SOCIAL IMPACT BUSINESS CHALLENGE
BUSINESS PLAN GUIDELINES
What’s the Social Impact Business Challenge?
The challenge invites students to use social media to create social impact. Specifically, students
are asked to design an ethics quiz that can be distributed through social networking platforms.
The quiz should promote the ongoing discussion of basic human values, and it should be
supported by a sustainable business concept. Using provocative topics from the news or
popular television programs, the quiz should engage the audience in entertaining ways and
keep them coming back week after week.
Business Plan Guidelines
The following guidelines are intended to provide a basic template from which to develop a
compelling plan. Each section below contains questions that your business plan should answer;
you may avoid questions that seem less than directly relevant to your concept, or address other
issues relevant to your concept.
In any case, your submissions should not exceed 10 single-spaced pages, with one-inch margins
and 12-point Times New Roman font. An additional 5 pages can be devoted to supporting
appendices.
Submissions are DUE April 15th, 11:59p to Dr. Matt Statler (mstatler@stern.nyu.edu).
Submissions that do not make this deadline will NOT be considered for the competition.
Section I: Executive Summary (~1 page)
Briefly describe your concept, its market potential, social value and impact, and sustainability.
A recommendation is to write this section last, after you have completed the following four
other sections (below).
Section II: Your Concept (~2-pages)
Describe your concept for how to use social media to create social impact. Specifically, how will
the ethics quiz be designed? How will it function, and on what social media platform(s)? What
topics will it address? How will the results of the quiz be analyzed or interpreted? How will the
quiz be renewed from week to week, or over time? How will people who take the quiz once be
encouraged to return? How will the quiz promote discussion of basic human values?
Section III: Market Potential (~2-pages)
What kinds of people will be compelled by your concept to participate? Who will be your
‘customers’? What social media offerings currently appeal to those customer segments? What
organizations have developed those offerings, and through what process have they been
brought to market? Are there any new entrants currently developing similar offerings? What
are the critical success factors for such offerings? What is the competitive advantage that will
distinguish your offering? How will you develop and exploit that advantage? What are the
critical risks that might impede your success, and how will you manage them? What various
approaches will you leverage to develop and expand the market for your offering, ensuring that
it has broad and sustainable appeal?
Section IV: Social Value and Impact (~2 pages)
How will your proposed offering create social impact? What metrics will you use to assess the
social impact created by your venture, both in the short term as people engage for the first
time, and over time as the venture develops and achieve greater market penetration? What
best practices or existing ventures that create social impact will guide your decision-making as
you develop and refine your concept? As your offering allows people to engage in discussions
about basic human ethical values, what potential implications does that have for society more
broadly?
Section V: Sustainability (~2 pages)
What organizational capabilities are required in order for your concept to function?
Specifically, what technological, logistical & operational, human capital, and leadership
resources will be necessary in order to develop and implement the concept? Either in the plan
or in the appendices, you should provide a summary of the technological specifications for the
social media platform, potentially including screen shots to indicate the look and feel of the
concept. What financial resources will be necessary during the alpha- and beta- phases of
development? What financial resources will foreseeably be necessary for the first year of
operations? What sources of funding and revenue will be developed? Whether in the plan or
in the appendices, you should provide a detailed monthly cash flow analysis as well as a set of
financial projections, including a simple income statement, cost of goods sold, other expenses
and projected margins. What milestones and longer-term goals will guide your efforts? How do
you plan to scale and grow the venture?