Perhaps for most marketing applications out there, Gamification is probably not the right term. Gamers and game developers are calling bullshit on the topic, and they are probably right. Games are not just about some point scheme for a sale.
“-ification involves simple, repeatable, proven techniques or devices: you can purify, beautify, falsify, terrify, and so forth. -ification is always easy and repeatable, and it’s usually bullshit. Just add points.
Game developers and players have critiqued gamification on the grounds that it gets games wrong, mistaking incidental properties like points and levels for primary features like interactions with behavioral complexity. That may be true, but truth doesn’t matter for bullshitters. Indeed, the very point of gamification is to make the sale as easy as possible.”
Ultimately that why I propose that as a core element of gamification, it has to be fun! With the fun, it has rewards in of itself. Without the fun, it is just a bunch of bull. Even still, as the author concedes, even the bull has merit in the marketing world… maybe we just need a better name for it.