For anyone who was unable to attend MLT Creative’s Revolutionary and Remarkable event recently, Ideas on Influence, I wanted to write a quick blog post to let you know what you missed. The event mixed business with pleasure to educate B2B marketers in a relaxed environment filled with food (from Atlanta’s Good Food Truck!), spirits, and presentations by Mark Schaefer and Ted Wright. As the event title suggested, both presentations discussed the idea of influence and looked at it from both the virtual and the face-to-face perspective. And both presentations were phenomenal.

Even though gamification is much more than badges, many people continue to think of it as just that. So in order to challenge you to think outside the box about gamification, I am going to look at it through a scientific lens to show how the concept is rooted in a distinct human trait: the desire for recognition of our achievements.

Social media has truly changed how most of us live our lives. Today, more than two-thirds of us are on the internet 15-18 minutes a day, tweeting pictures of our lunches and professing how much we love our significant others. This is because social media allows for immersion, achievement and social motivation — and so does gamification.