Is he hot? That’s what women who aren’t usually fans want to know about a superhero before seeing the film: the yummier he is, the more likely they are to show up at the cinema. Women flocked to see “Thor”, starring super-handsome Chris Hemsworth. But not because they loved superhero movies. They loved Chris.

Benedict Cumberbatch, star of Doctor Strange, is strangely attractive to women. Although not the stereotypical muscle-man, Benedict exerts a powerful pull by being charming and striking. His 5.6 million Facebook fans (regrettably named “Cumberbitches”), including 150,000 German fans, agree.

(By the way: Cumberbatch said he wishes his fans would “come up with a more empowering name”. So we’re calling them “Cumberlovers”.)

Since relying on the usual fans of superhero movies is not enough to hit the target of 1.3 million cinema tickets, we needed to unlock the power of the German Cumberlovers to meet the challenge.

First, we found them on Amazon, where we targeted German customers (and their lookalikes) who bought Cumberbatch’s Sherlock series on DVD or watched it on Prime with a Doctor Strange trailer that had Cumberbatch in EVERY shot (full screen 45% of the time)

Then, we went further, bringing the Cumberlovers to us.

Fans of actors adore gossip about them, so we knew they’d be curious to know why their hero was switching film genres. Doctor Strange was his first super-hero movie.

We placed articles about Cumberbatch displaying his role in Doctor Strange and that with his quirky allure, he would deliver a swoon-worthy movie experience whether you were a Marvel fan or not.

Call to action display ads were placed next to the articles, leading interested users to the trailer and pre-order tickets. After that, we re-targeted Cumberlovers and their lookalikes with the customized message of a Cumberbatch-only trailer.

1.45 million people came to see Doctor Strange, which is 12% more than the objective.

47% of tickets sold to Doctor Strange were bought by women. That is 34% higher than the average super-hero film – in other words: the highest for ANY superhero movie in Germany!

And by the way: Doctor Strange was almost as successful as Inferno but with a 40% lower cost per admission! This proves that a smaller budget is not a disadvantage with smart allocation, data-driven insights and the right targeting:

Exceeding admission goals was solely achieved by activating the Cumberlovers - unlocking this new potential was a win for our strategy and the movie.