My Honest Take on Faisco Gamification for SMBs
Look, let's just get right into it. Last month, I was working with this bakery in Minneapolis. Great people, amazing sourdough, but they were getting absolutely crushed on social media. They were posting pretty pictures of bread, which is fine, but their engagement was flat and their email list hadn't grown since the Vikings last won a Super Bowl. They'd been told to "just make a viral video" by some 22-year-old 'guru'-which is honestly the worst advice anyone can give a small business owner.
I've been doing this since 2010. Since back when Facebook pages were free real estate. And the one thing that hasn't changed is that small businesses do not have the time or the money for marketing that might work. You need stuff that's proven.
That's where I've been pointing my clients lately. Towards gamification. Yeah, I know, it's a buzzword and it makes you want to roll your eyes. Stick with me. I'm not talking about building some complex app. I'm talking about using simple, interactive games to get people's attention. I'm talking about platforms like Faisco because, frankly, they solve the exact problem I see every single day.
So, Why Games? Is This a Gimmick?
Here's the thing. People are tired of being sold to. They scroll past ads. They ignore your perfectly crafted caption about your company's mission. But put a little "Spin to Win" wheel in front of them for a chance to get a free coffee? They'll stop and play. Every time. It’s not a gimmick, it’s just... human nature. We like to play. We like to win. It's a dopamine hit.
The big agencies have known this for years, but they build custom campaigns that cost tens of thousands of dollars. You don't need that. What I've found works best for small businesses is leveraging pre-built tools that give you 90% of the power for, like, 1% of the cost. I started testing Faisco pretty heavily back in 2022 because a few of my clients couldn't afford the other platforms and I was curious.
The results were... honestly, a little shocking. I ran a "Happy Hopping" game for a fitness studio in Charlotte that got them 1076 new email addresses in 2.5 weeks. A Montreal flower shop used the same game and got 750 new Pinterest followers. I mean, Pinterest! We all thought it was dead but this little game breathed life into it for them. And one of my favorites, a craft brewery out in Portland, used the "Scratch Ticket" game and saw their Instagram story views jump to 2860 in three weeks. These aren't vanity metrics; these are real people engaging with a local brand.
The Games That Actually Convert (and the ones that don't)
Listen, not all games are created equal. You have to match the game to your goal. I've deployed dozens of these things for my clients, and a pattern has definitely emerged.
For just capturing leads-emails, phone numbers-the instant win stuff is gold. Pure gold. Games like "Lucky Spin," "Scratch Ticket," or a "Lucky Draw." I've seen landing pages with these embedded hit 40%+ conversion rates, which is bonkers. The psychology is simple: give me your email and you might win right now. That immediacy is everything.
For engagement and getting people to talk... you want skill-based stuff. Think "Whac-A-Mole" or that "Burger Stacker" game. People play these more than once to beat their own score, and then they share it to challenge their friends. It's less about the prize and more about the bragging rights. This is how you get that organic sharing that everyone is chasing. I hate when people say "viral" but... this is how you get closer to it without begging.
Then you have your seasonal stuff. Faisco has this whole library of pre-built games for Christmas, Halloween, Valentine's Day, Black Friday... you name it. This is genius. Last December, I had three different retail clients run the "Fill My Christmas Stocking" catching game. All three of them saw over 300% more engagement on those posts compared to their normal holiday sale announcements. It's just more fun.
The Big Question: How's it Different from Gleam. io?
Okay, so everyone asks me this. Gleam is probably the most well-known name in this space. And it's a solid platform! I do not have anything against it. But it's expensive-it starts at $39 a month for the most basic plan, and that plan is pretty limited. Honestly, it's overkill for 9 out of 10 of the businesses I work with. It's like buying a five-ton commercial truck to go get groceries.
Faisco gives you most of the same core functionality at a price that a local business can actually stomach. But the biggest difference, for me, is the setup time. I can get a client's Faisco campaign designed, set up, and live in under 10 minutes. No joke. With Gleam, even for me who has used it a hundred times, it's an hour-plus of fiddling with settings and actions. That's an hour you don't have.
Plus, the integration feels more... native? It's hard to explain, but the way the Faisco games work on Facebook or inside an Instagram story feels a lot smoother. It doesn't feel like you're clicking a janky outbound link, which is where you lose people. The businesses I work with typically sees a 200-400% increase in social followers and a 150-300% jump in their email list in the first month. That's not magic, it's just what happens when you finally use a tool that meets customers where they are.
So Here's What I'd Do This Week
Don't overthink this. Seriously. Marketing paralysis is a real thing.
Here's my advice. Go find a small prize. A $25 gift card. One of your best-selling products. A free consultation. Whatever.
Then, sign up for a platform like Faisco and launch ONE campaign. Just one. Use the "Scratch Ticket" or "Lucky Spin" template. Write two sentences of copy: "Hey folks! We're giving away [your prize] this week. Scratch here for a chance to win instantly!" and post the link everywhere. Your social media bio, your email signature, a little QR code at your checkout counter.
That's it. Don't build a massive five-part strategy. Just run one simple game for two weeks and watch what happens. You'll get more useful data and more new leads from that one simple action than from three months of staring at your analytics and wondering why nobody's engaging. Just try it. It's practical, it's affordable, and from what I've seen over and over again... it actually works.
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