At the 2023 Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo, Cisco Systems Inc. opened a portal to the '80s. Hosted in an ancillary exhibit space, Cisco's nostalgic Space Invaders-style arcade game featured a polarized screen and gaming filters that helped participants reveal and neutralize hidden security threats. A killer curiosity quotient lured in passing attendees, and the spacey experience shined a spotlight on Cisco's solutions.

Asteroids Ahead
Cisco's nostalgic idea was born of some ultra-modern challenges, chief among them garnering attention from the show's audience of IT executives and CIOs.

“It's easy to overlook pertinent information on a show floor or get overwhelmed,” says Molly Murphy, senior event strategist at Cisco. “And as marketers, we must remember that attendees — in this case CIOs — are far more than their titles. They're humans first and executives second. We wanted to go beyond a standard video or a screen full of text to create an interactive engagement that could integrate attendees' personal interests with their professional concerns.”

Another potential meteor on Cisco's horizon was its broad range of offerings, which can create a “can't see the forest for the trees” situation. A broad spectrum of solutions can make attendees struggle to spot their unique answer among the offerings.

Thus, Cisco's first order of business was to identify attendee pain points — or what Cisco marketers call “care abouts.” Marketers sought to distinguish which tree in the Cisco forest attendees wanted to see. After reviewing audience demographics, trending information requests, show sessions, and more, Cisco determined that security threats were among CIOs' top concerns.

Next, the team turned to No Hot Ashes, a Richmond, VA, creative agency, to help craft an engaging security- centric experience that would speak to the human side of CIOs. Locking in on the demographic's age range, the agency quickly identified an '80s-style arcade game as an effective lure. Reps surmised that the nostalgia would pull in visitors like a tractor beam while the idea of eliminating threats would tie in nicely to Cisco's offerings.

Cisco opted for a two-pronged plan of attack. It would employ two booth spaces — a 20-by-20-foot stand in the show hall and an 8-by-26-foot booth just outside of the C-level executive lounge — each with a different focus.

The larger booth would offer Cisco's full forest of solutions, and the smaller, in-line experience would capture visitors at a key traffic pinch point and provide an interactive activity in line with attendees' care-about concerns and personal interests. The smaller stand would also push visitors to the larger exhibit for private meetings. Together, they'd both drive traffic, on-site meetings, and new-to-Cisco leads. And with that, the Secure the Enterprise experience was born.


Promotional Power-Ups and a Fine-Tined Design
Cisco employed subtle yet effective tactics to drive traffic to its smaller stand, including social-media posts and electronic signage in the 20-by-20-foot booth that directed visitors. The exhibit's killer location as well as its eye-catching design (devised by George P. Johnson, a Project Worldwide agency) drew a significant amount of traffic from the nearby executive lounge. Employing a minimalist approach, the booth's walls offered Cisco logos, colors, and messages, while a large, white, and seemingly blank screen took center stage. Agency designers also employed a distinctive shape — referred to as the Cisco tine — on the stand's graphics as well as on the floor-mounted game filters/controllers.

While the right side of the space offered a demo station and the left featured a kiosk displaying rotating content promoting the larger booth, Cisco educational offerings, and more, the interactive gamified experience held a couldn't-miss front-and-center position in the booth.

Neutralize Threats
As visitors neared the stand, brand ambassadors greeted and encouraged them to step into the space to try their luck in the game. To begin, visitors peered through the two tine-shaped game controllers, which were polarization filters that enabled game players — as well as passing attendees — to see otherwise invisible content on the white screen.

“By revealing the invisible, designers linked the experience to Cisco's security products,” explains Murphy. Security threats often remain hidden until it's too late. But with Cisco solutions, you can not only identify, but also neutralize these threats.

This clever company tie-in likely wasn't lost on attendees, and it surely didn't escape judges, the latter of whom noted that the polarized filter technology provided the perfect analogy. “As soon as players started the game, they got Cisco's message loud and clear,” one judge exclaimed. “Scary threats go completely undetected. But if you look at things through Cisco's filter, you can identify and destroy them with ease.”

In terms of actual game play, attendees could compete against the clock, a booth ambassador, or other attendees. As ambassadors explained the gaming experience, attendees used circular knobs and buttons on the sides of each filter tine to enter their data and register for the experience.

Once the game started, various security threats such as ransomware, drive-by downloads, privilege escalation attacks, phishing, and more appeared as labeled icons moving around on the screen. To gain points and eliminate the threats, attendees used their controllers to maneuver a Cisco logo over the threat and then pressed a button to neutralize it. They could also choose to enlist a super-blast of Breach Protection (a suite of AI-powered Cisco security solutions) once every 10 seconds to clear all threats on the screen at once.

A timer atop the screen counted down the 60-second experience, after which participants viewed a final screen. Here, text linked the virtual experience to real-world threats: “Only 15% of organizations have a 'mature' enough cybersecurity posture to tackle the risk of a hybrid world. Where do you stand?” The screen also provided each player's score, a keypad to enter player initials and input scores for the leaderboard, and a CTA and QR code to schedule a meeting.


Multiplayer Mode
One would assume that a two-player game might draw a limited audience. However, thanks to the size of the tine filters and the setup's inherent curiosity factor, the Secure the Enterprise activation drew in a fleet of onlookers.

During the game, passing attendees couldn't help but wonder why players were so engaged with what seemed like a blank white screen. But upon further inspection, they could easily catch a glimpse of the action via the oversized filters. Many peered over participants' shoulders for the duration of the games, soaking in the same messages as players.

To further engage passersby as well as those who were reluctant to play themselves, staff loaned bystanders handheld filters that let them see what was happening on the screen. In an instant, booth visitors understood the brand promise: Cisco identifies and neutralizes unseen threats. Even better, they “got it” in a glance and via an entertaining game, rather than via mundane videos or a screen full of text.
Game Over. Winner: Cisco.
Cisco's gamified traffic builder highlighted the firm's security offerings, drove home key messages, and attracted C-level VIPs. And it did so via a fun and entertaining experience that was spot on with the attendee demographic. Plus, it reinforced the importance of targeting personal interests rather than just product benefits and business objectives. But Cisco's strategy didn't just produce a boatload of warm fuzzies. It also scored hard-core results.

In addition to attracting 138 C-level participants, the strategy exceeded Cisco's key-contact engagement objectives by 8 percent. And when it came to on-site meetings, Cisco was hoping to score 15 engagements. In reality, staff met with 83 executives on site, exceeding the goal by a whopping 453 percent. What's more, the experience got such a positive response that Cisco marketers have replicated the activation at three additional events.

“The experience drew in curious visitors and even resulted in repeat visitors who wanted to improve their scores or challenge their coworkers,” Murphy says. “At its core, the engagement was a way for us to capture attention, effectively relay our message, and then extend the conversation.”

Just as the Space Invaders game captivated a generation, Cisco's nostalgic experience proved that sometimes the best way to tackle modern challenges can be by embracing a classic strategy. By taking a gamified approach to cybersecurity, Cisco not only neutralized threats, it dominated the engagement and innovation leaderboard. E