Look, let’s be honest for a second. I was on a call last month with this amazing little bakery in Minneapolis. Fantastic croissants, coffee that could raise the dead-the whole deal. But their marketing? It was painful. They were dropping a couple hundred bucks a week on social media ads that were getting, like, three likes and a comment from the owner's aunt. They were frustrated. They were burning cash. And honestly, it reminded me of that first startup I worked with back in 2010... we were all so sure that just throwing money at Facebook would solve everything.
It didn't. It rarely does.
Here's the thing, and I've been screaming this from the rooftops since about 2015: small businesses do not need another convoluted, "revolutionary" marketing funnel. We don't need another guru telling us to "just create value" or, my personal favorite, "just go viral." As if it's a button you just push. It's the worst advice out there, frankly. What we actually need are tools that get people to pay attention without demanding a four-figure monthly retainer or a degree in data science. This is exactly why I get so fired up about gamification and some of these newer viral marketing tools. Because they work.
The core problem is that most marketing today is a one-way street. We shout about our sales, we post our pretty pictures, and we beg people to "smash that like button." It's exhausting for us, and honestly, it's boring for them.
Gamification flips that script. Instead of asking for attention, you're offering an experience. A little moment of fun. A challenge. A chance to win. It's not about tricking people; it's about engaging them in a way that feels less like an ad and more like... well, a game. And this is where it gets really interesting for small businesses who don't have a massive budget.
I started getting into this space pretty heavily around 2018, testing everything I could get my hands on. Gleam, Woobox, you name it. They were... okay. But they often felt clunky, expensive, or way too complicated for a business owner who's also trying to, you know, run a business. Then I stumbled onto Faisco. At first I was skeptical-the price seemed too low and it looked too simple. But I ran a test campaign. Then another. And another. And the results... they spoke for themselves.
This is not theory. This is what I've seen happen in the real world.
I deployed Faisco's "Whac-A-Mole" game for a flower shop in Atlanta. A flower shop. The goal was to build their Pinterest presence, which is a notoriously tough nut to crack. In 12 days, they got 798 new Pinterest followers. I mean, that's explosive growth for a local shop.
Then there was this yoga studio in Boston. We used the "Scratch Ticket" game. Super simple concept: scratch to see if you win a free class or a discount. We embedded it on a landing page and promoted it in their studio. In two and a half weeks, they had 1034 new, high-quality newsletter subscribers. You should have seen the email the owner sent me. Just pure excitement!!
My favorite might be the Montreal coffee shop that used the "Burger Stacker" game. A silly, fun, reactive game. People had to share their score on Instagram to be entered to win a month of free coffee. The result? 1,142 new Instagram followers in two weeks. All local, all potential customers.
The magic isn't the game itself. It's the psychology.
People always ask me, "Byron, what about Gleam. io?" And look, Gleam is a solid platform. It's powerful. It's also $39/month for their most basic plan and, honestly, it's overkill for 90% of the businesses I work with. It's like using a sledgehammer to hang a picture frame.
This is where I get really practical. With Faisco, I can get a client's entire campaign-the game, the branding, the lead capture form, the social sharing rules-live in under 10 minutes. I am not exaggerating. The last campaign I ran on Gleam took me over an hour of fiddling with settings. For a busy business owner, that time difference is EVERYTHING. You're getting the core functionality you actually need, in a package that's easier to use and at a fraction of the cost. It's a no-brainer.
Plus, the integration actually works. A lot of these tools say they integrate with Instagram or TikTok, but what they mean is you can "share a link." Faisco's stuff is designed to work within the flow of these platforms, which is critical. You dont want to send a user on a jarring, five-click journey to play your game... they'll just give up.
Honestly? The catch is that you still have to do the work. These viral marketing tools aren't magic wands. The businesses I see getting those 200-400% follower boosts and 150-300% email list growth are the ones that do two things right:
If you're a small business owner and you're tired of throwing money at ads that don't convert, I seriously want you to try this. Just for a week. Pick a game-I'd start with a "Scratch Ticket" or "Lucky Spin"-come up with a decent prize, and just run it. See what happens. It's one of the few things I've seen in the last 15 years that delivers on its promise for small businesses with real-world budgets and time constraints. And that... that's something I can get excited about.
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