The Social Enterprise Model Canvas is a tool used to visualise all the building blocks of starting a social enterprise, including customers, route to market, value proposition, and finance.

At the heart of the Canvas is the Value Proposition – the central pillar around which all the other elements revolves. It is the reason why your social enterprise exists and provides the guiding direction for all aspects of your core behaviours and activities. Nailing the Value Proposition is vital to the overall success of any social enterprise.

Forget about a 40-50-page business plan document. The key principle of the Canvas is to concentrate on quality rather than quantity. It is a living document that should be tested and re-worked over time. At any point it is purely a set of hypotheses that need to be tested and validated with actual customers/beneficiaries

The beauty of the Canvas is that it creates a common reference and language that can be used to articulate, share and thereby gain feedback on your social enterprise’s model. It provides a straight-forward yet transparent reference that can be used internally across teams, as well as externally with advisors, investors and partners.

The Canvas is designed to guide your thinking through each of the building blocks of your social enterprise’s business model – how the functions, activities and processes interlink and interlock. It gets you to think in a more systematic and formal way, ensuring that each area is effectively covered to produce a more comprehensive and considered picture of your social enterprise.

This Canvas is inspired by the Business Model and Social Business Model Canvas and is available as a FREE download!

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