Get the free Core Drives in the Wild guide, behavioral design applied to real products: professorgame.com/WildCD Episode Summary Tetiana Kobzar, product designer with 18 years of experience and creator of the Comportance Framework, joins Rob to share how behavioral design turns clinical and educational […]
Most apps lose 77% of their users within the first three days because they treat onboarding like a tax audit instead of a human journey. In this episode, Rob Alvarez breaks down why your “helpful” 15-step toolkit might actually be causing cognitive friction and driving users away. By moving from function-focused design to human-focused design, you can transform a bounce into a lifelong advocate. Rob explores the “Christmas Magic Mistake,” the “Hello World” principle for instant wins, and the “Miyagi Method” of scaffolding to ensure your users actually want to come back for Day 2.
Identify the exact strategies Sharon and Rob discussed so you can start increasing engagement in your own projects today. Grab our Core Drives in the Wild guide for free professorgame.com/WildCD Episode Summary Sharon Wood, who launched the original Grand Theft Auto in 1996 on […]
Don’t experiment on your own revenue with broken game mechanics. Get our guide “Core Drives in the Wild” to learn how to apply real behavioral science to your product: professorgame.com/WildCD Episode Summary Rob Alvarez breaks down three “engagement leaks” that cause products to lose […]
Exploring gamification for your product or org? Let’s chat → professorgame.com/chat Episode Summary Nesrine Changuel, former product leader at Google Chrome, Google Meet, Spotify, and Skype, argues that delight collapses when treated as a sprint at the end of the backlog rather than as […]
Master the science of motivation and see how top experts do it right. Get the free 9-day “Core Drives in the Wild” email sequence here: professorgame.com/WildCD Episode Summary Rob Alvarez dissects three high-profile gamification failures (Disney’s hotel laundry leaderboards, Zynga’s FarmVille, and Yahoo Answers) […]
Don’t experiment on your own revenue with broken game mechanics. Get our guide “Core Drives in the Wild” to learn how to apply real behavioral science to your product: professorgame.com/WildCD Episode Summary Rob Alvarez attacks the “chocolate-covered broccoli” approach to gamification, arguing that points, […]
Have a product challenge around retention? Quick intro chat → professorgame.com/chat Episode Summary Leif Sørensen, founder of Actee, argues that most learning games fail because clients treat them as “magic powder” that can absorb a dozen frameworks at once, and because designers say yes […]
If you’re implementing AI and want to realize that promised ROI, let’s see if Octalysis fits → professorgame.com/chat Episode Summary Rob Alvarez argues that AI implementation in 2026 is a behavioral problem and not a technical one, and that most AI rollouts fail because […]
I’ve interviewed hundreds of experts and now lead Engagement Strategy (EU) at TOG. If you want help applying this, start here: professorgame.com/chat Episode Summary Clark Aldrich returns to introduce Socratic Cards, a physical deck designed to replace expert-led teaching with peer-driven inquiry. Each card […]
