Play And Donate Game: Great Works Responds To The PSFK Future of Mobile Tagging Report

Researching and donating money to a cause can often feel like work. So why not make donating to UNICEF a bit more entertaining? This thought sparked the idea of a mobile game that connects the everyday wants and needs of poor children with the everyday wants and needs of welloff consumers. One will directly affect the other. First we will reach out to retailers: grocery, clothing, home improvement, drug and book stores. Then we will inspire and enlist these corporations to contribute money/goods to villages in need based on consumer spending.

Unlike traditional corporate giving, the corporation’s money won’t actually be donated until the consumer unlocks it by scanning a Microsoft Tag placed on store receipts with their mobile phone. The more consumers spend in a company’s store, the more that company will donate. When consumers first download the UNICEF game, they will choose a cause closest to their heart and an actual village to sponsor. Much like The Sims and Tamagotchi, the app will generate a virtual representation of the village in their phone. A dashboard will let the user know what issues the children are currently faced with, i.e. lack of medicine, clothes, drinking water, etc, thus motivating a consumer to help.

When you go shopping for groceries and scan your receipt, the virtual food and water levels will rise—but only because the grocery store will actually donate food and water to your selected cause based on your purchase amount. The same goes for all participating retailers. Clothes for you will become clothes for them. Medicine in your chest will equal medicine in theirs. By fulfilling your everyday needs, you are also fulfilling the needs of someone less well-off than you. The UNICEF barcode game is smart.

When the real village you sponsor is running low on supplies, the app will send you a push notification urging you to help. Yes, that’s right. The app will actually urge users to go shopping. Friends, stores, companies, cities and industries can all display and share real-time results. They can shed light on their accomplishments, and when needed shed light on causes in danger, challenging and driving consumers to shop for causes in need.

PSFK’s Future of Mobile Tagging report presents key trends in the mobile tagging space, so as to inspire creative agencies about their future use of technologies that include QR codes, barcodes and Microsoft Tags in branding and communication campaigns. This document brings together both literal and lateral inspiration to provide a framework within which organizations can begin to contemplate the issues facing the U.S. Fund for UNICEF and their fundraising efforts.

To start this exciting conversation, PSFK challenged advertising and design agencies from around the world to react to the Future of Mobile Tagging report. They were tasked with developing concepts making use of Microsoft Tag to address one or more or the needs set forth by the U.S. Fund for UNICEF in a creative brief. The end result of this initial phase of ideation is a set of 10 standout concept programs, including the one described above.

PSFK Presents Future of Mobile Tagging report