At OPENFORMAT, we spend a lot of time thinking about how our cross-platform rewards and reputation system can be applied to various use cases. This week, we've been focused on ambassador programmes, so we've created this comprehensive guide to illustrate how different game mechanics can be leveraged to maximise their impact.

Our goal is to incentivise and reward quality engagement rather than quantity. By focusing on meaningful interactions, we can prevent noise while fostering trust and long-lasting consistency within the community. Two key areas of focus are setting clear guidelines for expected content and ensuring that the value exchange is directly linked to value-added activities. With clear expectations on both sides, the following mechanics will make the experience valuable, rewarding, and enjoyable for everyone involved.

A critical tip is to make it genuinely meaningful for ambassadors. We've seen too many Discord and Telegram channels where users mindlessly complete tasks in hopes of an airdrop at TGE. This is the exact opposite of what you want. In such cases, both capital and engagement often vanish as soon as rewards are distributed. Not to mention, users frequently have to leave your platform to collect rewards, disrupting their engagement. Instead, we want a system based on fair value exchange from day one—one that gives ambassadors a sense of purpose and ownership, empowering them while celebrating their achievements and growing their reputation and social influence within the community.

The decentralised and transparent beauty of web3 enables OPENFORMAT to make this possible: your ambassador programme can run seamlessly across multiple platforms, like Discord and Telegram, with rewards distributed automatically. Our game mechanic cards simplify the process, helping you identify and implement the techniques that will have the most impact. What's not to love? 🤔

Each section of the document will explain the mechanic, the reasoning behind it, and provide crucial UI tips—because the success of the system depends on how well it’s flagged and signalled to the user. Remember, proper implementation is key!💡

A clear path of advancement is crucial to ambassador motivation and easy implementation is key to preserving community manager time. Ambassadors need to have a clear mission, and they also need to understand how to progress on this mission. Ideally, the reward structure is so clear that ambassadors can come up with various strategies for how to advance through the various tiers.

Points:

• Rewarded for completing tasks.

• Based on the difficulty of the task (eg hosting a live QnA > promo tweet) and the quality.

• Acts as a proxy for the ambassador's reputation within the ecosystem.

• Bonuses for high impact content (eg TikTok that goes viral)🔥.

  

Tiers:

• Ambassadors can climb the tier ladder (bronze → silver → gold or trainee → master → leader) as they accumulate points and deliver value to the programme.

• Higher tiers should be tied to higher responsibility as well as exclusive rewards🏆.

UI and Implementation Tips-

• Have a clear visual representation of the user progress. This can either be a literal path like in Duolingo or a simple progress bar that allows the ambassador to see when they will achieve the next tier or reward at a glance.

• Notify the ambassadors when they’ve earned points.

• Study the interactions with the notifications and personalise them. Use data-driven notifications to maximise engagement. Remember to make the notifications exciting.

• Host a dashboard that displays a detailed breakdowns of where points came from and what actions contributed the most. Transparency and easy access to information build trust.

• Use UI and drive the value in the rewards. The tier benefits need to be clear on what is rewarded at each tier and how. Clearly flag and display the areas and content that is exclusive. Make it mysterious and desirable.

  ---

The ambassadors now know how to progress through the system, the value they bring and the value they can expect to receive. Now we should employ some mechanics that nudge the ambassadors to stay active and drive consistency. Luckily for us, web3 innovation allows us to also be consistent and recognise the ambassador's streak across multiple platforms 😉

Streaks -

• Most of us are used to streaks being rewarded for consecutive daily actions (eg Snapchat streak).

• In reality, streaks are much more flexible and can also offer rewards for quality consistency (eg consecutive pieces of content being approved at first review).

• Make sure to scale the rewards with the difficulty of the tasks and length of the streak.

  • A milestone consistency streak on a difficult task should yield a very large, meaningful and public celebration.

Streaks carry with them a number of other potential mechanics that could be used to spice up the system.

• A wager or a stake on how long an ambassador can maintain a streak could be a fun way for the ambassador to get more skin in the game and use it as a temporary driver. Key there being temporary.

• You could also implement streak freezes or revival amulets as a reward for a streak milestone, something to recognise the achievement but also acknowledge that we’re all human and don’t have to be perfect 100% of the time🛡.

Decay -

• The accumulated points decay over time if the ambassador becomes inactive.

• Whilst theoretically simple, this mechanic needs to be balanced very carefully - if the decay is too aggressive, it will be discouraging and lead to drop outs. If the decay is too soft, it will be gamed and obsolete. Good luck.

  

UI and Implementation Tips -

• Again, clear visuals and tracking are key. Display and celebrate long streaks whilst flag and signal bright warnings when ambassadors are approaching decay.

• Any additional mechanics such as streak freezes or decay grace periods need to be communicated openly and clearly.

• Use encouraging notifications to help the ambassadors maintain their streaks and be prepared to set off literal alarm bells to prevent reputation decay.

  ---

Ambassadors' effort should be actively rewarded on a consistent basis as well as at key milestones. It's like little breadcrumbs of validation on the way to the big cake itself🍰. This is where OPENFORMAT really shines, allowing ambassadors to show off achievements collected across different platforms, while our game mechanic cards help design a reward system that’s worth bragging about.

Meaningful badges -

• Badges should be meaningful and rewarded for key achievements (eg 100k views or hosting 10 events with 100+ attendees).

  • If badges are rewarded at every corner, all of them lose value and stop being effective.

• As long as your badges are tied to meaningful progress within the system, you can use them as access keys as well as rewards (eg Super Hoster badge - hosting 10 events with 100+ attendees - can give access to channels and tasks around major conference planning)

Know how to celebrate -

• A simple "high-five" type reward can be rewarded en masse to celebrate small incremental process

• Coronations should be saved to celebrate standout content with public recognition (eg Content of the Month)

  

UI and Implementation Tips -

• Make the ambassadors trophy cabinet public and clearly visible on their profile.

• Use tooltips to explain the significance of each badge. Attract extra attention to exclusive or access granting badges.

• Feature top content on a dedicated leaderboard or as pinned posts. Celebrate ambassador achievements with banners and custom graphics. Maybe host a monthly rewards night.

Involve the ambassadors in decision making and content validation to further drive trust and collective ownership. Power to the people✊.

Tier Voting -

• Higher tier ambassadors should be able to vote on key ambassador preprogramme decisions such as selecting content themes or approving community events.

• This can also be implemented by being able to reward points by reacting with emojis in various channels, with higher ranked ambassadors able to reward more points. Be careful though, this could lead to collusion. You can balance this by putting a cap on how much rewarding an ambassador can reward.

Pier review -

• Contributions should be validated by the community to ensure alignment on the quality.

• Malicious voting can be punished by slashing the peer review rewards.

UI and Implementation Tips -

• Voting interface that clearly shows the active polls, past results and indicates the weight of each vote based on the tier of the voter is crucial for transparency.

  

• Implementing a voting system using emojis or simple upvote/downvote mechanics combined with approval thresholds can automate reward distribution and visually signal the peer approved content.

Community spirit is crucial, but maintaining it across a fragmented community can be tricky🌐. If only there were an infrastructure tool to unify your community with a frictionless reward system… Anyway, ambassadors should be encouraged and rewarded for working together. Collaboration needs to be fun and exciting, not daunting or anxiety-inducing. The goal is to foster authentic relationships that radiate throughout the rest of the community

Teams Quests -

• Simple missions that require teamwork (eg content collaborations or co-hosting community events).

• The rewards also need to be meaningful to the whole group, this is particularly important when ambassadors from different tiers are working together.

Reward Delivery -

• A whole guide could be written on various reward delivery mechanisms. The secret here is to keep them varied, fun and somewhat unexpected.

• Bundled rewards are good for completing multiple related tasks or missions. The promise of a big prize at the end can help to motivate longer and more difficult jobs.

• Random rewards can act as little surprises that keep the ambassadors on their toes and potentially exploring the system to see if there are any specific triggers.

UI and Implementation Tips -

• Team Quests require dedicated UI where all members of the team can track contributions and keep each other accountable.

• Team Quests and Bundled Rewards should have clear progress indicator to maintain drive.

• Spin-the-wheel or mystery box mechanics can be used to deliver random rewards. Remember to clearly and transparently communicate the chance of receiving each of the prizes.

• Focus on rewarding impactful contributions that add value to the community. Avoid mechanics that incentivise spammy or shallow participation.

• Ensure ambassadors have a transparent path for advancement with a well-structured points and tier system. Use visual tools like progress bars to help them track their growth and understand the benefits of levelling up.

• Use streaks and decay mechanics to keep ambassadors active, but balance these carefully to prevent burnout or exploitation. Offer flexibility, like streak freezes, to accommodate real-life challenges.

• Meaningful badges and public celebrations boost morale and foster a sense of accomplishment. Make sure these rewards are rare and impactful to maintain their value.

• Incorporate community voting and peer validation to engage ambassadors in decision-making. This builds trust and gives them a sense of ownership in the programme’s success.

• Design team quests and collaborative missions that promote teamwork and camaraderie. Reward group success in ways that feel fair and meaningful to all participants.

• The success of these mechanics hinges on how they are presented. Use engaging, data-driven notifications, transparent dashboards, and celebratory visuals to make interactions feel rewarding and intuitive.

At OPENFORMAT, we spend a lot of time thinking about how our cross-platform rewards and reputation system can be applied to various use cases. This week, we've been focused on ambassador programmes, so we've created this comprehensive guide to illustrate how different game mechanics can be leveraged to maximise their impact.

Our goal is to incentivise and reward quality engagement rather than quantity. By focusing on meaningful interactions, we can prevent noise while fostering trust and long-lasting consistency within the community. Two key areas of focus are setting clear guidelines for expected content and ensuring that the value exchange is directly linked to value-added activities. With clear expectations on both sides, the following mechanics will make the experience valuable, rewarding, and enjoyable for everyone involved.

A critical tip is to make it genuinely meaningful for ambassadors. We've seen too many Discord and Telegram channels where users mindlessly complete tasks in hopes of an airdrop at TGE. This is the exact opposite of what you want. In such cases, both capital and engagement often vanish as soon as rewards are distributed. Not to mention, users frequently have to leave your platform to collect rewards, disrupting their engagement. Instead, we want a system based on fair value exchange from day one—one that gives ambassadors a sense of purpose and ownership, empowering them while celebrating their achievements and growing their reputation and social influence within the community.

The decentralised and transparent beauty of web3 enables OPENFORMAT to make this possible: your ambassador programme can run seamlessly across multiple platforms, like Discord and Telegram, with rewards distributed automatically. Our game mechanic cards simplify the process, helping you identify and implement the techniques that will have the most impact. What's not to love? 🤔

Each section of the document will explain the mechanic, the reasoning behind it, and provide crucial UI tips—because the success of the system depends on how well it’s flagged and signalled to the user. Remember, proper implementation is key!💡

A clear path of advancement is crucial to ambassador motivation and easy implementation is key to preserving community manager time. Ambassadors need to have a clear mission, and they also need to understand how to progress on this mission. Ideally, the reward structure is so clear that ambassadors can come up with various strategies for how to advance through the various tiers.

Points:

• Rewarded for completing tasks.

• Based on the difficulty of the task (eg hosting a live QnA > promo tweet) and the quality.

• Acts as a proxy for the ambassador's reputation within the ecosystem.

• Bonuses for high impact content (eg TikTok that goes viral)🔥.

  

Tiers:

• Ambassadors can climb the tier ladder (bronze → silver → gold or trainee → master → leader) as they accumulate points and deliver value to the programme.

• Higher tiers should be tied to higher responsibility as well as exclusive rewards🏆.

UI and Implementation Tips-

• Have a clear visual representation of the user progress. This can either be a literal path like in Duolingo or a simple progress bar that allows the ambassador to see when they will achieve the next tier or reward at a glance.

• Notify the ambassadors when they’ve earned points.

• Study the interactions with the notifications and personalise them. Use data-driven notifications to maximise engagement. Remember to make the notifications exciting.

• Host a dashboard that displays a detailed breakdowns of where points came from and what actions contributed the most. Transparency and easy access to information build trust.

• Use UI and drive the value in the rewards. The tier benefits need to be clear on what is rewarded at each tier and how. Clearly flag and display the areas and content that is exclusive. Make it mysterious and desirable.

  ---

The ambassadors now know how to progress through the system, the value they bring and the value they can expect to receive. Now we should employ some mechanics that nudge the ambassadors to stay active and drive consistency. Luckily for us, web3 innovation allows us to also be consistent and recognise the ambassador's streak across multiple platforms 😉

Streaks -

• Most of us are used to streaks being rewarded for consecutive daily actions (eg Snapchat streak).

• In reality, streaks are much more flexible and can also offer rewards for quality consistency (eg consecutive pieces of content being approved at first review).

• Make sure to scale the rewards with the difficulty of the tasks and length of the streak.

  • A milestone consistency streak on a difficult task should yield a very large, meaningful and public celebration.

Streaks carry with them a number of other potential mechanics that could be used to spice up the system.

• A wager or a stake on how long an ambassador can maintain a streak could be a fun way for the ambassador to get more skin in the game and use it as a temporary driver. Key there being temporary.

• You could also implement streak freezes or revival amulets as a reward for a streak milestone, something to recognise the achievement but also acknowledge that we’re all human and don’t have to be perfect 100% of the time🛡.

Decay -

• The accumulated points decay over time if the ambassador becomes inactive.

• Whilst theoretically simple, this mechanic needs to be balanced very carefully - if the decay is too aggressive, it will be discouraging and lead to drop outs. If the decay is too soft, it will be gamed and obsolete. Good luck.

  

UI and Implementation Tips -

• Again, clear visuals and tracking are key. Display and celebrate long streaks whilst flag and signal bright warnings when ambassadors are approaching decay.

• Any additional mechanics such as streak freezes or decay grace periods need to be communicated openly and clearly.

• Use encouraging notifications to help the ambassadors maintain their streaks and be prepared to set off literal alarm bells to prevent reputation decay.

  ---

Ambassadors' effort should be actively rewarded on a consistent basis as well as at key milestones. It's like little breadcrumbs of validation on the way to the big cake itself🍰. This is where OPENFORMAT really shines, allowing ambassadors to show off achievements collected across different platforms, while our game mechanic cards help design a reward system that’s worth bragging about.

Meaningful badges -

• Badges should be meaningful and rewarded for key achievements (eg 100k views or hosting 10 events with 100+ attendees).

  • If badges are rewarded at every corner, all of them lose value and stop being effective.

• As long as your badges are tied to meaningful progress within the system, you can use them as access keys as well as rewards (eg Super Hoster badge - hosting 10 events with 100+ attendees - can give access to channels and tasks around major conference planning)

Know how to celebrate -

• A simple "high-five" type reward can be rewarded en masse to celebrate small incremental process

• Coronations should be saved to celebrate standout content with public recognition (eg Content of the Month)

  

UI and Implementation Tips -

• Make the ambassadors trophy cabinet public and clearly visible on their profile.

• Use tooltips to explain the significance of each badge. Attract extra attention to exclusive or access granting badges.

• Feature top content on a dedicated leaderboard or as pinned posts. Celebrate ambassador achievements with banners and custom graphics. Maybe host a monthly rewards night.

Involve the ambassadors in decision making and content validation to further drive trust and collective ownership. Power to the people✊.

Tier Voting -

• Higher tier ambassadors should be able to vote on key ambassador preprogramme decisions such as selecting content themes or approving community events.

• This can also be implemented by being able to reward points by reacting with emojis in various channels, with higher ranked ambassadors able to reward more points. Be careful though, this could lead to collusion. You can balance this by putting a cap on how much rewarding an ambassador can reward.

Pier review -

• Contributions should be validated by the community to ensure alignment on the quality.

• Malicious voting can be punished by slashing the peer review rewards.

UI and Implementation Tips -

• Voting interface that clearly shows the active polls, past results and indicates the weight of each vote based on the tier of the voter is crucial for transparency.

  

• Implementing a voting system using emojis or simple upvote/downvote mechanics combined with approval thresholds can automate reward distribution and visually signal the peer approved content.

Community spirit is crucial, but maintaining it across a fragmented community can be tricky🌐. If only there were an infrastructure tool to unify your community with a frictionless reward system… Anyway, ambassadors should be encouraged and rewarded for working together. Collaboration needs to be fun and exciting, not daunting or anxiety-inducing. The goal is to foster authentic relationships that radiate throughout the rest of the community

Teams Quests -

• Simple missions that require teamwork (eg content collaborations or co-hosting community events).

• The rewards also need to be meaningful to the whole group, this is particularly important when ambassadors from different tiers are working together.

Reward Delivery -

• A whole guide could be written on various reward delivery mechanisms. The secret here is to keep them varied, fun and somewhat unexpected.

• Bundled rewards are good for completing multiple related tasks or missions. The promise of a big prize at the end can help to motivate longer and more difficult jobs.

• Random rewards can act as little surprises that keep the ambassadors on their toes and potentially exploring the system to see if there are any specific triggers.

UI and Implementation Tips -

• Team Quests require dedicated UI where all members of the team can track contributions and keep each other accountable.

• Team Quests and Bundled Rewards should have clear progress indicator to maintain drive.

• Spin-the-wheel or mystery box mechanics can be used to deliver random rewards. Remember to clearly and transparently communicate the chance of receiving each of the prizes.

• Focus on rewarding impactful contributions that add value to the community. Avoid mechanics that incentivise spammy or shallow participation.

• Ensure ambassadors have a transparent path for advancement with a well-structured points and tier system. Use visual tools like progress bars to help them track their growth and understand the benefits of levelling up.

• Use streaks and decay mechanics to keep ambassadors active, but balance these carefully to prevent burnout or exploitation. Offer flexibility, like streak freezes, to accommodate real-life challenges.

• Meaningful badges and public celebrations boost morale and foster a sense of accomplishment. Make sure these rewards are rare and impactful to maintain their value.

• Incorporate community voting and peer validation to engage ambassadors in decision-making. This builds trust and gives them a sense of ownership in the programme’s success.

• Design team quests and collaborative missions that promote teamwork and camaraderie. Reward group success in ways that feel fair and meaningful to all participants.

• The success of these mechanics hinges on how they are presented. Use engaging, data-driven notifications, transparent dashboards, and celebratory visuals to make interactions feel rewarding and intuitive.