If you want to turn your website from a static page into an interactive experience, gamification is the way to go. By rewarding users for their time and activity, you can significantly boost loyalty and engagement.
Our favourite tool for this? myCred. It’s a powerful, flexible, and surprisingly free plugin that lets you build a full rewards system directly into WordPress.
Points, Hooks, and Incentives
At the heart of myCred are Hooks. These are specific actions on your site that trigger a reward. You have complete control over how many points are awarded and for what. Some of our favourite ways to use hooks include:
• Daily Logins: Encourage people to come back every 24 hours.
• Content Discovery: Reward users for viewing specific pages or deep-diving into your guides.
• Anniversaries: Celebrate the day a user joined your community with a points bonus.
Taking it Further with Badges & Ranks
To make the experience feel like a real community, you can activate two essential free add-ons:
1. Badges: Create specific milestones. For example, if a user logs in 10 times, they can automatically unlock a “Loyalty” badge on their profile.
2. Ranks: Set up a hierarchy where users “level up” based on their total points balance. It’s a great way to let your most active users stand out.
Supercharging with BuddyPress & bbPress
If you use BuddyPress for social networking or bbPress for forums, myCred becomes even more powerful. Once activated, you unlock new hooks that reward users for being social – like posting to their activity stream or replying to forum topics. It’s the ultimate way to keep a community buzzing.
Beyond the Basics: Stores and Banks
The ecosystem doesn’t stop there. You can use a Centralised Points Bank to manage where credits come from, or even link myCred to WooCommerce. This allows users to redeem their earned points for actual store credits – a massive incentive for customer loyalty in online shops.
Total Control & Customisation
One of the best things about myCred is how much you can make it your own. Through the settings, you can rebrand “Points” to anything you like (we often use “Credits”) and set up notifications so users see a pop-up the moment they earn something.
You can even set up deductions. For example, if you award points for a comment but a user deletes that comment later, you can automatically remove the points to keep the system fair.
Pro Tip: The “Bank” Page
I recently set up a credit system using myCred and bbPress where I displayed user ranks and badges right next to their forum photos.
I also created a dedicated “Bank” page where users could see their balance and recent transactions, transfer credits to friends, and learn how to earn more. It made the whole site feel like a cohesive, interactive platform.
Would you be interested in seeing the layout I used for the “Bank” page? Let me know in the comments and I’ll be happy to share the details!
Let’s Chat!
Have you ever experimented with gamification or used myCred before? How did you set it up, and what did you create? We’d love to hear your ideas in the comments below!
Resources & Links
• Explore the Plugin: Download myCred on WordPress.org
• Official Documentation: Visit myCred.me for shortcode examples and add-ons.