A social marketing perspective on value co-creation, engagement and motivation in gamified systems: exploring a gamified social networking service for physical activity

Abstract

In social marketing’s efforts to address health-related societal issues such as the insufficiency of physical activity and the rise of obesity, the field has recently embraced the idea of gamification. Drawing from extant literature on social marketing and gamification, this study focuses on value co-creation, motivation and perceived value, and explores an existing gamified system for physical activity from the customers’ point of view. The purpose is to learn as much as possible from that system and translate it into meaningful insights which can be used by social marketers in designing and successfully implementing interventions that incorporate gamification. Netnographic methods are being deployed (Kozinets 2015), which involve a fourteen-month long participation in the platform, with the output of a netnographic diary, data from private online discussion groups, and semi-structured interviews. The gamified system is considered as a service, and studied according to the Service-Dominant Logic (Vargo & Lusch 2008). A map of the field is drawn, which is based on the interactions between providers and customers (Grönroos & Voima 2013), and the notion of ‘value-in-engagement’ is introduced and explained. Subsequently, a thematic analysis is conducted where positive and negative value creation processes are identified, and subdivided into value (co-)creation, (co-)protection/ (co-)recovery, (co-)inhibition, and (co-)destruction (Echeverri & Skålén 2011; Grönroos & Voima 2013). The analysis continues with an investigation of the motivational processes behind value creation, by exploring the main constructs of the Self-Determination Theory (Deci & Ryan 1985a; 1985b). Finally, four processes of developing value perceptions are identified and explained, while dimensions of perceived value in social marketing literature (Zainuddin et al. 2017) are being applied and extended. Implications for research and practice are drawn which highlight the role of the intervention provider as a value facilitator and of the customer as a value co-creator, while taking into consideration the importance of motivational energy and direction, psychological needs satisfaction and cognitive processes of developing value perceptions. Recommendations for future research are provided.