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Barbie Inside Scoop.
Welcome to the eighth edition of the Gamification Insider Inside Scoop!
What is the Inside Scoop?
A monthly deep-dive into an organisation, product or service and how they are using gamification in their business.
We’ll talk about the specific gamification techniques used, explain what they are, why we think that business is using them and give you some ideas as to how those tools can be used by small businesses.
This issue of the Inside Scoop will be discussed in more detail at our monthly Codebreaker Club, available to Codebreaker level members and higher at 1pm on 17th April 2024.
The Barbie Movie
April’s Inside Scoop is about the promotion of the Barbie movie released in 2023.
‘Barbie and Ken are having the time of their lives in the colorful and seemingly perfect world of Barbie Land. However, when they get a chance to go to the real world, they soon discover the joys and perils of living among humans.’ Summary from IMDB
Barbie’s marketing campaign was prolific and contained a clever use of gamification!
Let’s take a look.
Personalisation | Gamification technique 1.
Wait? Didn’t we cover this in a previous Inside Scoop? Yep! There will sometimes be repeats in the Inside Scoop as organisations use the same techniques. It’s always a good thing to see more examples of how different businesses use the same technique, or how they use it differently. Here’s a refresher:
The Cambridge Dictionary Definition:
Personalisation. Noun: The act of making something suitable for the needs of a particular person.
You may already be using some personalisation in your business if you segment your emails.
People aren’t all the same. If we were it would be a very boring world. In fact, all of the detectives reading this probably like to learn differently, and are presumably here in this membership for different reasons, hoping to achieve different things…
This means everyone in your audience, your students, your members, and your customers could want entirely different things, need different things or have different goals. While you might have a course/ membership/audience that from the outside looks like it’s all full of the same ‘type’ of people (say parents of teenagers, or business owners, or photographers) they’ll still all have different needs and wants.
You can use gamification to change your project to cater for the different types of people.
Where do you see personalisation in the game world?
In video games, you might be able to change the appearance of your character, their clothes, weapons, vehicles and more. In some games, you can change your avatar’s name or upload a photo for your profile. You all play the same game but you start by making it feel like it’s bespoke to you. There are many more examples but you get the idea!
How did Barbie use personalisation and why?
When a movie trailer is released you expect there to be a movie poster too. Not Barbie. They released 24 different movie posters, each featuring a different Barbie or Ken to show off the cast.
Here’s where the personalisation came in. Their genius marketing team developed a Barbie Selfie Generator so that anyone could create their own version of the poster.
Why not create your own and share it in Gamification Insider HQ (Available to Codebreaker level and above) and we may share them (with your permission!) to our Instagram Audience.
The app allows users to upload a photo and personalise their poster. Users choose whether they want to be a Barbie or a Ken, whether they want to be on their own or in the corvette, change where their photo is within the poster, choose their tagline and the background colour too. Plenty of ways to personalise their Barbie poster so that they feel invested!
These personalised posters were shared everywhere on social media. It felt like everywhere I looked there was a Barbie poster with one of my friends on it!
Why did Barbie do this? It created a lot of buzz and talk on social media, lots of reach and engagement for the upcoming movie and excitement with potential movie-goers. Ultimately this was about ticket sales at the box office, but what a clever way to go about it!
These personalised posters were shared everywhere on social media. It felt like everywhere I looked there was a Barbie poster with one of my friends on it!
Why did Barbie do this? It created a lot of buzz and talk on social media, lots of reach and engagement for the upcoming movie and excitement with potential movie-goers. Ultimately this was about ticket sales at the box office, but what a clever way to go about it!
Is the technique of Personalisation something you could apply to your business?
Consider adding the concept of personalisation to your business strategy building on the suggestions previously mentioned in the Inside Scoop about Spotify, the Inside Scoop about Spotify Wrapped, the Inside Scoop and Amazon and the Inside Scoop about Goodreads.
If you run a membership or course, you could give your players different titles depending on things like which level they are at, what they have accessed, etc.
For example, in Gamification Insider our members are all detectives, but are they a Discovery Detective, a Codebreaker Detective, an Inspector Detective, or a VIP Detective? This is dependent on which level they pay for in the membership, but you don’t have to implement this in the same way. You could give your members, students, etc a choice of team for added personalisation. It doesn’t have to relate to any activities sometimes it’s nice to simply have a choice.
Don’t run a membership or course? You might try creating a survey or quiz for sales enquiries so that you can create bespoke quotes with the responses. Or the same idea, but to identify problems that you can solve for potential customers. There are many ways to add personalisation to different areas of your business.
FOMO | Gamification technique 2.
Wait? Didn’t we cover this in a previous Inside Scoop? Yep! There will sometimes be repeats in the Inside Scoop as organisations use the same techniques. It’s always a good thing to see more examples of how different businesses use the same technique, or how they use it differently. Here’s a refresher:
The Cambridge Dictionary Definition:
abbreviation for “fear of missing out”: a worried feeling that you may miss exciting events that other people are going to, especially caused by things you see on social media:
Don’t get FOMO. Get a ticket now!
You’ve probably heard this term, you may have even used it but you’ve almost certainly felt it!
When everyone is talking about something (or someone) on social media and you’re not sure what or who they’re referring to. You desperately want to know because…. well, FOMO.
During the pandemic, you may have been tempted to jump onto the bandwagon of over-buying toilet rolls because of a deep fear that if you don’t, you might run out. That’s also FOMO.
FOMO is used in gamification and as long as it’s used ethically (to help others win as well as your business rather than manipulate) it’s a fantastic tool.
Where do you see this in the game world?
Countdown timers for rewards or goodies if you take action before a certain time. Limited-edition items, ‘skins’ and more that can only be achieved within a very specific time frame. Early releases, where games are released early to people willing to pay a premium encourages others to pay the price because they don’t want to miss out.
How did the Barbie movie use the technique of FOMO and why?
Let’s go back in time to a year before the movie was released. The two main stars of the movie; Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling appeared all over the news in neon rollerskating outfits skating down Venice Beach while filming a scene for the film.
They created FOMO a year before the film even started with people wanting to know more having seen these photos.
As if this wasn’t enough FOMO, they released two teaser trailers whetting everyone’s appetite. How effective was this? When the second trailer was released, their hashtag #BarbieTheMovie generated 7.5 million engagements. I would argue that was quite successful!
The FOMO made people want to find out more about the movie and get involved in the hubbub and excitement surrounding the campaign. It increased visibility for the brand, engagement, and reach all with the hope of leading to ticket sales.
Is the technique of FOMO something you could apply to your business?
This is one of those techniques that some people might consider manipulative so I’m going to be very clear here.
If you intend to use this kind of technique in your business please do so ethically; with the intention of gamification that benefits the end user and their wants/needs (be that your audience, students, members, customers, whoever) as well as your business objectives.
We want a win-win scenario.
With this in mind; in order to use this technique you need to consider what it is that your players (the users of your gamification project) want and need as well as your business objectives.
I also hope this goes without saying but please do not create face scarcity or lie to your audience/students etc to create FOMO, use it as a tool to help rather than manipulate.
We covered FOMO in the Inside Scoop about Spotify Wrapped. You can find more ideas for how to use FOMO in your business there.
Let’s consider how you can use FOMO in your business by taking inspiration from how it was used to promote the Barbie movie. Think about how you can create a big buzz about something you’re doing, perhaps also using the gamification technique of Mystery.
This is an effective combo. Barbie released little snippets of information; the neon rollerskating scene, the two teaser trailers, the 24 posters, and more to create that feeling of FOMO. Bringing a little bit of mystery to the table as they said a little but not enough to spoil anything.
Think of it like Catchphrase, the British game show where contestants guess the catchphrase portrayed in an image. The image is split into many squares which are slowly unveiled. Initially, the contestants have very little information to go on but gradually more and more squares of the image are revealed so that they can see the full picture. Sometimes they can guess the catchphrase before the whole image is revealed.
Could you bring this into a marketing campaign for something new you are launching? Could you use it in your membership or course to reveal a new feature you’ll be introducing? Who knows where else you might introduce this into your business!
Senses | Gamification technique 3
Wait? Didn’t we cover this in a previous Inside Scoop? Yep! There will sometimes be repeats in the Inside Scoop as organisations use the same techniques. It’s always a good thing to see more examples of how different businesses use the same technique, or how they use it differently. Here’s a refresher:
We all know what senses are. Typically we might think of the five senses; touch, smell, hearing, taste and sight.
What are senses in a gamification context? Exactly that, seeing how you can incorporate senses into your project to enhance user experience, engagement or motivation!
Put simply, how can we make this better and more motivating by adding more senses to the experience?
Where do you see this in the game world? In video games, you might think the only senses included are vision and hearing, but consider how some game controllers vibrate to give feedback too; meaning that the senses used in these games include touch. Board games are tactile and include visuals, by interacting with others you also include sound. It’s fair to say many games are multi-sensory.
How did the Barbie Movie use the technique of senses and why?
Apart from the obvious; sight is used to watch the teaser trailer and to look at the app. Let’s look at some different ways that senses were used in this campaign.
Sound.
I have to mention the songs. The original Barbie World track by Aqua was remade by Nicki Minaj & Ice Spice and was played a lot around the movie release. The ‘I’m just Ken’ song became hugely popular too, further promoting the movie. These songs were played on the radio and trended on social media as popular songs to feature in TikToks and reels.
In addition to this, you may have heard people saying ‘Hi Barbie’ to each other after watching the film or using it in their social media posts. Again, this increases that feeling of FOMO but this time through sound.
Sight.
Margot Robbie who played Barbie was seen to only wear Barbie-esque outfits for each of the movie premiers. Apparently, each one of the outfits was a nod to Barbie dolls of the last 7 decades.
Red carpets on premiers became pink
Margot Robbie was also featured on Architectural Design showing us around the Barbie Dreamhouse. That video has had over 16 million views which could be potential moviegoers.
Vision and Touch combined.
If you visited cinemas during the release of the Barbie movie, even if you were going to watch a different film, you might have spotted a life-size Barbie toy box. These were physical items that people could get inside and take selfies. This added to the FOMO as people took selfies and shared them online.
By focusing heavily on senses as part of this campaign the Barbie movie pumped up the feeling of FOMO, creating more excitement, more brand visibility, more reach and more engagement and of course, more box office sales.
Is the technique of senses something you could apply to your business?
Check out the ideas that we discussed for senses in the Inside Scoop about the NHS Blood Donation service.
There are so many things you can do with the senses, here are some ideas. We’ll discuss more in this month’s Codebreaker Club.
Don’t miss the basics. Consider if you are doing as much as you can with your brand colours, fonts, icons, and anything associated with your brand. Can you do more, or go bigger with this? Barbie focused on their signature brand pink as a lever for a lot of their campaign. How can you be using your branding even more than you do currently? What can you add to it? and where can you use it more to add visibility to your brand?
If you work online only or mostly, something as simple as sending a handwritten card to customers can add that feeling of touch to your online service. Could you send them something else that aligns with your brand, which again they may want to take a photo of and post online?
Novelty | Gamification technique 4.
Wait? Didn’t we cover this in a previous Inside Scoop? Yep! There will sometimes be repeats in the Inside Scoop as organisations use the same techniques. It’s always a good thing to see more examples of how different businesses use the same technique, or how they use it differently. Here’s a refresher:
Novelty is an important gamification technique. It doesn’t matter how exciting or interesting something is, after a while, the novelty will wear off.
Let’s use some business examples, a new social media platform opens and you rush over there to join in the hype. A few days in and it’s already become boring despite being the newest and most interesting social media platform around, you’re already bored of it. (Think Clubhouse and Threads)
Have you ever found yourself getting into a great new consistent routine of scheduling posts, or getting to inbox zero every day or engaging on social media, but then… you just… stop? Once again, the novelty has worn off.
This is because when you do the same thing over and over and over again you get bored. Even if you do something fun or novel to keep yourself engaged you are going to get bored of that thing eventually because you become accustomed to it.
This is called habituation. The idea of habituation comes from studies of the animal kingdom. Initially, an organism responds a certain way to a new stimulus or change in its environment. We’ve evolved to notice and react to things that could be a threat. However, if the same stimulus is repeated over time, as we get used to it, it no longer causes the same reaction in our nervous system and so we stop paying so much attention. This is my very brief summary however and I encourage you to have a quick Google if you’d like to learn more.
This is where you need to add Novelty, to reignite that attention!
Where do you see Novelty in the game world?
Using a dice to decide how many spaces to move on a board game, shuffling cards to randomise the pack, adding in hidden rooms in video games and so much more!
So how did the Barbie movie use novelty and why?
Everything mentioned so far in this Inside Scoop has been fairly novel. The Barbie movie campaign was jam-packed with examples of the marketing team thinking outside of the box (ahem, excuse the pun!)
Want some more examples of how the campaign was the opposite of dull, dry and ordinary?
Here we go:
Did you see in the news that a giant CGI Barbie was spotted next to Dubai’s Burj Khalifa?
Or that they worked with many (I believe around 50) different brand partners to come up with quirky ideas for the campaign including a partnership with Airbnb leading to a real-life Malibu Barbie Dreamhouse available to rent on Airbnb. Cute eh?
There are many more examples but I think the biggest is the creation of ‘Barbenheimer’
Which according to Wikipedia is:
“A cultural phenomenon which preceded and surrounded the simultaneous theatrical release of two films, Warner Bros. Pictures’s Barbie and Universal Pictures’s Oppenheimer, on July 21, 2023.”
“The simultaneous release was an instance of counterprogramming. As the release date approached, discussion centered on the appositeness of watching the films as a double feature, as well as in what order to watch them, instead of generating a rivalry. Cast members of both responded by encouraging audiences to watch the films on the same day.”
This was a genius way to encourage collaboration instead of rivalry and bolstered the success of both films. All of these novel approaches to marketing the Barbie movie made it feel omnipresent. You couldn’t move for Barbie marketing, official or otherwise.
Why did they do this? Despite a decline in people attending cinemas thanks to the pandemic the Barbie movie was a huge success earning over $1.4 billion worldwide. It is also said to have increased sales for Mattel, the makers of Barbie dolls.
Could you apply novelty to your business?
Consider adding the concept of novelty to your business strategy building on the suggestions previously mentioned in the Inside Scoop about Spotify and our Festive Inside Scoop.
You could create a sales event (online or in person) that is themed. The theme could be something to do with your brand colours, the season, or something happening in the calendar. Revolve all of your marketing around that theme. This will be unexpected and different from your normal marketing so will stand out!
You’re probably wondering how to do something out of the ordinary, how do you even come up with novel ideas? Where do you start?
Let’s start by not trying to reinvent the wheel. In the words of Mark Twain “There is no such thing as a new idea. It is impossible. We simply take a lot of old ideas and put them into a sort of mental kaleidoscope. We give them a turn and they make new and curious combinations.”
As such, I find a good place to look is at other industries. Take a look at what businesses in different industries to yours are doing in their marketing, recruitment, or elsewhere as you may find something that they are doing that could be fun or novel in your industry. By doing this you’ll stand out from your competitors!
We’ll discuss more ideas in this month’s Codebreaker Club
Time to wrap this up!
Time to wrap this up! We’ve covered a lot in this issue. A deep-dive into the marketing of the Barbie movie and some of the gamification techniques they’ve used to increase brand visibility, and engagement, encourage collaboration, and generate lots of revenue through box office sales.
We’ve covered four gamification techniques; Personalisation, FOMO, Senses and Novelty.
We’ve also given you some ideas of how you could implement these in your business.
In pursuit of truth,
Kimba 🔍