In this episode of ThimbleberryU, we continue our discussion on gamifying savings by shifting from the “why” to the “how.” Last time, we explored the psychology behind gamification. Today, we walk through the specific steps to design a savings game that’s personal, sustainable, and motivating.
We begin by stressing the importance of having a vivid goal. It’s not enough to have a vague intention—our goals need to be visualized, named, printed, and emotionally connected to. Once the goal is in place, we choose a structure that fits our personal motivation style. For some, it's a streak counter; for others, it’s hitting milestones, unlocking levels, or incorporating random rewards. The key is to tailor the game mechanics to what actually drives us.
Next, we build structure around the game by defining clear rules—written rules—to eliminate ambiguity and reduce the temptation to bend the system. Amy emphasizes the importance of including predefined exceptions so we can respond to life’s inevitable hiccups without feeling like we’ve failed. Automation plays a huge role in eliminating friction; it ensures that we follow through without having to rely on willpower.
We also talk about the power of accountability. Whether it’s a partner or a regular financial check-in, accountability helps us track wins, adjust strategies, and stay committed. And because humans respond to incentives, it’s critical to build a reward ladder. These rewards should be meaningful but proportionate—ideally no more than 10% of what we’re trying to save. We also look at the value of experience-based rewards, which generate longer-lasting satisfaction than material purchases.
To ground the theory, Amy shares a story about “Alex,” who gamified her weekday lunch spending. By creating a simple challenge, defining her rules, and building in smart rewards and penalties—including donating to a “liked but not loved” charity—Alex turned a small change into a sustainable habit.
When setbacks happen, we encourage listeners not to see them as failures. Reset the streak, learn from the moment, and evaluate whether the original goal was realistic. Symbolic penalties and honest reflection can help restore momentum.
We wrap up with a lightning round, debunking the idea that gamification is childish or time-consuming. It’s backed by behavioral science and can be managed with minimal effort through automation. Finally, we suggest starting small, being flexible, and aiming for traction—not perfection.
[00:00:00] Jag: Welcome back to ThimbleberryU. I'm Jon "JAG" Gay, and joined as always by Amy Walls from Thimbleberry Financial. Amy, always great to be with you,
[00:00:13] Amy: Jag It's always good to talk to you.
[00:00:15] Jag: Today's the second in our two-part series on gamifying your savings. If you have not listened to our previous episode, part one, we give more of an overview.
Please check that episode out first. Then come back to this one. And that's where we unpacked why gamification works. We're gonna dive in a little bit deeper today, Amy.
[00:00:32] Amy: Yeah. Today's we're gonna talk about the how. We're gonna talk about how to design a game that works for your life, build in rewards that keep you going and set up a system that can survive setbacks.
[00:00:44] Jag: Alright, let's get into it. How do you actually build a savings game that works?
[00:00:49] Amy: I think there's a few key parts to this, and for each of our listeners it's gonna be different. Okay. And so when I'm talking with clients, it's, I have my ideas and things that work for me, and I have ideas that have worked for others, but ultimately, clients, if they're trying to gamify something, have to pull it together. So first thing is: create a vivid goal. You've gotta make that goal really real. Picture it, print it, name it,
[00:01:14] Jag: Manifest it, if you will.
[00:01:16] Amy: Exactly, exactly. Make it something really tangible and more than just an idea.
[00:01:22] Jag: Mm-hmm.
[00:01:23] Amy: Choose a mechanism. You know, are you somebody that like streaks? My 9-year-old is on a Duolingo streak and uh, this week is hard because he lost his tablet. And so he is upset.
[00:01:39] Jag: He misplaced it or had it taken away?
[00:01:41] Amy: Uh, he did not misplace it. How about I say that?
[00:01:45] Jag: Understood. We'll move on.
[00:01:48] Amy: Are you somebody that likes milestones? Right? I just hit a new milestone. I hit a new level. That's exciting to me. I know that there's 15 steps, 15 milestones between me and this goal, and I can get that down to 13 in the next couple weeks. That’s good for some people. Is it that you need random rewards? You're giving up something, right?
Because we're talking about saving. So in reality, for saving, we are cutting some expenses. So do you need to feel like I have an avenue to do the thing I've given up? Maybe as a reward in a small way. Okay? Three. I'm gonna say define the rules and write them. Sure. I can, like you, JAG probably, or many of our listeners, I can justify many different things. So if these rules are written for the game. I know I can't fudge that. I know I gotta play by the rules.
[00:02:52] Jag: Fair.
[00:02:52] Amy: So predefined exceptions. Because life does happen.
[00:02:57] Jag: Yeah.
[00:02:58] Amy: So you have to make this a little flexible and then automate it. Automation is amazing, and I will say I continually, in my 20 some years of being an advisor, the people who say, yep, we're automating this, they have success compared to the people who say, no, I'm going to do it manually each and every month, or each and every pay period, whatever it is. It doesn't work.
[00:03:24] Jag: In our last episode, we talked about friction and automating it. Instead of having to log in and do it every week or every month, really removes that friction.
[00:03:31] Amy: Absolutely. Another key one is: have an accountability partner.
[00:03:37] Jag: Mm-hmm.
[00:03:37] Amy: You know, I've got this for what I do as a financial advisor.
My husband and I have weekly check-ins on certain things, and once a month, one of those is much more financial. And in that we're gonna talk about wins, we're gonna talk about our misses, and we're gonna talk about what do we need to tweak to make us more successful towards this goal. Yeah. And then lastly, it ties to what I talked about earlier is build the reward ladder.
If you're somebody who needs the rewards, you know, build a ladder, now they have to be appropriately sized, right? So some small rewards at milestones, and maybe something big for your full win.
[00:04:16] Jag: This is a really good blueprint for how to put together a plan. Can we cement this a little bit better with an example of someone who made this their own?
[00:04:24] Amy: Yeah. I'll pick an easy example that I think many of us can relate to. I'll call this gal “Alex.” She wanted to cut back on how much she was spending on our weekday lunches. So she said, I am not going to eat out at a restaurant for lunch for a week and see what happens. Can I do it? Well, it was easy. And she saved quite a bit, and her week turned into another week and turned into another week, and turned into another week.
She let herself go out to lunch with friends and finally said, you know what? I'm gonna keep this going and my reward for doing it for a month is gonna be to go out with my coworkers and have a great lunch. Okay? And she also, because I said, you know, write the rules. If she broke the streak, she agreed to donate $50 to a cause that she likes but didn't love.
If she wanted to give to charity, she wanted to give to a charity she loved, but she knew she'd already give to the charity she loved. She had to now give to a charity she liked.
[00:05:29] Jag: I like that because if it's a charity you love, it's very easy to justify breaking the streak and say, oh, well this dog shelter could really use the money. As opposed to something that you're kind of lukewarm about and you, and I don't wanna say it's a punishment, but it's more of a motivating factor than, and it doesn't give you that get outta jail free card almost.
[00:05:48] Amy: Yep. You hit the nail on the head. She had motivation. On both sides. Right. Motivation to keep going. And she had motivation to not, not do it (chuckles). Double negative, but I think that made sense.
[00:06:01] Jag: It did. Okay. Motivation on both sides. That's smart. Okay. This is important. How do you make sure the reward doesn't undo the savings?
[00:06:11] Amy: Being thoughtful and intentional for one.
[00:06:14] Jag: Yeah.
[00:06:14] Amy: You have to choose rewards that reinforce momentum. So in the example I just gave for Alex, right, her “gotcha” was eating out at restaurants for lunch. And so by giving her the reward of doing that for not doing it, she got to enjoy it. Whereas if she was gonna break the streak and do it, it wasn't gonna feel very good.
I also think it can be good to apply some percentages. Now everybody has to adjust this based on what their goals are and such, but you probably don't want your reward to be more than 10% of what it is you're trying to achieve overall.
[00:06:52] Jag: Mm-hmm.
[00:06:53] Amy: Right. So if you think about, I've got this goal of saving a hundred thousand dollars, well, maybe my ultimate reward with milestones along the way, and maybe I get there.
Then I'm going to take a month or two months to continue to save that same amount. Right? Or I stretch the goal out to make it $110,000. I've now got $10,000. That was some rewards, but maybe. The big reward is a trip somewhere.
[00:07:24] Jag: Okay.
[00:07:24] Amy: Another thing that's important is to think about doing experiences as your rewards.
Like I just mentioned, the trip over stuff.
[00:07:32] Jag: Yeah. People tend to remember experiences more than tangible things.
[00:07:35] Amy: Yeah. Well, I think we've talked about in prior episodes that studies have been done around buyer's remorse, and then if you buy something, say like a car. Within three days, you no longer get the good happy feelings.
Hmm. From that purchase. Even when you think about it, three days later, they're gone. But if you do something that's an experience, you will have happy memories when you think of that experience for your entire life. They will be stronger soon after the experience, but they will be there for life.
[00:08:07] Jag: For sure.
[00:08:09] Amy: So I mentioned the trip. Here's an example. Maybe there's a hundred thousand dollars sabbatical savings goal, right? So maybe every $10,000 you give yourself some, some experience, reward, maybe about something that you plan to be doing on your sabbatical.
[00:08:26] Jag: Okay.
[00:08:26] Amy: Right? Maybe you're gonna be learning about something and so you do some things towards that. And then, like I said, add on some extra in there. And you've got a trip to Italy as part of that also.
[00:08:39] Jag: All right, so Amy, what about when people fall off their savings game? How do you sort of get back on the horse?
[00:08:44] Amy: Well, I think we all fall off on things and so we need to know that's part of what life's going to be. If you dip into your savings, reset your streak, right? It's not the end of the world. Yeah, it loses a little motivation, but let me get back there. Um, I have this really cool app. It's called Finch. Um, it's kinda like the Tamagotchi. It's this little bird that you grow from a baby bird into an adult bird and it has clothes and friends and all the things. So I'm on day 220 something at this point.
[00:09:18] Jag: Yep.
[00:09:19] Amy: I lost my streak after like 40 days.
[00:09:22] Jag: Ah.
[00:09:23] Amy: And I was so bummed and thought maybe I won't restart this, but you know what? I feel better every day that I use it because it makes me take care of me and then I'm better for everyone around me. So know that it's not failure.
You learn something by doing it. Impose a symbolic penalty, right? Like giving to the charity you like instead of the charity you love. And also look and say, did I make the goal appropriate? Is it too aggressive? Is it too much? Is it not accounting for life? Now, obviously you have to be honest with yourself because when we justify things, right, well, life is always going to have X, y, and Z.
It may, but can you control some of that or influence it more than you might have been doing previously? Alright,
[00:10:13] Jag: Amy, I know you get a lot of questions from your clients all the time about this kind of stuff, so let's, if you're, if you're good with this, let's do a quick lightning round.
[00:10:20] Amy: Okay. Okay. Gamification. Sure.
[00:10:22) Jag: First pushback. Some people say video games? Isn't this kind of childish?
[00:10:25] Amy: I see where people are coming up with that, but it's actually based on behavioral science.
[00:10:32] Jag: Mm-hmm.
[00:10:32] Amy: Dopamine works, so this isn't about being childish. Sure. You can make a pretty childish graphic that you hang on the fridge, or you can make one that isn't so childish. It's all about getting the pattern of behavior going so that you succeed and there's nothing childish about succeeding.
[00:10:50] Jag: Love that dopamine hit. Next question. Isn't this gonna take a lot of time?
[00:10:53] Amy: Not if you automate it and review it once a month.
[00:10:57] Jag: Okay, and what if something comes up and I have to dip into that savings that I'm putting away?
[00:11:01] Amy: Well, remember we talked about writing your exceptions and your rules, or writing your exceptions into your rules, if you will, before you start. That way you're not failing, you're adjusting. Now on a side note, I am gonna say something we have not talked about is that it is important to know that to save more, you likely have to cut expenses.
[00:11:24] Jag: Mm-hmm.
[00:11:25] Amy: If we just jump into gamification and saving more without dealing with our expenses that were too high, we're gonna set money aside in savings. And we're either going to need to deplete that savings that is part of our game, or we're gonna turn to some other bucket of money and start depleting that.
So this is about forcing behavior change and you've gotta be monitoring to make sure your other savings and what you've added is not depleted for any of this gamification to work.
[00:11:56] Jag: You've really gotta take a 30,000-foot view of it. And so you're not just robbing Peter to pay Paul and moving stuff between different buckets.
That's a really good point. Alright, so if folks wanna start with this gamification for savings, Amy, where should they begin?
[00:12:09] Amy: Pick one of the savings games from part one. There are also many others. I will share that I've used many different resources, and I actually asked Chat GPT recently for a list of gamification ideas and gosh, it was tremendous.
All sorts of things that I had never thought of before. So pick something and give it a shot. Write your rules down. Build a small reward for milestones or however you need to along the way, and keep it flexible. This does not have to be black and white. Hard bridges on the boxes. Life is not that way.You are not aiming for perfection. You're aiming for traction.
[00:12:48] Jag: I like that.
[00:12:49] Amy: And then here's something for listeners who like a little edge. You know, we talked about that you don't wanna be dipping into savings, you need to monitor that. But if you do dip into savings mid round, you might choose to forfeit the milestone reward. You need a little bit more incentive to keep yourself going. That might be something you wanna do.
[00:13:11] Jag: I feel like we're in the 80’s and playing Chutes and Ladders. (Laughter)
[00:13:14] Amy: So my point with that last thing is that having a clear boundary like that for some people makes the progress more real.
[00:13:22] Jag: I like that. Okay. Yeah, you really gotta know yourself and figure out what works for you. Like you said, there's so many strategies. You could do eight podcasts on what Chat GPT probably gave you for games and strategies. But figure out what makes you tick, what works for you. And if you wanna talk to Amy about this or anything related to your financial future, how do folks find you at Thimbleberry Financial?
[00:13:42] Amy: Yeah, they can give us a call at (503) 610-6510 or find us online@thimbleberryfinancial.com.
[00:13:51] Jag: I like this gamification. I'm gonna go see what apps I can go download on my phone and we'll talk again soon.
[00:13:55] Amy: It sounds good. JAG
[00:13:57] Jag:Securities offered through registered representatives of Cambridge Investment Research, Inc., a broker dealer, member of FINRA/SIPC, advisory services through Cambridge Investment Research Advisors, Inc., a registered investment advisor. Cambridge and Thimbleberry Financial are not affiliated.
Discussions in this show should not be construed as specific recommendations or investment advice. Always consult with your investment professional before making important investment decisions.
Securities offered through registered representatives of Cambridge Investment Research, Inc., a broker dealer, member of FINRA/SIPC, advisory services through Cambridge Investment Research Advisors, Inc., a registered investment advisor. Cambridge and Thimbleberry Financial are not affiliated.