The Impact of Social Media as a New Market Amidst COVID-19 Pandemic

Social media is a type of online media that allows for two-way conversations and real
time interactions. This includes social networking sites (SNS), blogs, discussion forums, cont
ent sharing, social bookmarking, wikis, and other similar applications. (Sharma & Verma,
2018).

For nearly three years, the COVID19 Pandemic closed many doors. It was a devastati
ng phenomenon in which people could not freely go outside without masks and PPEs to prev
ent the virus from spreading. One of the closed doors is a business door.Things like online s
elling began to rise during that time period. People buy online because they cannot go shop
ping outside.Many entrepreneurs took advantage of the opportunity to sell their products on 
social media platforms such as Facebook, YouTube, Google Websites, Blogs,
Twitter, Instagram, and Tiktok were used as a medium.

General Objective:

The general objective of this study is to find out the impact of social media as a new
market amidst the COVID-19 pandemic.

Specific Objective:

This study aims to find out the impact of social media as a new market amidst
COVID-19 pandemic according to:

Type of business

Years of existence

Monthly Income

Hypothesis

There is a significant impact of social media as a new market amidst COVID-19

pandemic on business sales and products when classified by type of business, monthly
income, and number of years of existence.

It had a significant impact on and influenced business sales and products in the
absence of delivery, so sales from lowered increased ever since most buyers are reliant on
door-to-door services.

Theoretical Framework
 Publishing was the first step in social media marketing. Businesses were using social
media to drive traffic to their websites and, ideally, sales. However, social media has evolved
far beyond being simply a platform for content distribution.

Businesses nowadays use social media in a variety of ways. A company that is

concerned about what people are saying about its brand, for example, will monitor social
media conversations and respond to relevant comments. A company that wants to
understand how it is performing on social media would use an analytics tool to analyze its
reach, engagement, and sales on social media. A company that wants to reach a specific
group of people on a large scale would use highly targeted social media advertisements.
(https://buffer.com/social-media-marketing. Retrieved: 11/09/22).

Social media marketing is a type of digital marketing that makes use of the
popularity of popular social media networks to achieve marketing and branding objectives.
But it's not just about setting up business accounts and posting whenever you want. Social
media marketing requires an evolving strategy with measurable objectives, which includes:
keeping and optimizing your profiles, posting images, videos, stories, and live videos that
represent your brand and appeal to a specific audience. Monitoring your reputation and
responding to comments, shares, and likes.

Following and engaging with followers, customers, and influencers to create a brand
community. Paid social media advertising, in which you can pay to have your business
appear in front of large numbers of highly targeted users, is also part of social media
marketing. (https://www.wordstream.com/social-media-marketing. Retrieved: 11/09/22).

Conceptual Framework

The revolution of online buying has arisen from the Internet era. Social media
promotes business merchandising and services to the market. These have been successful
technology for buying and selling products and services online. Social media have been
squared as the center of marketing strategy since the rise of the COVID-19 Pandemic. It
has quickly become the most effective way to advertise and market business, especially to
small and starting their names in the business world. Competitiveness, survival, and
profitability in social media have been greatly dependent on the target markets and market
strategies.

The social media referred to here are Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok, Youtube, and
Google Websites. Types of business, Years of existence, and Monthly income are the
independent variables while the new market is the dependent variable.

Paradigm

Definition of Terms

Social Media refers to the means of interactions among people in which they
create, share, and/or exchange information and ideas in virtual communities and networks
(https://communications.tufts.edu/marketing-and-branding/social-media-overview/
#:~:text=Social%20media%20refers%20to%20the,Instagram%2C%20LinkedIn%20and
%20YouTube%20accounts. Retrieved: 11/19/22).

In this study it refers to the platforms that the business use to promote and sell the
product or service.

Market a means by which the exchange of goods and services takes place as a
result of buyers and sellers being in contact with one another, either directly or through
mediating agents or institutions (https://www.britannica.com/topic/market. Retrieved:
11/19/22).

In this study it refers to the new way of selling the product or service to consumers.

Type of Business means the legal form of organization of a corporate parent or

recipient corporation (https://www.lawinsider.com/dictionary/business-
type#:~:text=Business%20Type%20means%20the%20legal,proprietorship%2C%20or
%20limited%20liability%20company. Retrieved: 11/19/22).

In this study it refers to either the business is merchandising, manufacturing, or

service.

Years of Existence means the count of the number of calendar year

(https://www.lawinsider.com/dictionary/number-of-years. Retrieved: 11/19/22).

In this study it refers on how long the business is operating. Either 1-3 years, 4-6
years, or 7 years and above.

Monthly Income means the gross countable income received or projected to be

received during the month or the monthly equivalent
(https://www.lawinsider.com/dictionary/monthly-income. Retrieved: 11/19/22).

In this study it refers to the income of the business every month.

Review of Related Literature

The need to survive and the competition are the main factors that has been pushing
the businesses to always search for the best alternatives existing in the market. In 1978,
before the World Wide Web (WWW) technology came, for the first time has been presented
social media in the so called BBS (Bulletin Board Systems), which was an application that
has made possible the change of information within the already existing networks and has
been developed by Ward Chrisensen and Randy Suess for the Department of Defense of the
United States. Until the discovery of social media we have had a chance to see an
advertising on TV for example and get informed about the product, but we never had the
chance to express our opinion on that product and change information between ourselves
about that product.

According to Sisira Neti et al (2011) when you can share your opinion, photos,
content, views and when people can communicate with each other is known as ‘social
media’. She also defines the social media by dividing into 2 parts, “social” which has to do
with the communication people do with each other and the “media” is defined as the way
how we send information into different channels.
 People have been afraid to leave their homes since COVID-19 because they are
afraid of coronavirus (Chaudhary, 2020). They even hesitate going out to buy their needs
and wants. Because of the lockdown, some people resort to panic buying to avoid the
spreading of COVID-19. Afraid of being infected by the COVID-19 caused many customers
to shift their purchasing habits from offline to online shops/stores. As a result, in the face of
the pandemic, many people prefer to buy online rather than offline. Furthermore, Guthrie et
al. (2021) explain how online purchasing behavior evolved during the COVID-19 crisis.
Because of the fluctuating demand during the pandemic, many specific stores reduce their
product sales. In response to the COVID-19 crisis, some manufacturers and retailers are
shifting and changing their product mix. Due to high demand, shoe manufacturers for
instance have decided to produce facemasks (Roggeveen et al., 2020). Because of the
pandemic, many stores converted to online stores, as many people then prefer to shop
online. Furthermore, with the help of other online shops, more people discovered that online
purchasing is convenient and that, in addition to purchasing facemasks and alcohol online,
they can also shop for different products online.

Consumer attitudes and personal preferences also influence their decision to shop
online. Those who understand online shopping as more relaxing (Swinyard, 2003) or more
efficient (Li et al., 1999), particularly when compared to in-person shopping, are more likely
to engage in this behavior. Those who enjoy shopping or consider themselves impulsive
buyers, on the other hand, are more likely to shop in person (Cao et al., 2010). This
decision is also influenced by one's trust, familiarity, and attitude toward technology. For
example, (Lee et al., 2017) discover that people with a positive attitude toward technology
are also more likely to shop online. Past experiences also influence one's likelihood to buy
goods online; a positive past online shopping experience increases the likelihood of
engaging in this behavior again (Dijst et al., 2008; Farag et al., 2007).