Technique · Hooked
Fit the reward to why people come
Before designing rewards, interview at least five customers about what they find enjoyable, encouraging or satisfying, and match the reward to the reason they came: social, material or mastery. Then check how often each reward lands and whether users notice it.
Plain label: reward that matches the motivationAlso known as: reward fit, delight interviews, reward currency, reward frequency, reward salience, Mahalo vs Quora
How it works
Rewards work only when they ease the itch that brought the user, in a currency the user values, often and visibly enough to register. A question-and-answer site that paid small, rare cash lost to one that gave frequent, visible votes, because contributors wanted recognition rather than wages.
What the research says
The cash-bounty answers site, launched in 2007, peaked at 14.1M monthly visitors, then interest faded (book account, undated peak).
Hooked Ch.4 (Mahalo)
How to build it
- Web
- In a contributor community, test recognition (votes, helpful marks) before any money.
- B2B
- If buyers come for certainty, the reward is a clear, correct answer, not a badge.
- Mobile
- Ask five users what made a session satisfying and tag the answers social, material or mastery.
What can go wrong
- Copying another product's reward type.
- Rewards so rare that users never connect them to the behavior.
Pairs well with
- Pay in recognition, not small cash.
- Then add variety across reward types.
In practice
Where it shows up
Limits
What we don’t claim
- The Hook Model is a practical design tool, not a validated or complete theory of behavior.Hooked, Introduction
Sources
Hooked · Nir Eyal
Ch.4
Source IDs: HK-RWD27HK-MEA10HK-RWD29HK-T18
Book content is paraphrased, never quoted at length. Last verified October 24, 2026.
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