AIESEC International Online Challenge/Competition Project Hypothesis: To produce an online micro experience product from the global office. This micro experience product should result in: • A higher conversion rate of customers for ELD programmes than marketing activities • Should drive online and physical activity at a grass roots (LC level) of the organisation • Should align with the Ew@ principles •Should capitalise on our existing online channels and levels of engagement
Assumptions: • To enable more young people to experience AIESEC’s experiential leadership development platform we need to create more entry points/touch points with the organisation. • To add additional value to the offering of the AIESEC Xp and our core ELD programmes. • To increase AIESEC’s brand positioning amongst our key stakeholders: primarily young people aged 18 -24. • To pilot activities that push our reach beyond traditional geographical boundaries and physical activity constraints. i.e. physical activities could manifest amongst non-AIESECers. • AIESEC should mobilise the global network towards a common engagement activity in the area of micro experiences.
Project Idea: Create an online challenge that engages young people around either world issues, cultural awareness and/or values education. This should enable more young people to engage with and understand AIESEC’s essence. The challenge could have two potential results: 1. The output from the challenge is used to create a sustainable micro Xp product for AIESEC that can be run every year. 2. An online challenge that engages young people across AIESEC’s media channels will result in a significant increase in our online engagement. i.e. we should see an increase in Online Registration System sign-ups.
Initial Project Targets: • 50,000 visitors to the site/page launching the challenge • 1000 entries to the competition (as an indicator of engagement) • 2000 sign ups to the ORS system
Research Research was conducted into 15 currently operational Global online challenges/competitions globally. Challenge Commonalities: • Challenges are run around topical themes (innovation/entrepreneurship) or social causes (i.e. competitions that align to MDGs: eradicating poverty) • Most of the challenge organisers are in the social business/social impact sector • Target audience is a youth audience of between 18-30. • Challenges have prizes in the region of $10,000 - $30,000 US dollars. • All provide support for implementation of the social idea. i.e. mentoring scheme or online resources for running the idea. • The impact that many of the challenge organisers are looking to have ARE the challenge activities or implementation of the challenge ideas. (AIESECs impact would be through change agents developed i.e. ELD programmes) • Almost all challenges have final judging rounds that involve a physical meeting. Research was also conducted in AIESEC.orgs web traffic as an indicator of online engagement • AIESEC currently has 1.5m unique visitors to the site per annum • AIESEC has on average 21,100 per quarter sign ups to the ORS/month. • Conversion rate per annum indicated by ORS sign-ups is approx. 5%
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AIESEC International Online Challenge/Competition Insights What can AIESEC provide that is unique in this sphere: 1. Pre-established large network of young people to contribute with submissions and to implement the winning ideas. 2. Alumni network (of change agents) who can support as mentors, network of contacts for consultancy and funding 3. Existing financial partners are interested to contribute to this kind of product.
- AI should utilise the power of the AIESEC network. i.e. the product should be attractive for AIESECers and also for nonAIESECers.
- The level of online engagement required is higher than the initial projected targets. - The challenge should have a physical element to it to ensure that the level of engagement is a meaningful as possible. i.e. Local Committees should run a physical activity within the project. i.e. an idea jam
- The one answer to the challenge should in some way be to take an ELD programme to increase conversion of the people
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engaged to join our ELD programmes. i.e. to address youth unemployment young people need to have more hands-on business experience/soft skills.....therefore join AIESEC! The challenge should be on a topical issue to have maximum engagement To enhance the value of the competition it should have 3 types of partners: (1) Network Partners - for promotion of the challenge (2) Expertise Partners - to provide advice/ideas for developing the theme of the project (3) Financial partners - to provide the prize or reward for the winners The challenge output should drive people to a specific programme for AIESEC to ensure the highest rate of conversion. The primary stakeholder of the challenge should be an AIESECer, the secondary customer that is engaged is an external young person - based on a model of engaging the AIESEC network to then engage external young people. AIESEC runs a challenge where the most valuable aspect for the organisation is the ideas output. i.e. the challenge creates engagement with AIESEC activities that can be implemented at a local level. The implication of this is that the level of online engagement is less.
Conclusions 1. AIESEC should move away from the idea of a challenge as the level of engagement needed is unachievable without massive investment of resources. i.e. We cannot compete with the knowledge and expertise of current challenges. We cannot attract the kind of numbers needed through a challenge concept. 2. AIESEC can partner with a current online challenge that is already running i.e. EF photo competition and develops it to have a physical element or Challenge future - Make It Work. 3. If we develop the product the physical element of the product will take resources away from ELD activities. 4. The Global office should look to develop products that are solely based online or create a product framework that can be used at a local level and customised to their needs. 5. AIESEC pursues the challenge as a means to crowd source and test ideas that should be used and driven globally for micro-experiences. 6. Given the high volume of traffic to the AIESEC.org website, further research should be conducted into the segmentation of that web traffic and also how to drive a higher conversion rate to ELD programmes through online micro experiences.
Documents Used Online Challenge Brief and initial research doc [see here] ORS data analysis [see here]
Recommendation Option 2 to be considered by the brand Xp team. Option 5 can be taken forward. Option 6 can be take forward and a hypothesis developed with the brand XP team.
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