The Psychology of Motivation — It Matters!



In my studies related to performance and the emerging field of ‘gamification’, I have become immersed in how to leverage behavioral science and technology into the sales and marketing strategies and practices of businesses.

Demand Generation, which includes Sales Force Automation and CRM, and the range of communication channels to engage a company with their digital audience, provide the platform to increase revenue and profits.  However, understanding what motivates customers (and employees) desired actions is the ultimate driver for success.

Michael Wu, Ph.D., is a true thought leader digging into the complex dynamics of social interaction and group behavior in online communities and social networks.   Here’s an introduction his recent posting, ‘Gamification 101: The Psychology of Motvation.

Fogg’s Behavior Model (FBM)  asserts that human behavior is a result of the precise temporal convergence of three factors:

1. Motivation: the person wants desperately to perform the behavior (i.e. he is highly motivated)
2. Ability: the person can easily carry out the behavior (i.e. he considers the behavior very simple)
3. Trigger: the person is triggered to do the behavior (i.e. he is cued, reminded, asked, called to action, etc.)

Game mechanics and game dynamics are able to positively influence human behavior because they are designed to drive the players above the activation threshold (i.e. the upper right of the ability-motivation axis), and then trigger them into specific actions. In other words, successful gamification is all about making these three factors occur at the same time. As I mentioned last time, the temporal convergence is the key.

Click The Psychology of Motivation to read his entire post.