Milestones and Badges
For a deep dive into Milestones and Badges, check out this session and associated slides.
Milestones and Badges are setup in the "Goals" section of the Challenge Dashboard:
Full setup instructions can be found here.
Why Use Milestones and Badges?
- Intermediate Motivation: Challenges are long, and it can be easy to get lazy. Milestones are like mini-rewards, reminding participants that they are making progress and encouraging them to continue.
- Make it Fun: Milestones can be customized to make a challenge feel more like a game - for example, if you're racing across a geographic area, milestones for local landmarks make the journey feel more like a real trip.
- Build your Brand: Themed milestones and matching badges keep your challenge on-brand, and keep participants engaged.
What are Milestones and Badges?
In short, milestones are intermediate goals that participants can reach along their challenge. Badges are the digital rewards for reaching those milestones.
Milestones can be based on distance covered, elevation gained, or a custom tally (like books read or hot dogs eaten), and can apply as an overall metrick or specifically to one activity type. Additionally, you can set individual as well as team milestones. Types of Milestones include:
Fixed Milestones can be created so that participants earn them at preset “points”. You could make Milestones for towns and cities that you pass by on the way across your virtual tour of Texas for instance.
Repeating Milestones can be created to track repeated progress. Let’s use the Hot Dogs Eaten example – you could create a Milestone that represents a “Pack” of 10 Hot Dogs, so that the participant will be able to see earn a new Milestone each time they log 10 Hot Dogs eaten, and it show how both the total number of Hot Dogs and the number of total packs of hot dogs they consumed over the course of this very indulgent challenge!
Percentage Milestones can be created so that when a participant reaches a set percentage of their Goal – whether they have set their own Goal, or you have set it for them. This type of Milestone really is handy if you have participants setting their own Goals – so all participants will be able to feel a sense of achievement as they make progress in logging their Activities.
Fun with Badges
Badges mark the achievement of reaching a milestone. There are built-in, default badges you an select from for the primary sports on the platform (running, biking, swimming), but you can build a badge for anything. Custom Badges can be still images or fun GIFs - they just need to be 300x300 pixels. If you need a resource for building your own badges, we recommend Canva.
Example of fun, custom badges (the buildings climbed):
ADVANCED SETTINGS
Notifications
Once you have saved a milestone you will have the ability to configure additional display settings like adding a custom message to the Milestone Unlocked page as well as an email notification once the milestone is unlocked. Milestone Unlocked Page Message and an option to send an email notification once achieved.
Milestone Unlocked Page Message - This message is accessible directly from the pop-up once the milestone has been reached as well as the individual Trophy Case. There are social sharing icons for the participant to show off their new milestone and badge.
Here is what the Milestone Unlocked Page looks like from the participant side:
Send E-mail When Achieved? - Turning this setting on will allow you to customize an email notification that gets sent when the milestone is reached. This can be completely customized to include words of wisdom, the image of the badge, sponsors, and more!
Here is a sample email notification and what it looks like from the participant's perspective:
We hope to see some fun and creative ways these additional settings can be used for your challenge event!
