Social Media Campaign Review: The Axe Angels Club

Axe India launched in India in 1999 with Axe Deodorants.  As the largest selling male deodorant in India which has a wide range of male grooming products such as Axe Aftershave Lotions & Axe Body Wash, Axe has been making waves with its dare to be different strategy in advertising and promotion.

Axe has been helping guys get the girl since its launch in France in 1983, their award-winning, attention-grabbing ads always excel at pushing boundaries. Axe’s advertising and video games on the official Axe YouTube channel and the Axe Angels Club is a unique initiative launched by the brand.

Objective

The objective was to create one of India’s largest and most well engaged social media campaigns, which reaches out to more than a million users on a daily basis. The brand wanted to give the users, who played the AXE Inxtinct game a better and a more realistic brand experience.  With this end in mind they activated the 5 Angels from the game across Social Networks.

Execution

They started off with 5 Axe angels who would drive the audience to join the official Axe community – The Axe Angels Club. The challenge was to make the AXE Angels a part of the daily lives of thousands of users.

The club is run by the Angels who play different roles and ooze oomph without really pushing the Axe brand in your face.

• Alisha – Fashionista, Film Critic
• Sophia – The cute college chick
• Rhea – The musical rockstar!
• Simran – The hot Punjabi kudi
• Tanya – The Gym Babe
• Lydia – The corporate hottie
• Kelly – The sexy bartender
• Natalie – The bold Biker babe

Positives

Using the video medium to connect with users on a daily basis is over and above a one point interaction while playing a game or watching a TVC.

Each Angel was given a set of interests and a profession which gave a large base to power content in the community. The brand has been able to drive engagement through its initiative revolving around the Angels.  For instance the Axe Provoke page leads to some ridiculous and corny Fallen Angel videos on Youtube! &feature=relmfu">Check out a sample.

The latest videos on Axe Shower Gel are India centric and reflect the brand’s vision and identity to be the brand which makes a man immensely attractive to women.

The brand is using Fcaebook to promote its offerings, the official Axe Facebook page launched in 2010 and has more than 3.5 million fans, while more than 1.2 million users have viewed Axe’s advertising and video games on the official Axe YouTube channel.

Scope for Improvement

The question I’m asking is are people willing to spend time watching video advertisements on YouTube simply because they have good looking women drooling over a man who wear Axe?  In a time when attention span is very brief and people are looking for something new has the gorgeous women drooling over a man who smells good concept been overdone?

Will an offline initiative supplement the online campaigns and prove to be more effective?

Conclusion

Overall the Axe Angels Club has worked proactively towards building its presence on Google Plus, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. The campaign has grabbed the attention of many and is in line with Axe’s global brand image as well as the one it has sought to build in India.  While some might think the central theme has been running too long another way of looking at it is if it has worked until now then why change?

Apart from sales of the brand having increased in the Tier 1 and Tier 2 cities, it is now recognised as one of the most active Youth brands in India on the digital medium.  Having given a human face to its brand through the Axe Angels Club might have been the trick that has worked for it.