our theme bloggers.

If you want to go to SIME Stockholm 2011, but haven’t got a ticket, you are still in luck. The registration is still open, but the tickets are starting to run short, so hurry up and sign up for this years conference!

Bloggers at #SIME11: Peter Sandberg – Entrepreneurship

Photo by: Heidi Harman

Peter is another great part of our theme blogger team, who’ll be covering the field of Entrepreneurship. When not at SIME, Peter is “Entrepreneur, father and blogger with a keen eye for all things web and mobile”, as he describes himself on Twitter and can read more about on disruptive.nu.

What are you passionate about in the digital space?

– The entrepreneurial side of the digital space. Never before has human kind seen an industrial area with such rapid growth, such low barriers of entry and such potential for scale and globalization. Big corporations and  startups compete in this space, not always on equal terms, but still young companies and entrepreneurs have an unprecedented chance at winning against bigger competitors because this is not solely about resources, it’s about ideas!  Thats why I and Christian Rudolf decided 4 years ago to start Disruptive.nu, a blog covering entrepreneurship on the web. In these years we’ve managed to become a respected and trusted source of inspiration  and information for entrepreneurs and people interested in entrepreneurship in general.

What do you expect from this year’s SIME?

– Inspiration, insights and getting to know a lot of new people.

Keep track of  Peter!

Visit his blog at disruptive.nu and start following Peter on Twitter where he goes by the handle @poppetotte.

Peter has been to SIME Conferences before and we’re happy to welcome him this year again, not least as one of our fantastic theme bloggers.

If you want to go to SIME Stockholm 2011, but haven’t got a ticket, you are still in luck. The registration is still open, but the tickets are starting to run short, so hurry up and sign up for this years conference!