It’s pretty hard to type the word “clout” nowadays without spelling it with a “K”.
In the social media world, a company named Klout has created a business model whereby companies who have a product or service to market can connect directly with “social media influencers”, or those who tend to command a large following of people who will share the content they create, be they Tweets, blog posts, Facebook posts, and so on. It’s a sound business model, and those who are influential get free stuff (called “perks”), while brands get their stuff in the hands of people who are sure to talk about it to a large audience. It’s a targeted approach, and it seems to be working.
Raptr, the social network for gamers that’s been around for a few years, aims to apply this model to the world of gaming. To that end, they have recently released a new “perks” program called Raptr Rewards, which is currently in beta.
A quick glance at the Rewards available give some indication as to what we can expect in the future:
As you can see, each reward has influence requirements; in order to qualify, you need to be ranked (according to Raptr’s ranking system) at a certain level of influence for a certain game. The way the ranking works is that the more time you spend playing a game and participating in discussions or events related to that game, the higher your rank. Just as an example, I am considered “Elite” rank in Team Fortress 2, probably because I play it for 10-15 hours a week. If Valve wanted to reward dedicated players, they could partner with Raptr to award a perk to people ranked at a certain level in TF2. Please Valve?
Most of the rewards will probably end up being coupons, discounts, and early access to betas, at least in the beginning. As far as ‘free’ things, in-game items and DLC are extremely inexpensive for publishers to give away, so we can expect rewards to be those kinds of things. Unless this takes off and becomes the de facto social platform for gamers, you probably shouldn’t hope for things like free games or hardware any time soon.
The big play
Raptr is well-positioned to lead the charge into social gaming. The platform has improved greatly over the years I’ve been using it. It’s really nice to have a single interface to track all of my gaming activity, whether it be Xbox Live, PSN, or Steam. Last night I saw a Raptr friend pop up a notice that they were playing a DS game. I’m not sure how that works yet (manually?) but at least the Raptr system recognizes all gaming platforms.
Having your games organized and categorized also lends itself to another useful feature of Raptr: the concept of the Raptr network as a gaming news and discussion aggregator. The front page of Raptr is starting to resemble Reddit in that gaming news from the various games you play is listed, with up- and down-vote arrows. It’s a one-stop shop of gaming news and information. The centralization of all your gaming networks also allows you to do things like this:
If you haven’t tried it out, or it’s been a few years, you should check out Raptr again. I’ve always been fascinated with the idea of a social network specific to gamers, and also with Raptr as a tool to keep track of my sprawling game library. The new Rewards system is… well, just another perk.
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