Playing to Win: How Gamification Helped Boost This Company's Sales The term may get a bad rap, but stoking employees' competitive fire helped this company dramatically increase its sales.

Conductor, a New York City-based SEO technology company, had a track record that spoke for itself: a 6,700 percent revenue increase from just over $100,000 in 2009 to more than $7 million in 2012.

The challenge for CEO Seth Besmertnik and his sales team was to sustain that incredible momentum. "They have to do it from quarter to quarter, from year to year, to grow the top line of the business," he says of his salespeople. "It's a tough job."

So Besmertnik set out to find the ever-elusive source of "continuous inspiration" to drive his team and their flagship Searchlight SEO platform to new heights.