Everything had to be executed simultaneously to create this epic moment. We also needed guys to believe it was for real - that they could really be going into space. To drive participation, all TV ads, across all channels, were Shazam-able for the first time ever. This was only made possible because Shazam were so excited about our launch moment that an exception was made to their exclusivity deal with Britain’s largest commercial TV channel, ITV. Viewers could just Shazam the ad to go straight to the competition entry page. In digital media, including YouTube, Facebook, and more, potential astronauts could simply click the ad to enter. We also geo-fenced cinemas and large OOH screens. This meant huge numbers of opted-in mobile users, when seeing our cinema and OOH ads, would receive a text at the launch moment including the launch video and a link to enter the competition.

We reached over half the UK population and 85% of our target audience on launch night. Over 10,000 people Shazam’d.

Axe globally opened the competition on the same day; 3 weeks later, the UK and Ireland represented more than a third of entries, massively over-delivering considering our comparatively small populations. The highest proportion of the population entering in the world. The hero product sales were 19% higher year on year.

We have 86,298 entrants and counting. We’ve seen mass participation with the Lynx Space Academy cadets receiving 675,458 votes online to go through to the next stage of competition!