Pharma and Gamification: motivating positive outcomes – a primer

Gamification is coming of age and Pharma companies need to understand how it can help all levels of their business.

When is a game not a game? When its gamification. Gamification is not about creating games. It is about taking people in directions you want them to go by engaging them and offering them rewards in points, badges or bonuses that signify achievements that are sufficiently meaningful for people to want to compete for them. At its heart gamification is about stakeholder engagement, influencing behaviour and improving outcomes– key goals for Pharma.

Gamification is growing rapidly across many business sectors. All the more surprising, Pharma has been slow to include it as a weapon in its marketing and sales arsenal. Anxieties about regulatory compliance play a role but, more widespread, is an underlying scepticism that gamification is essentially trivial and has no role to play in the serious business of pharmaceuticals and healthcare. Are many in the industry missing a trick?

Gamification is being applied across the healthcare spectrum: simulation training, patient adherence, clinician information, research and medical education. It is being applied by charities, health services and by some of the industries major players such as Boehringer Ingelheim, GSK and Janssen.

A key driver to the adoption and spread of gamification is the widespread use of mobile technology. Games need to be available at the point of need, and multi-channel availability including direct response as well as social media is key to ensuring high levels of usage and measurable feedback.