COVERT RECRUITER - FRENCH ARMY HUMAN RESOURCES DIRECTORATE
CYBER RECRUITMENT

Bronze

Title of Entry:	COVERT RECRUITER
Brand:	FRENCH ARMY HUMAN RESOURCES DIRECTORATE
Product/Service:	CYBER RECRUITMENT
Client:	FRENCH ARMY HUMAN RESOURCES DIRECTORATE
Entrant Company:	DENTSU CREATIVE France
Entrant Company Country:	France
Creative Team:	CCO : Sebastien Zanini CEO : Nathael Duboc Copywriter : Yann Vicherat Digital Creative Lead : Gregory Sujkowski Art Director : Emilie Basset Copy writer : Marc Sinegre Art Director : Rudy Bamberg Senior strategic planner : Frederic Cally Head of digital : Florian Vindel Lead developer : Benjamin Fouché Deputy Managing Director : Amelie Ozouf Account Director : Marlene Cherel Group Account Director : Marion Chassagnard Head of Social Media Insight : Bruno Laporte Social media manager : Tom Ilan Lamy
Submission Text:	The French Army Human Resources Directorate faced a measurable recruitment challenge: attract more highly specialized cyber talent in a market where these profiles are rare, heavily solicited and often resistant to conventional recruitment advertising. The objective was not simply to raise awareness of cyber careers. The campaign needed to reach the right audience, engage them deeply enough to reveal their potential, and help convert that engagement into real recruitment impact. Covert Recruiter was built on a simple effectiveness principle: the best way to identify cyber talent was not to ask them to declare their interest, but to give them a challenge that would make them reveal it. A hidden anomaly inside the official French Army recruitment ecosystem introduced Louis Warcell, a fictional hacker who appeared to disrupt the campaign. Curious participants were pulled into a digital investigation unfolding across TikTok, Reddit, GitHub, YouTube, Discord, Google Maps, What3words, Gallica and other digital environments. The experience was designed as a qualification journey. To progress, participants had to demonstrate the exact behaviors the Army needed to identify: curiosity, persistence, logic, investigation skills, cyber culture and collaborative problem-solving. The deeper they went into the ARG, the more they revealed their relevance as potential cyber recruits. This approach transformed attention into active participation. More than 580 participants entered the experience. The community generated over 21,500 interactions on Discord, where players shared theories, decoded clues, compared evidence and advanced together. Among participants, 96% matched the target profile, showing that the campaign did not simply attract volume, but reached the audience the client needed most. The full experience also identified 25 finishers, a smaller group of highly committed participants who completed the journey. The operation also changed the role of content in recruitment. Covert Recruiter was launched as a three-week always-on live operation, with more than 350 assets created, most of them in near real time, to maintain the investigation, react to player progression and keep the community immersed. But the experience was not designed to disappear after the live phase. The ARG remains accessible today, allowing anyone to enter the investigation, explore the clues and attempt to solve the challenges. This turned Covert Recruiter from a short-term campaign into a persistent recruitment asset: a live operation that generated immediate impact, and an ongoing experience that can continue to engage cyber-curious audiences after launch. Most importantly, the campaign delivered against the client’s core business objective. Cyber recruits doubled versus 2024. Covert Recruiter proved that the French Army could recruit hard-to-reach cyber talent by replacing conventional messaging with an experience that allowed the right people to self-select, engage and demonstrate their skills before entering the recruitment process. The campaign also delivered broader engagement and visibility for the recruitment ecosystem, reaching over 15 million people and creating a high-intensity community around a specialized military career path. A second season is now in preparation for late 2026, confirming that the campaign was not only effective as a one-off activation, but has opened a new recruitment model for the French Army. Covert Recruiter turned the hardest part of cyber recruitment — finding the right people — into the creative idea itself. And by doing so, it delivered measurable recruitment impact: more recruits, more qualified engagement, and a lasting asset for future talent attraction.
Other Credits:	Client Head of the Marketing Department : Lieutenant Colonel Mathieu Brulais Head of the Production Section : Captain Léo Dell’Aglio Head of the Distribution and Ambassador Programmes Section : Major Céline Brunetaud Deputy Head of the Distribution and Public Relations Section : Second Lieutenant Valentin Mercier