Common Touchpoints

The most common touchpoints across the communities I worked with are as follows

1. Radio 

2. Community meetings,

3. Religious institutions mainly Mosques and Charges, 

4. Mobile phones

5. Social Media

6. Music/Theater events specially the cultural days and public holidays

Although the usage of radio is the most common touchpoint in my context, the most amazing touchpoints that surprised me was the massive usage of mobile phones and social media while most of these communities were illiterates sometime back. they learned writing and reading of the local languages in order to use the phones and access social media as their mode of communication with their families, relatives and friends in other countries. Its a touchpoint that is amazingly increasing by the day and its an easy, cheaper way to deliver messages to the target communities in most of the contexts I work.  

In Greece we used Puppet shows for children they were popular. In Ethiopia we used mobile cinema also to good use. But the best one was in Greece were we had a young female volunteer that started a women's café round. they met in our HP tent once a week and all male volunteers and staff were ceremoniously kicked out of the tent :-) This cafe round was a lot of things (FGD, psycho-social support group, a friendly hangout,.....)  

I would like to bring up a question on social media, which more and more becomes one of the main touchpoints with any population, but which is a medium on which it is nearly impossible to control a message. (example anti vaxxer messages for COVID are far less than pro vaccine messages and yet they dominate the perception of most people as they are loud) Does anyone have good recommendations on how to use social media for a targeted population without becoming a social media moderator full time?

In Sudan, we used a car (rickshaw) with a speaker going around the camps all day. 

In Greece, the showers became touchpoints for women without planning it ourselves. Showers were managed by community members and had specific schedules and shifts for women and men. There were 4 to 5 women managing the facilities, maintaining them properly, protecting users, helping people with disabilities, pregnant women, children, etc. Little by little, it became a meeting point with 20 of them every day, sharing experiences, keeping company with each other, supporting them, and sharing knowledge. It was beautiful to see how they created their own space to discuss health, wellbeing, and women-focused issues. 

I have used several touchpoints, from mass communication through the media as radio, sms to mobile phones, to community activities: drama, clowns, community meetings, and personal communication: home visits, group meetings. Depending on the context different combinations of touchpoints were used. Although we had impacts and outcomes we did not expect, I cannot say that the touchpoints themselves surprised me, they were all quite common, so I am very curious about the results that the touchpoint tool will deliver. I see this as a way to investigate new ways to reach people.

In my line of work, we use various touchpoints which depend on the target population, the type of intervention and the resources available. These include; TV and Radio(jingles and interactive programs), edutainment, religious and traditional leaders, print media (posters, brochures, banners, billboards Q&As, flipcharts), social media, mobile phones, community mobilizers, town announcers, motorized announcements, compound dialogues, U-Report, Goodwill ambassadors, Celebrities, Artists, youth groups, women groups, men groups, community based organizations, civil service organizations to name but a few.

I have worked on the below touch points,

1.Community meeting

2. Mosque based intervention engaging faith leaders

3.Radio

4.Mobile phone

5.Learning center/Child friendly space.

6.Cross check with WASH structures

7.Model Mother experience sharing/peer learning

8.HH visit

The Model mothers or care givers experience sharing was amazingly worked in Rohingya context and the involvement of Faith leaders also going well. As Rohingya Community is very conservatives so drama and song is not appreciated by all. However They feel role model when they practices hygiene properly and prevent diseases. We have triggered that emotion and motive people through their own community members or engaging their neighbor's who are practicing .

For me I mostly have used religious / community leaders/community development committees, telephone, schools, and radio. What has surprised me is that some of the most powerful touchpoints may actually hinder or disrupts progress.   

Agree with the discussion above ,there are so many methods, which methods work best?

 In my experience  the selection of the method was not the same in Mozambique than in Philippines and furthermore needs to match the target group and the need; there is no ‘best method’, as some will work better with some groups and some contexts than others. Some methods work very well with children, and others are better for adults. Some methods are needed specifically to be able to communicate with persons with disabilities, such as easy-to-read/understand materials for persons with intellectual and developmental disabilities. An ideal is to have a selection of methods. Pre-test the methods with the community to see how they work is essential. 

Khumbu, I share in your experience as well.

It is interesting mostly how the beneficiaries tend to approach the process. They often want to do most of the things at their pace whiles you are so pre-occupied with reducing human suffering !

More recently, during the COVID-19 Response, I served on the Emergency Response Team in part of my country Ghana. I observed that the principal touch points were TV, Radio, WhatsApp, Facebook, Community Information Centers ( an overhead 'ahuja speaker' mounted on an elevated mast that towers high enough to reach the ends of the communities). 

More remarkable about this touchpoint is the element of social distancing which under normal circumstances would have made it possible for people to validate and triangulate information disseminated. 

Everyone was eager to listen to the Presidential Update on COVID-19 every other Sunday evening to inform their next action. Beside general educations on the preventive protocols, panelist also rely on the Presidential Updates to further disseminate these to the community members via other touch points.

The surprising part for me is the common and coordinated information sharing across the various touch points. So, the most authoritative information is that of the President on the next-steps as far as COVID-19 is concerned.

Depends on the context. For instance in Chad/Tchad (central africa) it was the radio, religous leaders, trucksound (speaker on a truck), communities meetings but also shouters (crieurs in French). Television was not a thing. When I come to work in Congo, which is also central Africa, I was expecting the same. Nope. Not the case. Television was more a thing and since 62% of the population live in urban settings, social media is also to be considered. In Haiti, community health workers paid a tremendous role. Therefore, a tool like touchpoints are important. I also love the part about respected individuals to assess and be able to build on the influencers. It reminds me on the course social norms and sanitation where it was emphasize that the KAP survey won't let us know who can influence the community we are working in.

In fact, I'm currently discovering new touchpoints that I hadn't thought of before because they weren't relevant in previous contexts. In past contexts (Africa, Caribbean, Asia) these included meetings with the most influential people (depending on the case: religious leaders, village elders, teachers/intellectuals, elderly people, etc). We have always done this face to face. Currently, I work in a very low profile, so large groupings are not possible. That said, we continue to do a lot of small-scale meetings. However, the majority of the population and therefore of our beneficiaries have smartphones. So we have created Whatsapp groups for example to pass on certain hygiene messages. We also use the local radio, which is very popular.

When conducting a rapid assessment of WaterAid's hygiene response to COVID-19 one thing we wanted to evaluate is what are the most common touch points, or places where people get trusted information. We found the top four were TV, radio, social media and health worker. However, if you disaggregated the data and looked at people with a disability then the top places for information were newspapers, loudspeakers and NGOs. This highlighted the need to use multiple touchpoints and ensure we break down the data to ensure everyone is included. 

In our being piloted (completing soon) handwashing program in the community, we have found the following to the helping people in motivating in the installation and use of hand washing stations – (1) mobilization of the local leaders, and health female community volunteers that are associated with the local health care facilities; and (2) installation and use of handwashing stations itself, that is also serving as the demonstration of new norm of washing hands better in the community. What other touchpoints could be used while scaling the program will be explored soon, when we have to move to broader or mass communication methods to cover larger areas. 

Most available touchpoints in communities I have experience with were Radio , religious people  and school teachers. 

In communities  where we had been calling people to participate presidential election we were using awareness cards , solar radio and some times phone messages but non of these touchpoint was as effective as a voice of religious people when they call on people to participate and earn good rewards otherwise god will punish them due to not taking their responsibility of choosing , also teachers' voice when thy call on students families to choose a person to lead their offspring future and conducting discourse and meeting on community level under community leaders was key as well. 

So, this idea of  touching people lives can help out in different emergency context as well on community level . 

Most of the touchpoints mentioned above also work for my context, Ethiopia, refugee camps as well as host communities. For instance, since March 2020 the COVID-19 outbreak in our country, I observed  ,the country health minster & INGOs have been campaigning about the washing hands, even if some of the communities don’t take as serious.  In general, due to the COVID-19 outbreak most of the community handwashing practice changed with supervising including mine. 

common touchpoints were the health worker and mosques. in my country the mosques always effect to the communities

Touchpoints that rely on telecommunications or internet may temporarily be disabled because of communications black-outs during periods of unrest or for other reasons.  Hopefully these black-outs don't last long, but in some settings they might disrupt information sharing for awhile.  Has anyone had issues with this? Have you found that using multiple touchpoints help get around this problem?

Mostly radio, community meetings and health workers. 

In our country, I think the most common touchpoints are social media (especially Facebook), mobile phone, FM radios, Megaphone (hand speaker), Television, Religious institutions (chapel), dramatic demonstrations.

The touchpoint that surprised me was the dramatic demonstrations. Most of the community is favorite dramatic demonstrations because it's not just that they learn what about health education but also it's entertaining for them.

From my experience the touching points are vary from communities to communities,  depending on their life styles, cultural and literacy level. In major/common are

• Leaders either religious or cultural,
• Radio
• Communities meeting like formal or cultural festivals
• community health workers

we use a variety of touch points in the communities we work in these include. Social media, WhatsApp Facebook and telegram. SMS. Posters at community places.  HH visits from our staff who inform them of other touch points.   One of the best touch points for us is face to face visit where HHs go to vist the team in charge of pumping water directly.  HHs can then ask any questions or even make a complaint. 

We common use Healthworkers,phones churches schools and radio. Television is rare in our rural communities.No touch point suprised me.Most of them work effectively unless in areas that they are not present

The common touch points in my context have been; community health workers, community leaders both political, opinion leaders and religious leaders, community meetings and radios. It was amazing to know the growing number of phones in the communities and text messages were a surprising touch point to me. My under standing was that the beneficiaries had no cell phones, but I was wrong. This knowledge has made up package some message for circulation through text messages though it comes with limitations as not all community members can read.