#Zadaqa

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Anthony Fineran (B 1981), 'Pizza Zadaqa', 2024

[aboutyourstartup]

Zadaqa - Corporate Social Responsibility, Redefined

The name Zadaqa comes from the Arabic, Hebrew, Farsi and Turkish word "Sadaqah", which refers to the amount of charity voluntarily given to the poor, or for a noble cause, after one has already given "Zakat" (mandatory amount of money given to the poor).

Through the explanation of this ancient and cleverly used word we can already understand what this promising startup does: it's modernising the concept of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). What it does is allow companies and corporations to create "social" CSR initiatives; for example, Efani will plant a tree every 10 new Likes it receives on its Facebook page, Club Parker will donate $3 for each person who subscribe to their service, Kiva Microlending will donate $1 to a social entrepreneur for every new Like on its Facebook page, and so on.

Zadaqa's headquarters at the recently inaugurated entrepreneurship incubator at INSEAD Business School

This represents a great opportunity for companies to start CSR programs that customers and people in general are actually interested in, as through Zadaqa companies are able to monitor their CSR campaigns' success and determine whether it's something the customers value and want to participate in. Also, it makes CSR campaigns more "social", so it improves consumers' engagement with companies, and such campaigns might even translate into more customers for them.

Finally, Zadaqa gives people the power to back CSR campaigns with a click and to really make a difference, also exploiting the virality factor.

When it comes to CSR, it's often tricky business, because of the many implications of different nature involved, but serial entrepreneur  and Zadaqa's CEO Jonathan Levi seems to have found the right formula to modernize CSR.

To see more, visit Zadaqa's profile at AboutYourStartup