Why is this work relevant for Media?

The initiative used the right media for the right target audience - Whatsapp. It has a reach of approximately 500 million in India - making it free and easy to use. It also ensured a deep penetration into rural India, where the teachers are not tech-savvy. Additionally, Whatsapp is the only platform they use on a day-to-day basis. And we converted this communication platform into a holistic digital English learning university.

Background

In India, only 1 out of 10 students in grade 5 can read a full sentence in English. Which forces around 6 million students to drop out of high school and miss out on a 38% wage premium in any job sector. The reason being, the teachers teaching them haven't learnt the right way. For over 200 years, teachers in rural India had learnt English, not in a language of their understanding. So, they were not able to teach students correctly. To make matters worse, they had no access to quality English education. Nihar Shanti Amla, has been dedicating 5% of its profits towards English education. So India's largest-selling hair oil decided to Re-teach the teachers, the correct way. We had to educate teachers in a way that would be direct, impactful, innovative. It also had to bypass all the social and economic barriers they had to learn again.

Describe the creative idea / insights (30% of vote)

We partnered with LeapForWord, an educational non-profit, to solve this. We created the first-ever mathematical formula that taught teachers English - in their Indian regional languages. Using logic and phonetics, they learnt to speak English correctly. We then implemented an entire English learning initiative on Whatsapp. Its reach of 500 million in India made it free and easy to use anytime, anywhere. This was of key importance as our target audience aren't tech-savvy. We then helped them with sentence formation and reading. Through tests, modules, and quizzes we created an entire digital university for learning.

Describe the strategy (20% of vote)

Our target audience was two-fold. One was our consumers, 25 year+ women in rural India. Their brand affinity was to our charitable causes and being part of our initiatives. The second were teachers in rural India. They had neither the means nor the reach to get access to quality English education. For this initiative, our holistic approach tackled the root of the issue. First, we taught the teachers how to speak English, the right way. We then delved into every aspect of the language. This covered reading to pronunciations and sentence formation. The call to action of the initiative was to get teachers onto our learning platforms. In this way, they re-learnt English the right way.

Describe the execution (20% of vote)

November 2019: Initial development started. June 2020: Product (beta) rolled out to 5 districts in Madhya Pradesh (Bhopal Zone) July 2020: Scaled up to the 80,000+ villages, covering 52 districts. August 2020 - Present: Product rolled out to the entire country. The project is ongoing till the present day and aims to be for the next couple of years. It was implemented on Whatsapp, which has a reach of 500 million in rural India - making it free and easy to use.

List the results (30% of vote)

Since the launch, 100k+ teachers and 600k+ students have been taught. Over 1.2m+ content files consumed, 600k+ quizzes solved, and an average of 8 hours spent per concept. Nihar Shanti Amla was awarded Best Education Project at India CSR Awards. It was recognized by the MP Govt. for its contribution to education. And it received donations of INR 10 million for its efforts to champion children’s education. Nihar Shanti Amla also saw a 6% increase in sales. We also recorded a 10% contribution to absolute volume growth markets. All summed up with a 100% achievement against business targets.