ING Turkey - Corporate Responsibility Campaign of the Year

Company: ING Turkey, İstanbul
Entry Submitted By: Unite Edelman
Company Description: Communication Agency
Nomination Category: Corporate Communications, Investor Relations, & Public Relations Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Communications or PR Campaign of the Year - Corporate Responsibility

Nomination Title: ING Digital Teachers Project

Specify the date on which this campaign or program was launched: October 2020

ING values digitalization not only in business processes but also in community investments. With the acceleration of digitalization, being aware of developments in technology equally, making better use of digital tools and using them to boost the quality and impact of education has become more important than ever. ING in Turkey developed Digital Teachers project believing in the value of education as a major area to drive forth digital transformation. The digitalization project with focus on teachers, allows ING to contribute to education community investments with more holistic approach.

ING in Turkey held workshop sessions with teachers to understand their needs. Teachers explained their need for professional development. The most frequently voiced issue was their desire to obtain digital skills. Teachers wanted to establish more effective communication with students. As preliminary work continued for the project, COVID-19 pandemic broke out, which further accelerated the use of technology in education through remote learning. The pandemic also revealed how correct this project was in addressing this need. Although the project preparations began much earlier than pandemic, Turkey’s shift to remote education increased the impact of our program for teachers.

Based on the insights obtained through workshop sessions, the project was designed to help teachers gain digital literacy; and contribute to our goal of equalizing digital skills of teachers from different regions of Turkey.It is projected that teachers who received our trainings would further help approximately 30,000 students obtain digital skills,which will allow them to receive education under equalcircumstances.

Objectives of the project were: 1) Help teachers gain digital literacy thus equalizing digital skills, contributing to country’s digital transformation 2) Increase awareness about digital literacy through communication. Success criteria for launch were: 1) Receive at least 3,000 applications to the project 2) Creating visibility media to raise awareness (Reach 100 million through conventional & 7 million people through digital communications). In line with the goals of the project, our target audience consisted of 2 groups as teachers eligible to apply and mass target audience.

A comprehensive period, approximately 1 year was utilized to design the program with stakeholders Habitat Association and Middle East Technical University. The project was designed and developed based on flipped learning mode. A learning management system was utilized to manage and delivery of educational content. Educational content was created by academicians. Criteria and application process for candidates were maximized to reach right target audience covering all around Turkey.

A holistic communications plan was designed to reach target audience. Digital communication channels were effectively utilized alongside traditional media channels. The power of social media influencers and endorsers was also leveraged in order to increase the reputation of the project and to reach mass audiences. Furthermore, teacher “influencers” on social media were used in order to reach eligiblecandidate teachers.Communication channels held by various stakeholders were also utilized to benefit from their audiences. During the project, teachers who attended the program also benefited to create organic conversation in social mediaand traditional media.

ING in Turkey implemented project with Habitat Association and Middle East Technical University. Project was designed in 2 phases to educate 1000 teachers in each term. First phase consisted 10 weeks of live sessions and interactive asynchronous courses for 1000 teachers including digital citizenship and security, critical thinking, creativity and visual design lessons. In the second phase, 100 selected teachers given advanced training about VR application in education, they developed VR projects for their students. First term of the project was completed and second term already started, thus 2000 teachers were reached until now. The project will also continue with new terms. 5,217 and 6,703 teachers applied for the first and second term respectively.

In 360 degree communication, traditional media targeted to increase its reputation; digital media was utilized with tailor-made content. Project was launched with press conference including TV interviews. In conventional media, we received 163 news coverage, 8 million net effect, 171 million reach. In addition to launch digital video, influencers and celebrities issued calls.Digital media results were 9.8 million reach, 1.4 million video view, 45,000 views in application website. 3 seminars were given by academicians, in which teachers generated organic social media conversation with 564 posts.

We publishedemotional video on Teachers’ Day, November 24 to celebrate and highlight importance of remote learning during pandemic,receiving 790thousandview,2.5 million reach. Second term announcement press release received 132 news coverage,63 million reach,2 million net effect.

The project was successfully implemented in terms of two distinct perspectives. First, evaluating the effectiveness of the program, the teachers who attended the trainings reported that they already started to use their learnings and digital skills in their lessons and this helps them to increase the effectiveness of education for their students. 87% completion rate of the first term also proves the interest of the teachers and the efficiency of the program. After the training was completed, the participants were surveyed about the program. Accordingly, 95% of the participants stated that the course contents were sufficient and very sufficient. Approximately 86% of participants gave information about the adequacy of courses. As the attendees were happy about the program, they also informed their colleagues about the project through word-of- mouth, resulting in that the second term of the project got higher application numbers than the first one.

Second, the communication execution of the project launch and post-launch increased awareness about the importance of digital literacy in education and Digital Teachers project itself. This also enabled the project’s news to spread organically both in social and traditional media. Teachers who attended the program continuously share posts on social media about their experience and how they apply their learnings in their own classes. A media publication also got in contact with a teacher from the project to tell and publish his story as “digital teacher”. The trainer academicians also got attention of the media to tell about the success of the project.