Webinar on Diversifying and Digitalising your Business - By the Social Enterprise Hub
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The first global webinar organised by IPPF’s Social Enterprise Hub took place on the 29th of July 2020. The one hour educative session was open to all MAs, Regional and Central Office staff. Between 50 - 60 participants from across different countries were in attendance.
The webinar addressed two crucial strategies that are key for MA resilience and advancement through and beyond the current global healthcare crisis – ‘Diversification and Digitalisation’.
In any industry, diversification means branching out into other product categories, industries or marketplaces. While this strategy does present some risks for a company, diversification is often viewed as a safety net against downturns, unexpected crisis such as the COVID pandemic or a way to grow your business.
For MAs, the mode to diversify is to; Expand income sources through new enterprises (products or services) and/or Engage in multiple donor-funded programmes/activities.
For every IPPF MA, SRHR delivery is the core undertaking and going online can help take this objective to a whole new level. Digital Marketing opens doors to a large audience beyond the physical reach of the offline business to target and is relevant in all business scenarios. And in this business climate, it is the way to move forward.
The SE Hub intends to support this initiative by:
- Establishment of an e-Commerce/online sales and marketing platform – A common online store for the Federation with separate pages for interested MAs
- Enabling a payment gateway to be integrated to accommodate global credit/debit cards
- Including country and MA specific delivery mechanisms
- Providing guidance on administering and managing said web platform
- Providing capacity building and technical assistance on online sales and marketing topics
- Help develop a business plan for the online business model
This session supported an opportunity to engage with the MAs, provide an understanding of the available online solutions, hear first-hand from MAs who have diversified income sources and who have had positive business continuity despite the challenges of the COVID crisis.
The panellists were Thushara Agus - Executive Director, FPA Sri Lanka, Fadoua Bakhadda - Executive Director, Moroccan Family Planning Association and Dhammike Mendis - CEO, Ceynocta (Pvt) Ltd, Software Developer/IT consultant who provided a technological overview.
The session was conducted via Zoom Webinar, with technical support by FPA Sri Lanka.
The individual presentations and the intermittent and culminating Q & A session was well received with encouraging engagement and a good flow of questions and comments from the participants.
After the session, the SE Hub received positive feedback from most of the participants who thought it was an important session and a good knowledge sharing experience. A post session survey was shared to evaluate the session, assess usefulness and to ascertain which areas the SE Hub could be of assistance to individual MAs.
** The Social Enterprise Acceleration Programme (SEAP) continues to be coordinated and managed by the FPA Sri Lanka team (FPASL) in collaboration with IPPF Central Office and the six Regional Offices.
