Wordle & how marketing can use it

2022 kicked off with Wordle- the latest internet craze. Wordle is a simple word game in which you have six attempts to guess a five-letter word and was founded by Josh Wardle, a software engineer, who originally created the website for his word-game-loving girlfriend.

There’s one new five letter word every day, and you’re allowed to share your scores online- without spoiling the answer. Those black, green and yellow squares you’ve been seeing on the timeline? They’re Wordle results.  

You don’t have to download an app, or subscribe; meaning that if you’re online, it’s universally accessible in the English language.

 From a marketing standpoint, analysing what made  Wordle’s organic viral success provides a useful  look into how to generate buzz, create a fandom, and achieve consistent hype in order to stand  out in the digital crowd.

Here are the takeaways that marketers can  use from Wordle’s success:

Small Victories:

We’re all collectively experiencing  prolonged pandemic, and in this digital age, where we’re always susceptible to a barrage of bad news, we could all use a win every once in a while. The game  is designed as an “agency-expanding game” where players feel increasingly empowered and closer to the goal as they play, because it works through the process of elimination.

And since there’s only one Wordle puzzle a day, you don’t have to spend too much time on it,  but it’s  habit-forming.

For marketers, this collective need for small daily victories points us in the directions of the opportunities that lie within creating simple, user-friendly experiences that reward customers on a regular basis without demanding too much effort.

Whether it’s something well known like loyalty points or exclusive access, there are many ways in which you can create a small victory for consumers to keep them coming back for more.

Shareability is key:

When you complete a game of Wordle, an overlay is displayed on the webpage, showing a bar chart of your guess placement and one button – ‘Share’.

As soon as you click this button, it copies an emoji mockup of  the game’s guess placement to your device, making it a case of simply copying and pasting to your social media of choice. And loads of people are doing it, driving Wordle’s popularity in an almost word-of-mouth way (pun intended).

But it’s important to note that this wasn’t a feature that Wordle had from the beginning – it was only when Wardle noticed that some of the game’s players were sharing their results by manually typing out their results and patterns with emojis, and then he decided to implement it into the game.

This to say, community ideas are a powerful tool in the  marketer’s arsenal, and, as marketers, it is our responsibility to keep up to date, in order to keep our media fresh and relevant to create interest but also organic traction.

Leave people wanting more:

The game only gives you one word per day, resetting at midnight, making it has very easy for even casual players to pick up and play every single day. In the world of a whole series landing on a streaming site in one go, or many multi-level games, Wordle stands out because it isn’t ‘binge-able’ yet it’s very successful.

 Wordle’s success might have been accelerated by refreshing to a new game every time you wanted to play, or having multiple levels, it may have burnt out too quickly.

But with limiting player access, Wordle has built a following of loyal players that log onto the site daily. While having the format be open to fit the player is great, the limited access per day for the player and the need to keep your win streak running has left the audience constantly wanting more and thus logging onto the site day after day.  It’s a simple trick, but it has created brand loyalty.

Universal Accessibility:

As mentioned above, the game isn’t an app. Instead, Wordle is a web-based game that anyone can easily access from any internet connected device that has a browser. Regardless of which device you use, the user experience stays consistently simple and free.

Wordle’s universal accessibility undoubtedly aided its viral spread, which is especially effective in today’s digital age.

A major part of brand marketing specifically usually comes  down to getting your brand message out there, and if it’s a mass audience that you’re after, then easy, universal access should be a top priority in designing your brand experience.

 All in all, Wordle is a lesson in how to captivate an audience worldwide, and cultivate consumer loyalty.