The Email Wars

Not sure how familar you are with the concept of badges and rewards in terms of the internet and social communities. In all the research and work we have done at eROI in social community development and social campaigns we have found that the notion of giving badges or visible rewards are a motivator that work. The concept comes from the video game indutry where people receive visual recognition that are displayed in their profile page letting people know of their accomplishments in regard to the community. There can be based on number of connections, type of account, games played, comments given, and more.

But what we have not seen, until now, is the use of profile badges into an email. I was a little excited to notice this idea used in an email newsletter. Notice how in this email that the badge is used to display profile information about what you have available in your own account. It is a simple notion and for the sake of an email not publicly facing outside of your inbox, but I think it is a good way to use it. Other examples might be more typically seen in your rewards point account information in hotel, airline, or book club email where membership benefits are shown to you as to what you have earned in miles, points or how many more stays you have to reach a badging point.

There must be some more ways that we could look to use this information to make an email more “sticky” and worth reading and maybe even keeping tucked in a folder for later reading. Think about what you might have in your business to display as rewards or badges. Everyone should have something that they can think of and if not it is an opportunity to create something.