Worldoo.com urges kids to ‘Gift a Tara’ to underprivileged kids through CRY

Worldoo.com, an online ecosystem for kids aged 6 to 12, has tied up with Child Rights and You (CRY) for an online campaign that allows kids to 'donate' to their less privileged peers.

Worldoo has been created by advertising and digital media agency Focus. 'Gift a Tara' (gift a star) is a social initiative where kids can earn Worldoo 'Taras' by browsing Worldoo.com. For every 10 'stars' earned, Worldoo will donate Rs 1 to the cause for which the 'star' has been picked by kids, through CRY. Currently, there are two causes being displayed on Worldoo - providing education and drinking water.

Taanaz Ghatalia, director, Focus Kids, said, “Most kids in today’s age are so used to getting that the idea of giving is rarely inculcated in them. At Worldoo, our vision has always been to be more than just a website and create meaningful and enriching experiences for kids. We are really excited and believe in the nobility of the idea where a kid is helping another kid in need by his own means. We thank CRY for giving this its desired shape.”

Puja Marwaha, CEO, CRY, said, “Together with Worldoo, we endeavour to sensitise children on the issues of child rights, by explaining the rights and their importance to them and how they can contribute to ensure a lasting change in the lives of other children. We hope that in the process of donating 'stars', children find new facets of their identities by becoming sensitive to the needs of the children who are denied their rights. We believe that at the heart of it all, children are more than willing to stand up for what is right.”

Q&A with Harsh Wardhan Dave, head, experience and brand, Worldoo

On the marketing plan for Worldoo.com and 'Gift a Tara'

We are doing advertising on digital platforms where kids visit. There is no Comscore for people below 15 years. A lot of research has gone in terms of what kids are searching on YouTube, what they are searching for on Google, whether it’s a Ben10 game or an free online games, and so on. After which, we devised a digital strategy which involves search, display, contests on Cartoon Network, Disney etc. Apart from that, we have also done couple of rounds of TVCs which aired on Disney, Pogo, ZeeQ and Cartoon Network. And we are doing a lot of on-ground activations as well. As we speak, we are doing a Worldoo Safari - we wanted to reach out to kids in their home and their society. So every weekend we go to a society and then explain the concept of Worldoo, play games with the kids, take feedback from there and make them experience the website. So far, we have done these activities in eight societies and another 20 societies are lined up till September-end. And the biggest one for us is the school contact program. We are planning to reach out to more than 200 schools across India. We start next week and we aim to reach approximately two lakh kids. And we will explain the concept of Worldoo and Worldoo Tara to them.

Tie-ups...

We have tie-ups with Cartoon Network, ZeeQ, National Geography channel, Sentosa Island... Apart from that we have regular tie-ups with most of the media production houses. Recently we did a contest for Despicable Me2 and currently there is a content running on for Smurfs 2 - we partnered with Sony pictures for that. So these things will keep happening. Worldoo Tara initiative went up today morning and we have not spent single rupee on advertising and we already have some 5,000 'stars' donated. 

On the association with CRY...

There are lots of kids who don’t get a lot of stuff - there is a problem for education, there is a problem for water. We thought, let's do something. Now, we are a portal - we don’t actually do these things. So we were looking for partners and met a lot of NGOs. We spoke with CRY and they were already doing a lot of such initiatives. These are two areas are where CRY actively does a lot of work, so we decided to integrate it into Worldoo.

For every 10 'stars', Worldoo will give Rs 1 to CRY. And we put a cap of 5 lakhs stars for each cause and there is a minimum assurance of Rs 1 lakh for the first month. This is a three-month initiative. And CRY will be using this money for education and health (drinking water) for these children. They have already identified eight villages. And that Rs 1 lakh will go from our marketing budget.