Gamified sales promotions vs BOGO sales promotions, a study comparing the effectiveness of rear-loaded incentive programs against each other

Abstract: Gamification as a promotion method is something that has been gaining increasingly in popularity during recent years. Due to this fact we wanted to investigate if this technique is as effective as many claim it is. We wanted to test if Gamification was more effective than a classic sales promotion technique, BOGO, when it comes to promoting hedonistic products. We based our evaluation of effectiveness on three areas, 1) Effects on sales, engagement and loyalty. 2) Effects on brand perception. 3) Possible difficulties that each promotion comes with. The study was conducted through an experiment consisting of 40 participants, equally divided into two groups; one Gamification and one BOGO. The hedonistic product chosen was coffee that was sold at the cafeteria in Stockholm School of Economics. We then monitored each group's consumption behavior and then followed up the results by a survey that was sent to the participants. Our results showed no empirical difference that Gamification would be more efficient than BOGO on any of the effectiveness parameters, but rather that BOGO was more efficient. Our conclusion to this was that promotions needs to be adapted to the product in terms of what benefits they provide the customer with and that Gamifications needs to be well designed in order to work. BOGO had a better fit according to our research. Our contribution to the field is that we have done first attempt of trying to measure the effectiveness of Gamification. More attempts on trying to measure the effectiveness of Gamification are encouraged.