5G Face was a media-first idea. With a strong understanding of audience behaviors, both on-platform as well as through the consumer journey, we were able to create a cutting-edge media and creative execution that drove brand lift and business results.

We started with a well-loved media tactic, coupled it with a familiar creative trope, and supercharged them both to push the limits of Snapchat’s AR capabilities. For 5G Face, the medium truly was the message.

The holidays are a critical sales period for Verizon. This year was especially important as the holiday season kicked off on the heels of our 5G Nationwide announcement.

From the day we took our 5G network nationwide, we produced a steady drumbeat of content that showed off the functional use cases of 5G. But we hadn’t shown people the emotional benefits. And unless you’ve tried 5G yourself, it’s tough to get a sense of how groundbreaking it really is.

We needed to get people to upgrade to a 5G phone.

But how could we convince people to gift this brand-new technology to their loved ones when they didn’t know a ton about it and had probably never experienced it for themselves?

In a “normal” year, figuring out the right gift to give can be a struggle. 48% of Americans feel pressure to give the best gift possible, and 46% say that figuring out the right gift to give causes them anxiety. And no matter how much you think you’re going to deliver, there’s always the fear of missing the mark.

Exactly how much someone loves (or, *gasps* doesn’t love) a gift is written on all 42 muscles of their face the moment they receive it. So we created a way for people to show precisely how they would react the moment they received a 5G-powered gift before they ever got one.

5G Face—the first Snapchat Lens to manipulate all 42 facial muscles—gave people a fun taste of what it feels like to use 5G gifts on the world’s fastest 5G network.

Unlike other platforms that have this capability, Snapchat built its community around the playfulness of AR augmenting your face. Lenses are the most-used functionality on Snapchat.

5G Face launched with a custom one-day sponsored Lens. We targeted adults 18+ in the United States to ensure that we were reaching people who had the ability and interest to buy a 5G gift.

Because Snapchat only allows one sponsored national Lens per day, we knew that timing was critical. We needed to capture attention in an already cluttered and stressful holiday shopping season.

Based on prior-years’ shopping data, we chose a date in late December when we knew that search volume for tech devices would be at its peak.

5G Face was a high-impact tactic designed to draw consumers into the digital funnel, where we could then retarget consumers both on-and off-platform to drive purchase.

We created the first Snapchat Lens to manipulate all 42 facial muscles. We let users try out different 5G emotions with a slider, and choose the 5G face that suited them best.

Snapchat has had lenses that manipulate your face, but none quite like this. We worked with partners at Snap to push the limits of their facial recognition technology in ways that hadn’t been done before--giving users a one-of-a-kind experience and the ability to see and share their 5G Face.

We released it for one day only.

Only on one platform.

And only one Lens.

We expected a few people would try it. We were off by a few million.

In a single day, our Lens garnered over 44.5 million impressions—that’s 52% of all daily active Snapchat users in the United States. People spent 63% longer with 5G Face than average for branded Lenses. More than a million people shared their 5G Face. And the Lens contributed to over 300,000 5G device sales during the week it was live.