SIMAGES 2016.1 - 2015 Rising Star Award

Every year at NASAGA conferences, game designers, consultants, educators and business professionals are exposed to both classic and new strategies for enhancing learning and designing games. This year, we had the opportunity to participate in something new - sessions focused on unique ways to market ourselves and our products. These interactive sessions were offered by Cathey Armillas, Marketing Strategist and the author of the award-winning book, The Unbreakable Rules of Marketing: 9 ½ Ways to Get People to Love You.Cathey is the recipient of the 2015 Rising Star Award; given to a first time presenter who embodies the enthusiasm, engagement, and values of NASAGA. Since everything we do is marketing – whether we are in business or not, Cathey helped us learn how to be more effective at getting people’s attention and to stand out from the crowd.Cathey presented two sessions this year. Using the 9 ½ principles from her book, she explained how to use creativity and simple rules to get people to love you and your business. She says that creativity is the smallest investment with the biggest return. She encouraged us to figure out how not to be like everyone else. We need to determine how to evoke emotions, engage people and create a unique differentiator.Her second session was titled “Playing Games on Periscope: How to Create and Play Games with the World.” During the session, we quickly learned about the purpose and mechanics of the Periscope application, downloaded it, and began to design and play some simple activities. Much to our delight, we logged on with our games and within minutes we had active participants from across the United States and many other countries. We saw how easily we could use creativity and an inexpensive media platform to instantly reach an international audience.Congratulations and thank you Cathey Armillas!See Cathey share basic concepts from her book at the Accredited Speaker Association 2015.  Linda Keller is a master facilitator and designer of meetings, retreats and learning events that are participant centered, memorable and actionable. She is a long time NASAGA member. She can be reached at lindatkeller@gmail.com