Our working method, written down
The same frameworks we use with clients, set out so your team can design engagement without us in the room. Written for people who have to launch, measure and defend behaviour change in a real organisation.
The Habit Building Playbook
Design habits that drive goals
People sign up, attend or download once and then disappear. The problem is rarely the tool, it is the habit design underneath it. This playbook starts with the goal your customer, user or colleague has, and builds the habit around that.
- The EARN engagement cycle and the PROVE IT framework in full
- Five applied contexts: customers, products, operations, courses and onboarding
- The people side: safety, leadership, resistance and inclusive habit design
- Measurement that looks past vanity engagement, plus ethics and sustainability
- 13 appendices of tools, from the Habit Design Canvas to a workshop flow
What a playbook actually is
Think of it the way a sports team does. The playbook is what your coach brings: the standard plays, the mechanics that make them work, and the signals for when to run each one. A Game Plan takes those plays and tweaks them for the specific game in front of you, your business, your people and your constraints. Together they turn engagement from a guessing game into a coached system.
Each playbook gives you clarity on
- What actually drives your users or your employees
- How to increase participation and motivation
- Where to remove friction and improve flow
- Which behavioural and gamification principles apply to your goal
- Where AI can support efficiency or personalisation
- How to design experiences that are ethical, inclusive and human-centred
Every playbook includes actionable plays: practical steps you can put in place straight away.
Go deeper and it also includes
- Surveys of your people and your customers
- Workshops and co-creation sessions
- Behavioural analysis
- Stakeholder interviews
These come with the coached Game Plan, the Game Starter Workshop and the Pathway, where we are in the room with you rather than handing over a document.
What you getFrameworks, not a list of points and badges
Every playbook gives you the thinking, the diagnostics and the canvases to run it yourself.
EARN
Engage, Attract, Retain, Nudge. Find which part of the loop is broken, instead of guessing.
PROVE IT
Take someone from first experiment to real competence, starting with their why, so progress stays visible.
Five contexts
Customer engagement, products, operations, courses and learning, and onboarding, each with loop design and metrics.
Teams who know engagement matters and are tired of guessing
L&D and HR leaders
Whose onboarding, training or culture programmes stall at completion rates nobody is proud of.
Marketing and growth teams
Looking for lead generation and conversion without resorting to dark patterns.
Product and UX teams
Designing habit-forming experiences that hold up to ethical scrutiny.
Customer success and community leaders
Trying to build loyalty that outlasts the discount.
Founders and senior leaders
Who want one coherent engagement strategy across the company, instead of five tools pulling in five directions.
Not a neat fit?
If your challenge spans several playbooks at once, a Pathway is usually the answer. Your onboarding feeds your habit loop, your habit loop feeds your loyalty, and your loyalty feeds your brand.
Five problems, five plays
Each playbook takes the same method into one job to be done. Here is the problem it solves, where it works, and what the evidence says.
1. Habit Building
Available nowThe challengeYour people start strong and drop off. Onboarding stalls after week two. Training completion hovers at 25%. New processes get ignored once the launch buzz fades.
What this playbook solvesDesigning experiences that turn first actions into lasting behaviours, using progression systems, streak mechanics and AI-triggered nudges that adapt to each person’s pace.
Where it worksEmployee onboarding, L&D programme completion, health and wellness behaviour change, process adoption, app engagement.
The evidenceGamified onboarding programmes reach 90% completion against 25% for traditional approaches. Habit loop design grounded in behavioural science creates engagement that lasts beyond the novelty phase.
Buy the Habit Building Playbook2. Curiosity and Awareness
Coming soonThe challengeYou need people to notice, explore and care before you ask them to act. Your campaigns get attention but not understanding. Your message is not landing.
What this playbook solvesDesigning discovery experiences that reward exploration and build genuine interest, using quiz mechanics, reveal-and-reward patterns and AI-powered content personalisation.
Where it worksBrand awareness campaigns, product education, event engagement, museum and cultural experiences, public health campaigns, internal communications.
The evidenceGamified quizzes generate 8 minutes of average brand engagement against 15 seconds on a typical web page. When curiosity is rewarded, people learn 40% more than when information is simply presented.
Join the waitlist3. Shopping and Conversion
Coming soonThe challengePeople browse but do not buy. Leads go cold. Your funnel converts at 2% and you are spending more to get the same result.
What this playbook solvesDesigning conversion journeys that feel like play rather than pressure, using the EARN framework (Engage, Attract, Retain, Nudge) with AI-personalised pathways that adapt to each buyer’s motivation.
Where it worksE-commerce conversion, lead generation, event sign-ups, subscription trials, retail foot traffic, financial product comparison.
The evidencePlayerence-powered campaigns deliver 45% average conversion from player to lead. One rail client generates 150+ qualified leads a day through gamified campaigns. A single retail campaign captured 531 contact details.
Join the waitlist4. Trust and Loyalty
Coming soonThe challengeGetting people in the door is one thing. Keeping them is the expensive problem. Your loyalty programme feels transactional, churn is steady, and customers leave for a 5% discount elsewhere.
What this playbook solvesDesigning retention systems built on genuine value exchange, using purpose-driven progression, community mechanics and AI that spots disengagement before it becomes churn.
Where it worksCustomer loyalty programmes, employee retention, community building, membership organisations, subscription retention, alumni engagement.
The evidenceCustomers who feel emotionally connected carry 306% higher lifetime value (Motista). An insurance board game we designed lifted sales agent confidence by 80%, because trust-building works for internal audiences too.
Join the waitlist5. Learner Results
Coming soonThe challengePeople complete the training but cannot apply what they learned. Assessment feels like a test rather than a tool. You cannot prove capability gain to the business.
What this playbook solvesDesigning learning experiences that measure and develop real capability, using our PROVE IT framework with scenario-based challenges, spaced repetition and AI-adaptive difficulty that meets each learner where they are.
Where it worksCorporate L&D, compliance training, professional certification, skills assessment, sales enablement, technical training.
The evidenceOne search engine client reached 90% learning completion and 80% professional certification through gamified VIP training. Scenario-based assessment measures what people can do, not just what they remember, which is what the business actually needs.
Join the waitlistFrom playbook to Game Plan to Pathway
A playbook is the method written down. A Game Plan adapts that method to the reality of your business or product and builds a solid base to design a solution on. A Pathway is the whole thing delivered for you. Pick the level of help you want.
Game Plan, self-run
We hand you the step-by-step approach and you run it with your own team, in your own time.
Buy the self-run planGame Plan, coached
We hand you the approach, then nudge and coach you to a result. You do the work and report back, we keep you honest and unstick you.
Start a coached planGame Starter Workshop
An intense, condensed, hands-on Game Plan. Two full days or four half days online, covering the Game Plan basics with your team in the room. It works as a starting point on its own, or as a supplement to another Game Plan or a Pathway.
You leave with
- A clear view of the options open to you and the budget implications of each
- A report of the opportunities, so you can decide what to prioritise
- The next step identified, whether that is custom design and development, an out-of-the-box product or a platform configured to your requirements
- Enough to unlock the budget you need to take that step
The Pathway
Your full engagement strategy, researched, designed and delivered for you. Engagement strategy, gamified experiences on Playerence, AI workflows, CRM integration and ongoing optimisation. You get a complete strategy, not a presentation.
Best when
- The engagement or behaviour challenge is complex
- Your team has limited time or bandwidth
- You need a business case for stakeholders
- The project runs across functions
Why teams across Europe build it with us
You have options. Here is what you get here that you will not get everywhere.
Doing this since 2012
Engagement systems designed for learning, recruitment, marketing, loyalty and sales enablement, across sectors from retail and transport to financial services and manufacturing.
Gamification and AI, together
We do not pick a side. Behavioural design combined with AI, so your engagement system gets smarter as it runs without losing the human judgement that makes it work.
Research-backed, not folklore
Every playbook is grounded in behavioural science, self-determination theory and current engagement research, rather than whatever is trending.
Ethical and inclusive by default
We design for motivation, not manipulation. Accessibility, neurodiversity, gender, language and cultural context are built in from the start, not bolted on at the end.
EU-built and EU-compliant
European data, European servers, European regulatory context. GDPR and the EU AI Act shape everything we build. We treat that as a design constraint worth having, not a compliance tax.
Proof across sectors
Real results from retail, financial services, transport, recruitment and training. Named case studies and anonymised numbers, not hypotheticals.
Platform and practice in one place
Playerence gives you the delivery layer and the playbooks give you the strategy. You do not have to stitch two vendors together.
You work directly with An
No account manager handoff and no team you never meet. The strategy and the design come from the person whose name is on the door.
Tell us which one you want first
We build the next playbook where the demand is. Leave your email, pick the one you need, and we will send it the day it lands. Nothing else in between.
Before you buy
What do I actually get?
The Habit Building Playbook, expanded paid edition, as a 101-page PDF. You download it straight after payment and get a VAT invoice for your business.
How does VAT work?
Prices exclude VAT. UK businesses pay 20% UK VAT. EU businesses with a valid VAT number are reverse charged. We ask for your VAT number at checkout.
Is this a catalogue of points, badges and leaderboards?
No. Those are tools, not a strategy. The playbook is about designing habits that serve the person as well as the business, and it is explicit about not manipulating people into behaviour that only serves your metrics.
Do I need a behavioural science background?
No. The book tells each reader where to start, so a product leader and an HR leader can both get to what they need quickly.
Not sure which playbook you need?
Tell us what you want people to do more of, and we will point you to the right starting point.