Product awareness and training is an uphill battle for complex products - product walkthroughs, demos, knowledge centre aid to an extent but it doesn't build user confidence or trust especially where financial investment is required from the user at the outset. The stakes are pretty high and poor initial performance/financial loss could negatively impact the user - feeling incompetent with the product/domain leading to higher barriers of entry for future use.
ASX has been a shining example of resolving such issues with ease via their ASX Sharemarket Game. The game provides its participants with seed money of $ 50,000 which can be invested in the live stocks at ASX. Here are some noteworthy aspects :
* The game is not run in a separate simulated environment but in the same stock trading environment - so the price of the stocks is live, trading is live, portfolio standing/impact is live
* Since it is mock money, the participants can try out various strategies, take higher amounts of risks and explore different stocks available
* Over a period of time, the participants get better understanding of how a stock exchange works, what affects the price of stocks and overall how the global economy is interrelated - all without going through laborious hours of videos and expert talks
* By playing the game, the participants become familiar with all the features of buying/ selling at ASX and gain confidence with trading - making conversion post the game a breeze
* There are few gamification aspects like leaderboard, prizes etc. added to give it a competitive sense
* There is a social element to it - the game can be played individually or as a group
Loved the fact that it has been offered to high schools too which gives early exposure to children to build their financial muscle.
While I have enjoyed exploring the world of stock trading via the game, there are some great product takeaways in there !
More about the game can be found here : https://game.asx.com.au/game/info/public/about-the-game