In Kenya, a partnership between the non-profit organization Text to Change and the telecommunications company Zain used SMS mobile quizzes to keep Zain’s employees up-to-date on the latest HIV/AIDS information.
For four weeks in November and December of 2009, Zain’s Kenyan employees were part of a pilot program for SMS mobile quizzes. Employees received three multiple choice questions each week that focused on different aspects of HIV/AIDS such as prevention and treatment. The quizzes also directed participants to testing centers in order to learn their HIV/AIDS status. Says Bas Hoefman, co-founder and managing director of Text to Change, the choice to partner their mobile program with a telecommunications company was logical: “We thought, ‘why isn’t Zain using its own products – mobile telephony and SMS – to educate its own employees?’ Use your own product for your own employees.”
Zain covered the cost of the SMS quizzes and the employees’ responses, as well as sponsoring prizes (such as additional airtime, mobiles, or health club memberships) for employees who answered questions correctly. Hoefman estimated that the total cost of the SMS mobile quiz program was between $5,000 and $10,000 USD, including Text to Change’s work on the development and technical side, and Zain’s prizes and hosting charges. Employees participated for free.
Among the 506 employees targeted by the program, the pilot received a 43% participation rate with roughly 220 responses for each question. Hoefman said that the results were encouraging, because it shows that the program can raise awareness while engaging the audience. He says, “We did some internal communication, and people tend to like to be educated in a playful way during work time.”
The system works by sending out a question, with multiple choice answers, over SMS to employees phones. Each employee can respond with his or her answer; if participants answered correctly, they received supplementary information about the subject, if they answered incorrectly, they were texted the correct answer with an explanation. See this chart, from Text to Change’s website, for an illustration of the program:
According to Hoefman, the main technical challenge was adjusting the system to run on another country’s platform (Text to Change’s SMS mobile quiz was originally designed in Uganda, where the non-profit is based).
The second, larger challenge was getting people to move beyond just responding to the quizzes and to take action in response to the information presented through the SMSes. Zain set up an in-house HIV/AIDS testing center on-site during the pilot, but they found they had to work around the stigma of HIV/AIDS. Explains Hoefman, “The challenge, of course, with HIV/AIDS is that it has to be confidential. There was in-house testing arranged, but if you encourage people to go for a test people don’t like to be seen when they walk into a test center. But you can use SMS for people to stay anonymous. So the test center was not on the work floor, but in another building.” By allowing users to anonymously participate over SMS and to be tested discreetly, the pilot tried to get participants to take action. During the pilot, there was a 10% increase in the number of Zain employees accessing health services.
According to Hoefman, Text to Change is about to roll out a new version of the pilot in Madagascar and he says that the organization learned a lot from the Kenyan pilot: “Some of the questions in Kenya were a bit intrusive, people felt that ‘this is not a question you ask on a Monday morning’ or something like that. So that’s something we learned, and we have to adapt the content."
Text to Change’s SMS Mobile Quizzes are an anonymous and easy way for participants to keep up to date with health information and find relevant testing, prevention, and treatment information.
Mobile Quizzes For HIV/AIDS Awareness: Zain and Text to Change Locations
In Kenya, a partnership between the non-profit organization Text to Change and the telecommunications company Zain used SMS mobile quizzes to keep Zain’s employees up-to-date on the latest HIV/AIDS information.
For four weeks in November and December of 2009, Zain’s Kenyan employees were part of a pilot program for SMS mobile quizzes. Employees received three multiple choice questions each week that focused on different aspects of HIV/AIDS such as prevention and treatment. The quizzes also directed participants to testing centers in order to learn their HIV/AIDS status. Says Bas Hoefman, co-founder and managing director of Text to Change, the choice to partner their mobile program with a telecommunications company was logical: “We thought, ‘why isn’t Zain using its own products – mobile telephony and SMS – to educate its own employees?’ Use your own product for your own employees.”
Zain covered the cost of the SMS quizzes and the employees’ responses, as well as sponsoring prizes (such as additional airtime, mobiles, or health club memberships) for employees who answered questions correctly. Hoefman estimated that the total cost of the SMS mobile quiz program was between $5,000 and $10,000 USD, including Text to Change’s work on the development and technical side, and Zain’s prizes and hosting charges. Employees participated for free.
Among the 506 employees targeted by the program, the pilot received a 43% participation rate with roughly 220 responses for each question. Hoefman said that the results were encouraging, because it shows that the program can raise awareness while engaging the audience. He says, “We did some internal communication, and people tend to like to be educated in a playful way during work time.”
The system works by sending out a question, with multiple choice answers, over SMS to employees phones. Each employee can respond with his or her answer; if participants answered correctly, they received supplementary information about the subject, if they answered incorrectly, they were texted the correct answer with an explanation. See this chart, from Text to Change’s website, for an illustration of the program:
According to Hoefman, the main technical challenge was adjusting the system to run on another country’s platform (Text to Change’s SMS mobile quiz was originally designed in Uganda, where the non-profit is based).
The second, larger challenge was getting people to move beyond just responding to the quizzes and to take action in response to the information presented through the SMSes. Zain set up an in-house HIV/AIDS testing center on-site during the pilot, but they found they had to work around the stigma of HIV/AIDS. Explains Hoefman, “The challenge, of course, with HIV/AIDS is that it has to be confidential. There was in-house testing arranged, but if you encourage people to go for a test people don’t like to be seen when they walk into a test center. But you can use SMS for people to stay anonymous. So the test center was not on the work floor, but in another building.” By allowing users to anonymously participate over SMS and to be tested discreetly, the pilot tried to get participants to take action. During the pilot, there was a 10% increase in the number of Zain employees accessing health services.
According to Hoefman, Text to Change is about to roll out a new version of the pilot in Madagascar and he says that the organization learned a lot from the Kenyan pilot: “Some of the questions in Kenya were a bit intrusive, people felt that ‘this is not a question you ask on a Monday morning’ or something like that. So that’s something we learned, and we have to adapt the content."
Text to Change’s SMS Mobile Quizzes are an anonymous and easy way for participants to keep up to date with health information and find relevant testing, prevention, and treatment information.
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