Week 12: Social Enterprise - Low Public Awareness

Social Enterprise - Low Public Awareness

Singapore Social Enterprise Association (SEA) conducted a study on 2000 respondents, out of 2000 respondents, only 13% knew the meaning of "social enterprise" and only 2% of those who know, could name an existing SE correctly. This shows that even though there have been more social enterprises but the level of awareness of social enterprise is very very low.

And out of the 2% of the 13% of the respondents, only the "successful" and somewhat famous Social Enterprises in Singapore, like Singapore Corporation of Rehabilitative Enterprise (SCORE) and the cafe Eighteen Chefs, the ones that they could think of.

However, more than half of the 2000 respondents would support social enterprises if they know what a social enterprise is. Hence, we could safely say that the public are not stereotyping social enterprise with charities/business. The reason why many people are not supporting social enterprises is due to the confusing bottom line that is not communicate to the public properly. This is so as many social enterprise are trying to get ‘sympathy; from the public, resulting in the misconception of the public about social enterprises. Therefore, people would not support what they are unfamiliar with or do not know about.

Hence, it is very important to develop a high level of awareness for social enterprise because of the potential social impact and the economic benefits that SEs can generate. Also with a high level of awareness of social enterprises will also increase the interest and media coverage of social enterprises in Singapore. With many underlying social problems in Singapore, social enterprise is definitely one of the best ways to help the less fortunate and to also give them a opportunity to survive in the world today.  

Also, the Social Enterprise Association has stated that it would work more closely with the Community Development, Youth and Sports Ministry to publicize more about social enterprises. Even with the help of SEA and MCYS publicizing, I think that social enterprises themselves should also come up with their own marketing strategy and campaigns instead of waiting for others to help them. Also, social enterprises should spend more efforts to let the public know about what they do in order to correct the misconception that social enterprises are charities by sharing about how their business models work.

Reference:
Grosse,S. (2011). Study shows low public awareness of Social Enterprises in S'pore. Retrieved January 11, 2013 from http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/1150901/1/.html