1) Bell Bajao – How Breakthrough Rang the Bell via the Internet

2) Social Publishing Strategy at Pratham Books – Pratham Books

3) WWF -Getting India to switch off their lights for Earth Hour

4) Dr. Mani Children Heart Foundation – the Heart Kids Tweetathon – and How Twitter Helps Save Lives

As I was going through the case studies from IndiaSocial Case Challenge, I realized that there is no formula for social media strategy. The level of engagement and the apertures are decided by the nature of the product in consideration and the stakeholders. For instance, we received quite a few entries from the not-for-profit organizations and it is intriguing to see how each one of them has a very different approach and strategy despite falling under the same category. They have a very different set of stakeholders each, and the aperture used to engage them differs accordingly. It is imperative and critical to understand the need and the objective first. Here is a quick recap of the case studies submitted in the voices of the brands who shared them.

The first person in the following case studies has been retained.

Not-for-profit organisations:

Bell Bajao – How Breakthrough Rang the Bell via the Internet

The Bell Bajao blog focused on making a platform for user generated content. Bell Bajao is a campaign which centres around enabling women and speaking against domestic violence. The online activities hence carried on by the Bell Bajao team are interactive, responsive and attentive of what others are saying. The campaign does not merely use the online space to showcase its work but sees it as a place to share, connect learn and reach out. There was no such space in the Indian context where people could talk about domestic violence, where people could share and learn and reach out etc. We never used the site as a static information tool. It is a space to share, learn, communicate, collaborate and act.
We realized that the radio and TV ads were for a limited period of time, so we needed a space which could keep the campaign alive, so the interactive online space.

Stakeholders: Youth present on the internet, which are capable of bringing a change in their respective homes and neighborhood. We wanted to appeal to the youth by breaking out of the traditional image of an NGO and use latest cutting edge technology to spread the message.
On the website, we had a downloadable tool kit, which had information on how net users can become virtual rights advocate (an online version of our training program), hosted contests, polls etc.

Apertures used: Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

Social Publishing Strategy at Pratham Books – Pratham Books

Objective of the campaign is to “Democratize the joy of reading”
The reason to do this is because we cannot put a book in every child’s hand alone – we needed help to locate, distribute and co-create content.
We followed a very unstructured approach to our social media efforts. It really did begin as an internal experiment to document the work we do and highlight work that others do in the same space.

Stakeholders: When we began, stakeholders were all internal. Now that we have a community being built, we are always listening as to how we can improve. We hope, it has been received well and even enthusiastically.

Apertures used:

• Blog: A resource which talks about publishing, reading, literacy, kidlit, learning, non-profits, events and more.
• Twitter: A space where we can engage with the community, share ideas, ask for help, get feedback, listen to complaints, participate and mobilize people to help us with our vision of ‘a book in every child’s hand’.
• Scribd: Uploading our books frequently so that they can be read by more people. Also, for our Creative Commons licensed books to be remixed/repurposed by the community in whatever way they wish to.
• Facebook: Updating information from the blog and information about the events we do and communicating with the community.
• Flickr: Documentation of the work we do and also to upload our Creative Commons licensed illustrations so that they can be remixed/reused.
• YouTube: Documentation of our work and to inform people about some of the initiatives we are participating in. Also to inform people about our books through book trailers.

Initiative included –

• Skype reading sessions
• Inviting people to remix/repurpose our content
• More access to our books
• Audio books for the National Association of Blind
• Passing it on – the book edition

WWF -Getting India to switch off their lights for Earth Hour

Earth Hour is a global awareness programme by WWF to create awareness on climate change and fight global warming. People participating in the Earth Hour voluntarily choose to switch off their lights of their homes and offices for one hour to make their stand against climate change. For the first time in 2009, WWF India took the initiative to bring this campaign to India.

Stakeholders: General public who were online

Apertures used: An interactive and informative Earth Hour India site was created asking people to register themselves. Social media channels on Facebook Cause, Orkut Community, Twitter , YouTube, and Flickr photostream were created and these were used to engage with people and direct them to the site.

Within 18 days, the Earth Hour site got 1,23,704 visitors; 28,484 people registered on the website to participate in the Earth Hour event; the Earth Hour Facebook Cause got 19,059 members; the Orkut Community got 4,547 members; the Flickr photostream received 1,700 views; the Twitter channel got followed by 321 followers. Earth Hour 2009 was a huge success and the programme is on its way to another successful year in India now.

Dr. Mani Children Heart Foundation – the Heart Kids Tweetathon – and How Twitter Helps Save Lives
In an innovative use of social networking site Twitter, Indian heart surgeon Dr.Mani Sivasubramanian does an annual event to raise awareness and funds for children born with congenital heart defects – by staying awake for 24 hours non-stop in a day-and-night Twitter marathon – the Heart Kids Tweet-a-thon.

Stakeholders: A large network of small business owners, entrepreneurs, social workers and generous, caring donors

Apertures used: Heart Kids Blogathon, 47 Hearts Group, You Tube videos, Twitter, Facebook

One of  the great analysis around the IndiaSocial Case Challenge has been undertaken by Anand Pillai, a  Phd scholar (Marketing) with MDI for the Telecom Circle.

Anandan undertook an analysis of  the similarities and dissimilarities in the social media strategy adopted by the long term winners of the IndiaSocial Case Challenge . In a very comprehensive manner, he has analyzed their social media strategy based on the criteria of – platform selection, stakeholders targeted, activities undergone and the impact measurement.

H ere are some of the overall learnings shared in the post -

Depth and not the breadth of social media platform that matters.

Firms should be prepared to face the negative discussions on social media

Synchronization between the product category and social media platform is very essential

Identifying the presence of right target audience on right social media platform is the key.

Conducting appropriate activities and measuring their impact in the most suitable manner is what matters at the end of the day.

These are the parameters taken into consideration -

Source : Telecom Circle

To read the full post, go here – http://www.telecomcircle.com/2010/04/social-media-success-dawning-in

Source : Telecom Circle

To read the full post, go here – http://www.telecomcircle.com/2010/04/social-media-success-dawning-in-india/

-india/

There were no cash rewards, no award ceremonies, no festivals… just pure rigour. From the submission form (not for the faint-hearted), to the  judging process that our esteemed panel of judges adopted, it has been about recognising the best social media work in India. We received a total of 37  submissions  of  social media work in India, of which 3 winners each under, Long-term initiatives and Short-term project categories have been selected.

There are several ‘non-winning’ entries that missed by a small margin; the quality of insights and work on these and many other was fantastic and we’d be sharing many of these with you over the next few days and weeks.

Here are the winners!

Long-term Initiatives

Position # 1

Pratham Books – Social Publishing Strategy at Pratham Books (Score – 8.1 : 10)

We’d like to think that we spread the love, so to speak, but realistically, we’re going to have to build a platform sometime soon to engage our community to co-create and do so much more to contribute to the cause of a book in every child’s hands…

Read case-study here.

Position # 2

Fastrack  – Fastrack Fans (Score 7.6 : 10)*

Our initiative is focused around the experience we deliver to the fans and both current and potential, driving them toward a better, and more personalized connection with the brand…

* One of the juges abstained citing conflict of interest.

Read case-study here.

Position # 3

Cleartrip Travel Services Pvt. Ltd. – How the Cleartrip brand travels through social media (Score 7.3 : 10)

Cleartrip has upheld integrity and transparency as foundational values of our brand. Embracing these values has made it incredibly easy for the brand and the organization to have an active social media presence…

Read the case-study here.

Short-term Projects

Position #1

Hindustan Motors – Mitsubishi Cedia – The Great Driving Challenge (Score 7.0 : 10)

Consumer research reiterated that a loyal Cedia owner loved to get behind its wheels and just drive. So when it was time to launch the new Mitsubishi Cedia sports, HML wanted to reach out to their target audience and engage the travel fanatics in conversations around “a long drive”

Read the case-study here.

Position #2

Dr.Mani Children Heart Foundation – The Heart Kids Tweetathon – And How Twitter Helps Save Lives (Score – 6.5 : 10)

…even in the midst of a deep recession, the 2010 event held on February 14th, brought in close to $5,000. As the Foundation’s cost to sponsor a child’s operation is around $1,250 the Tweetathon alone will be responsible for healing more than 10 little hearts!

Read case-study here.

Position #3

WWF – Getting India to switch off their lights for Earth Hour (Score 6.3 : 10)

Earth Hour is a global awareness programme by WWF to create awareness on climate change and fight global warming. People participating in the Earth Hour voluntarily choose to switch off their lights of their homes and offices for one hour to make their stand against climate change.

Read the case-study here.

Final Shortlist

The entries that made it to the final phase in the case challenge were –

Long Term Initiative	Short Term Project
Fastrack	Channel V – Using Twitter to create buzz around the relaunch of Channel [V] in August 2009
Hard Rock Café	Hindustan Motors – Mitsubishi Cedia – The Great Driving Challenge – India’s Most Succesful Social Media Campaign.
MTV – NO. 1 Social Brand in India	UBL – Kingfisher Beer
MTV – Best use of Social media: Sony Ericsson MTV Roadies Battleground	Dr.Mani Children Heart Foundation
Pratham Books	KPIT Cummins Infosystems Ltd – WidUS (Widget designing for University Students)
Breakthrough	WWF India – Getting India to switch off their lights for Earth Hour.
8 Day Academy
Celebrity – Priyanka Chopra
BLANK NOISE
BookMyShow
Tata Docomo
Nokia Email With Ease Campaign
Nokia “Search for N”
NASSCOM
Goanet
Cleartrip Travel Services Pvt. Ltd.

Evaluation Process

• Step 1 – All judges evaluated each entry and categorised them as ‘Keep’ or ‘Drop’
• Step 2 – For any entry which had votes between 2, 3, 4 or 5 ‘Keep’ votes, the judges who had voted for ‘keep’ stated, briefly, why they had voted so
  • If there were 5 votes out of 6, against a case, it was dropped
  • If there were 5 votes out of 6, for a case, it was promoted to Phase 3
  • Only the ones with 2, 3, 4 or keep 5 votes were voted upon again by all
  • A simple majority again decided who got promoted to Step 3

• Step 3 -  All the finalists got another detailed viewing by the judges, who then rated the case studies on a scale of 1-10
• Step 4 – Scores as given by all judges (if a judge was associated with a programme, he/ she would abstain and no scores would be granted), was averaged by the total number of judges who voted and winners selected

The evaluation process ensured that all the judges on the panel reviewed each case study and also evaluated over several phases.

Since the judges did not have access to one another’s scores prior to submission of their own scores, their own evaluation was independent and totally unbiased.

Judges Speak

The final results were arrived after a rigorous evaluation process by the panel. Here is what some of our judges had to say on the case challenge –

When it comes to effective social media usage, we often hear only about success stories in the US. There are wonderful, innovative usage in Indian companies and the IndiaSocial case study challenge has unearthed many such gems by crowdsourcing” – Kiruba Shankar, CEO, Business Blogging

I hope this encourages social media marketers and agencies to craft strategies that are realistic, achievable, innovative and sustainable, those which effectively engage the community and deliver a delight” – Dina Mehta, Co-Founder & Head of Research, Mosoci

On behalf of allof us at IndiaSocial, I’d like to thank all our judges for putting in their time, effort and rigour to identify the best social media case studies in India. We’d also like to thank impact weekly and exchange4media.com, our partners for the initiative, for their generous support like always

Infact, pick up a copy of impact magazine’s latest issue (on stands tomorrow) which features all winners of the IndiaSocial Case Challenge – 1. Do share your thoughts and comments – it’s an Open invitation.

Cheers

IndiaSocial Case Challenge – edition 1

Category: Long-term Initiatives

Winner of Position #1

Title : Social Publishing Strategy at Pratham Books

Share a little about your organisation

Pratham Books was set up in 2004 as a response to a large need gap in India for good quality and affordable content for children.
There are a number of NGOs who are working with children in India to improve basic literacy skills of reading, writing and mathematics. As more and more children became readers, there was a need for good content and there were few publishing sources that were willing to supply this content at affordable costs and in multiple Indian languages. Pratham Books was established as a not-for-profit Public Charitable Trust to enable children whom the market ordinarily would not reach, and therefore to democratize the joy of reading. Pratham Books’ mission is “to see a book in every child’s hand”.

Executive Summary

In it’s simplest, what we seek to do is create a social publishing strategy for Pratham Books. We began with content and context in the form of our published content and the cause which we used to initiate a conversation around the subject of reading and children. Over time, we have been able to establish some sort of authority, as it may be, in this space and with time, we hope to build trust within the little community we curate. And this, over time, translates to engagement and loyalty. Have we been successful? It’s too soon to tell but we’d like to think we’ll get there because we have an awesome community. We’d like to think that we spread the love, so to speak, but realistically, we’re going to have to build a platform sometime soon to engage our community to co-create and do so much more to contribute to the cause of a book in every child’s hand.

Background

The background to this was to find a way to share our work, internally at first, and then externally. The need was to document and discuss internal and external strategies and later on, to create a community around the cause. The reason to do this is because we cannot put a book in every child’s hand alone – we needed help to locate, distribute and co-create content.

Approach/ Strategy

Please share details about the initiative stating clearly the strategy, objectives, goals, the duration, resources and budgets allocated.

We followed a very unstructured approach to our social media efforts. It really did begin as an internal experiment to document the work we do and highlight work that others do in the same space. It’s been far more successful than we imagined it would ever be.

The initiative had its roots in an internal need to highlight work done within the organization and work being done in this space externally. It has not been driven by a strategy or any clearly defined goals and objectives. However, we now have these in place.

The strategy is simple – it’s to be a clear, authentic and community voice for reading as a social good.

The objective is to catalyse the creation of content for children’s reading and to find and fill gaps in the current market structure.

The goal is ultimately to put a book in every child’s hand.

The duration is open ended – we’ll be doing this as long as we exist.

The resources and budgets are not formal – we all contribute to the efforts internally and we have one person who anchors this effort both internally and externally.

The technology resources are all free and as below:

• Blog: A resource which talks about publishing, reading, literacy, kidlit, learning, non-profits, events and more.
• Twitter: A space where we can engage with the community, share ideas, ask for help, get feedback, listen to complaints, participate and mobilize people to help us with our vision of ‘a book in every child’s hand’.
• Scribd: Uploading our books frequently so that they can be read by more people. Also, for our Creative Commons licensed books to be remixed/repurposed by the community in whatever way they wish to.
• Facebook: Updating information from the blog and infromation about the events we do and communicating with the community
• Flickr: Documentation of the work we do and also to upload our Creative Commons licensed illustrations so that they can be remixed/reused.
• YouTube: Documentation of our work and to inform people about some of the initiatives we are participating in. Also to inform people about our books through book trailers.

Stakeholders

Which stakeholders did you engage through this initiative and how? How was/ has this initiative been received by them so far?

The stakeholders, when we began, were all internal. Now that we have a community being built, we are always listening as to how we can improve. It has, we hope, been received well and even enthusiastically.

About the initiative

Share details about your activities, touch-points that you created/ channels you used to reach the stakeholders.

• Skype reading sessions: This project started after a few tweets were exchanged between a librarian from Central Manor, Pennsylvania. We started off by people from our organization having Skype reading sessions with a few children and then moved onto having sessions with entire classes. On 20th March, 2009, we managed to hold a Skype storytelling session between kids from Akshara Foundation’s community library and a class from Central Manor.The purpose is to go beyond being just a publisher. Through these activities we are encouraging reading, learning and connecting children from different communities and backgrounds. Channels used: Twitter, Skype, Blog
• Inviting people to remix/repurpose our content: As a publisher, we have a lot of content available which we want people to access as easily as possible. In our attempt to do so, we have managed to license some of our books under Creative Commons licenses. Now, if we can’t publish a book in Assamese, but a teacher in Assam wants to do so, she doesn’t have to worry about copyright infringement. We have also put up some of the illustrations of our books so that people can remix or repurpose them. Channels used : Scribd, Blog, Flickr
• Facilitators/connecting organisations and people: @Anorakmagazine found us on Twitter and asked if they could send us some back issues of their magazines to share with kids in India. Once the books arrived, they were sent to the community libraries run by Akshara Foundation. We also helped coordinate a drawing project that Anorak Magazine wanted to involve the children with. Now, some of the kids have their work published in an international children’s magazine.Channels used: Twitter
• More access to our books : We frequently upload several of our books on Scribd so that they can be read and downloaded by people. Channels used : Scribd
• Audio books for the National Association of Blind : This project started off because of another blog post (on the Helen Keller Talking Library project) that got automatically updated to our Twitter account. @owos then messaged us to tell us about a similar intiative Radio Mirchi had started. Then another tweep (@barkhad) told us that she had registered with Radio Mirchi but they didn’t get back to her. So, we got in touch with Radio Mirchi to talk about a blog post and while we were talking, she asked if we would be interested in having our books recorded by Radio Mirchi for the National Association of the Blind. We also requested if @barkhad could record one of our books and they agreed. So, our Twitter friend went offline and recorded a book in their Delhi studio! Channels used: Blog, Twitter
• Passing it on – the book edition: We read about about a bunch of kids in Kolkata who went around with a van full of books to reach kids who didn’t have access to books and even went on to teach the kids how to read. After reading about this initiative, one of our trustees volunteered to sponsor some Bengali books if we could find these kids. We mailed the news bureau which published the article, but were unable to get a response. So, we decided to see if the Twitter community could help us. Within half an hour of sending out a tweet, we had a volunteer who said he would get us the information and by the next day we had an address and contact number. Within a few days, Bengali books were sent by us to these kids.From this story, we decided to start an initiative which would allow our online community to participate…to help these kids as well as other kids. Channels used: Twitter, Blog, Facebook
• Participatory community – Through our social media efforts, more people are aware of our work and several authors, illustrators and translators have offered to work with us.Channels used: Blog, Twitter, Facebook

Impact – Outcome

We measure our impact solely by points of serendipity catalysed.

• Skype Reading Sessions : Increased interest in reading. The Skype session held in the community library was even attended by some of the parents and they were very excited that their kids could chat with children in another continent. The project continues to evolve as we are now looking forward to more Skype sessions between the kids, creating learning projects which encourage creative thinking and writing amongst the children at an Akshara library and a group of children at Central Manor
• Inviting People to Remix/ Repurpose Our Content : It has taken some time for people to start experimenting with our content, but we are getting more queries about how people can help us translate/review books/create more content, etc.Microsoft approached us to repurpose our content into a DVD format. The project is currently being tested with two NGOs (Nanubhai Education Foundation and Akshara Foundation). OLPC (One Laptop per Child) has used our content in Nepal. An advertising agency in Brazil wanted to use one of our photographs and we’ve had another enquiry about using our photographs on a website. We’ve also seen a creative interpretation of our illustrations and our illustrations were also used by an organization as part of a fun activity of creating stories from the images
• Facilitators/ Connecting Organizations and People : We are trying to see if there are more activities that can involve children and Anorak Magazine. Anorak Magazine also wants to send more books to be reviewed by the kids which can then be kept in their library…thus adding to the reading culture we want to build
• More Access to Our Books : Measure impact through the number of reads and downloads registered for each book
• Audio Books for National Association of the Blind : Radio Mirchi has finished recording some of our CC books and have now offered to record more of our books (in multiple languages) for National Association of the Blind
• Passing it On – The Book Edition : The initiative is in its initial stages and we are still getting opinions from people, but as we gather more infromation about people who have books and people who need books, we are slowly and steadily building a useful resource which will ensure that books reach more kids.

Learnings

What were the key learnings? Positive and things to do better; share any challenges you might have faced.

One of the key learnings is that one must be patient, authentic and transparent to see the results of social media. It takes time for people to listen, trust and engage with your cause. but once you manage to gain their trust, they are willing to be your spokesperson, recommend you to other people, help with initiatives you start, etc. One has to be frequent with their communication and reply to positive as well as negative comments. Transparency is key and people will always appreciate it.

What Next

Where is the programme/ initiative now? Where will it go from here?
We’ll keep at it – do more, attempt greater transparency and create more touch points. We’re also building a social publishing platform and hope to create more content to put a book in every child’s hand.

Reasoning

What in your opinion makes your programme/ initiative/ activity a case-study/ best practice case.

It’s not so much a case study in social media as a case study in karma – the more you give the more you get. Sharing really is what differentiates us from other publishers.

Credits – Strategy

The awesome community we have, the writings of Gaurav Mishra, and Gautam John (from Pratham Books)

Credits – Execution
Manisha Chaudhry, Mala Kumar, Sandhya Taksale, Purvi Shah, Gautam John and Maya Hemant

Testimonials

• http://www.boingboing.net
• Beth Kanter (slideshare deck)
• http://globalvoicesonline.org
• http://beth.typepad.com
• http://www.desipundit.com
• http://beth.typepad.com/beths_blog/2010/02/social-media-and-the-bottom-of-the-pyramid.html

Factsheet

Name of the company: Pratham Books

Number of Employees: 11-50

Category: Not-for-profit institution

Case submitted by: Maya Hemant

Website: http://www.prathambooks.org