research in use

The plan/idea

WaterAid Bangladesh’s communications unit planned to disseminate main findings

of serious researches in simple, communicable and digestible language. Side by

side, we decided to put some key messages (doable action points) as a way out of

the situations that the research findings indicate.

We planned to adopt product/content marketing approach of communications for this

where the original report will be mentioned as reference as a download link and QR

code. This will publicise the research itself to the wider audience.

The content

Three of the contents we used have been extracted from the “Bangladesh National

Hygiene Baseline Survey 2014” and one from “Faecal Contamination of Commuters’

Hands in Public Places in Dhaka City 2014”. Both of the researches have been

carried out by icddr,b with inputs from WaterAid.

We developed the contents in Bangla with strong visuals in an engaging tone. They

key findings were presented in form of infographic expressed in simple language like

a product advertisement. The copy was then checked with the research team to

make sure that we’re not wrongly communicating the things. This took a number of

back and forth to reach a point of agreement. It was worth spending the time as the

final product came out of this process found to be simple, clearly understandable,

engaging yet scientifically correct. All the messages end up with promoting hand

washing with soap.

The platform

We have chosen a national daily that has both print and online publication. We

picked Prothom Alo (www.prothom-alo.com), the highest circulated daily in

Bangladesh. Its readership is around three million per day; over half a million buy the

print edition. As per Google ranking – its website is accessed from 210 countries and

the highest hit Bangla website of the world.

We have published messages in the form of ad in the daily Prothom Alo at the

bottom part of page 5. The advert was available online the same day and is still

accessible online at its archive. A total of four ads have been published in four

consecutive days starting from 19 Nov ’14, the world toilet day.

The contents are available in following pages with an English version (translated just

to communicate internally, not scientifically copy-edited or checked). Next to creative

that has been published there is an online link.

Ad 1: availability of soap and water around toilet

Newspaper insertions published on 19 Nov 2014

English translation of the ad

Weblink: http://epaper.prothom-alo.com/view/dhaka/2014-11-19/5

Ad 2: hand hygiene of mothers

Newspaper insertions published on 20 Nov 2014

English translation of the ad

Weblink: http://epaper.prothom-alo.com/view/dhaka/2014-11-20/5

Ad 3: hand and cleanliness of children

Newspaper insertions published on 21 Nov 2014

English translation of the ad

Weblink: http://epaper.prothom-alo.com/view/dhaka/2014-11-21/5

Ad 4: hand hygiene of commuters

Newspaper insertions published on 22 Nov 2014

English translation of the ad

Weblink: http://epaper.prothom-alo.com/view/dhaka/2014-11-22/5

The impact

As soon as the newspaper advertisement came out we started receiving a number of

media and public queries. Also it has successfully drawn attention of the actors

within and beyond the sector and we got numerous communications in this regards.

The ads were shared through social media channels as well that has quite a good

number of hits. The post insights (engagement) of each post on the day they went

live are as follows (drawn from official Facebook page of WaterAid Bangladesh):

Post 1: availability of soap and water around toilet

Post 2: hand hygiene of mothers

Post 3: hand and cleanliness of children

Post 4: hand hygiene of commuters

After the success of this simple and straight infographics WaterAid Bangladesh is

considering to share them in other public spheres.

All the infographics in high res are available to download in the following link:

https://app.box.com/s/uwjigrzwzieb9xsrrrct