Malaysian Media Awards Winners Showcase

Challenge
There are plenty of scholarships being offered to students. Axiata Young Talent Programme is by far, the most unique “Developmental Scholarship” and is being offered at 3-tiers (Lower Secondary, Pre-University and University). The challenge was to reach Standard Six students and their parents, to apply for the Lower Secondary Scholarship.

Solution
Teachers are highly looked upon as a credible source or opinion leaders. UPSR students do not respond to conventional media channels. Parents are key influencers and will only look at credible educational property with strong connection with students and trusted by parents. Hence, we explored sponsorship with Astro’s education channel – Astro Tutor. And from there, instead of hard-sell TVC, we used the popular Astro Tutor’s animated characters Cikgu Arif to deliver the messages.

Execution
Animated advertorials were placed within Astro Tutor where Cikgu Arif chatted with an animated student character explaining the AYTP, its uniqueness as a Developmental Scholarship programme compared to the other scholarships and to encourage application. We became part of the educational content and it did not look commercialized or force-fitting. We were the first to create and implement the idea of Cikgu Arif’s character sharing about a scholarship.

Results
Given the uniqueness of the idea, it generated a huge awareness and was rated the 2nd highest most effective medium for AYTP. Media ROI of 8.9X. This contributed to a 15% increase in the no. of expected applications, with 3,000 applications over 2 weeks.