Words are important: Adding the adjective ‘For-profit’ to the term ‘Social Enterprise’ affects intentions to donate

As nonprofit organizations consider launching social enterprise ventures, it is important to continue the investigation of how communication about these ventures affects individual donation decisions. Non-profits cannot successfully seed businesses among the poor and reduce poverty rates if they cannot fund raise. Utilizing a choice-based conjoint survey of donors from four nonprofit organizations, a sample of 191 participants indicated that a nonprofit organization’s administrative efficiency was the most important attribute when choosing between donations.  However, attributes concerning the venture itself (the profitability of the venture, the venture’s location, the entrepreneurial competence of those starting the venture, and terms used to describe the venture) were all significantly more important to donors than the age of the nonprofit organization launching the venture. These findings extend previous research studies.