Ty Ahmad-Taylor, founder and CEO of FanFeedr, discusses the desire for prestige in game settings as an engine for monetization. It's a little confusing because he talks about prestige as a monetization model and prestige as currency but the basic concept is that people like to show that they're making moves in online settings with a game element:
"Prestige turns into real money in any one of several ways. Game players are granted some amount of free virtual currency at the start of play. That currency is used to purchase virtual goods or services that allow the player to advance levels. When the user runs out of currency, he/she can replenish it by paying for more currency with a credit card or PayPal account; by taking a survey; by taking a lead-generation offer like a Netflix (NSDQ: NFLX) trial subscription; or by watching videos (gWallet offers this)."
Virtual currency is a big part of this game and he mentions companies like Offerpal who are providing services to make such things happen. Since that's not a space in which I'm working, I haven't kept up very closely but I have noticed that Inside Facebook is a good source for such info. No, not the posts, the ads.
