Lights, Camera, Action: Shining the Spotlight on Social Entrepreneurs

How do we help social entrepreneurs who are tackling big problems capture more attention?

I constantly ask myself this question.

Why is attention important? Attention means more eyeballs, more eyeballs means more supporters, more supporters means more donors, and so on and so on.

For organizations that are focused on purpose rather than profits, which usually isn’t a traditional investor’s favorite thing, attention is critical for long-term impact.

Over the past four years, I’ve been fortunate to connect with numerous social entrepreneurs tackling important problems in the world – from shrinking the gender gap in tech to ending poverty in rural Honduras.

These connections have enabled me to gain a unique perspective on the problems that changemakers face on a daily basis.

Three problems consistently came up during conversations:

1. The lack of internal talent (i.e. marketers) to scale
2. Lack of capital to grow strategic initiatives and programs
3. Difficulty generating awareness for their cause in a very noisy world

In many ways, Startups Give Back has helped on the talent front by exposing people who work in corporate America to great organizations through volunteering.

But what about awareness? Furthermore, what about capital?

Changemaker Forum was built for one reason

With social entrepreneurs struggling to build awareness around their cause and raise the necessary capital to accelerate their impact, I wanted to create something to support them.

In 2017, Changemaker Forum was born.

Changemaker Forum was created with a singular purpose in mind: shine a spotlight on the problems that are worth solving in the world, while supporting the social entrepreneurs who are tackling them.

Whether it’s publishing stories written by social entrepreneurs, connecting them with each other at live events and online communities, or putting them in front of impact investors, Changemaker Forum is here to help changemakers build sustainable organizations whose impact can be felt for generations to come.

Final thoughts

To solve any meaningful problem in the world, it takes a village.

Social entrepreneurs will have many obstacles they have to navigate along their path to impact. Changemaker Forum, despite a relentless effort to do so, will not be able to solve every single problem along this path. It’s going to take more players to make a dent.

However, it’s that relentless effort that’s going to shine the spotlight on the problems that are worth solving in the world and the people tackling them.

That spotlight will be the catalyst that brings attention. With attention comes action. With action comes change.