Make The Change went to Indonesia, Bogor!

Earlier this year, our Make The Change team went on a 3-day trip to Indonesia to visit the refugees from the Refugee Learning Centers at Bogor. As part of our CSR project, we funded a 3-day training session to equip the refugees with digital marketing skills. With the job market booming, there has been a rise in demand for digital marketers – this has made digital marketing an essential and in demand skill, especially for companies looking to expand their brand. As refugees are not allowed to work in the country they have sought refuge in, equipping them with an up and coming skill can give them opportunities to find employment online as digital marketers only require a laptop to get the job done. With employment, the refugees can send their children to schools and reduce their dependence on their families in their home countries for monetary support.

To provide professional training lessons for them, this project was done in collaboration with MAD School, in which the trainers from MAD have kindly volunteered their time to conduct a 3 day workshop for 45 refugees at Hope Learning Center. On day 1 of the workshop, the trainers taught the refugees all about digital marketing, which includes SEO, Google algorithms, keywords planning and backlinks. Even though it was something new to the refugees, they still put in their utmost effort to digest the information given and readily asked questions to clarify doubts.

Picture credits: M.A.D School

Day 2 was about social media marketing! The trainers from MAD taught them how to run ads on Facebook to reach out to a larger audience as well as how to analyse and measure metrics that would give them an overview of their social media marketing performance. Similar to day 1, the refugees were eager and fast learners as they were to quickly adapt to the new terms introduced. On the last day, content marketing was introduced to them. Not only did they learn how to create blogs and videos, they also learnt how to develop their self branding. This is especially important for the refugees as having a well curated personal branding can open up much more employment opportunities as well as leave a lasting impression on their potential employers.

At the end of the 3 day training, we were pleased to see that the refugees’ hard work had paid off as approximately 5 of them were ready for employment and they were selected for “Digital Marketing job placement” within 2 months. Make The Change also hired 1 full timer and 2 interns to become country representatives to market MTC services and MAD School courses to the Indonesia market. There were approximately 20 refugees that had to undergo further training in Digital Marketing before they can be employed, but we are confident that they will become qualified digital marketers in no time!

Picture credits: M.A.D School

There’s more! Make The Change’s efforts does not stop there. Before flying off to Indonesia, our team had reached out to their network of family and friends to seek for donations. We have raised a total of S$3,112 to be donated to 3 refugee learning centers which will fund the students’ learning materials as well as cover the teachers’ and center’s expenses. We are extremely grateful to all of our donors, including MAD School, for making this donation a purposeful and meaningful one.

Together with MAD School, Make The Change will continue to support the refugees and equip them with digital marketing skills so that they can find employment. We strongly believe that by giving them a marketable and sustainable skill set, the refugees are able to find footing in the job market and become a valuable asset to society. As the saying goes, “We rise by lifting others”, we hope that we were able to give them leverage to uplift themselves.