**5. Findings**

The findings are presented in a narrative form. This is because they are from my personal experience and reflection. My narration is structured to first provide a background including outlining the objective of my business. Second it outlines the products of my business. Third, it explains the use of social media applications. Finally, I conclude with my reflection on the influence of the social media ecosystem on my business.

In the last quarter of 2018, I started an online shop on Etsy. I had planned to start earlier but I delayed perhaps due to procrastination. The idea of starting an online shop originated from conversations with my extremely practical sister. She was selling handicrafts on Saturday markets. I thought it took a lot of energy from her hence I suggested that she should explore a way of selling online. Being practical, she immediately started to sell online. Her online business picked up. As it did, she gradually stopped going to the Saturday markets. She found more time to spend with her daughter. As her online business kept rising, I shared strategies from theoretical understanding of the information system (IS), but I never practiced anything. It was until I saw the benefits and gains she was getting that I was personally prompted to start my own online digital shop. My objective was to get income and build capital. I had gained insight and considerable understanding of business from her experience. She also linked me with people who she had met through social media. I manage to source items following her example. My business strategy is a digital business strategy, which is a fusion of IT and business strategy [35]. Thus, for me, the IT strategy is the business strategy. The digital business strategy was informed and influenced by my research in IS.

In Etsy, I sell handmade products from Ghana, Zimbabwe and Tanzania. The products include different types of handwoven baskets such as baby bassinets, laundry baskets, handbags, buckets and wall hanging basket decors.

My business significantly relies on different social media applications, which enable different functions for my business. From the outset I knew that I would need to use different social media applications because I knew one social media application could not do everything. Also, I wanted to get the synergy by using different social media applications in combinatorial fashion. In my business I use WhatsApp to communicate with local artisans. For marketing and promotion, I use Pinterest, Facebook and Instagram. For Logistic and tracking I use ParcelsApp. Whereas, for financial operations I use Wave, PayPal and internet banking applications. Wave enables people to send money to some African countries and the recipient receives their money on their mobile wallet such as MTN. There are other applications which send money to Africa, but their cost structure is different. Wave deals with exchange rate but other applications such as World Remit charge

#### *Social Media Ecosystem and Its Influence on Small Business Strategic Practices DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.95058*

a percentage which can reduce or take off the profit margin of the business. These applications work as an ecosystem, a change in function of one application changes the whole structure and strategy of the business. For example, in December 2019 Wave was unable to send money to Tanzania. With that inability, it was hard to pay for products from Tanzania and consequently I thought to change my operation strategy. For example, I thought instead of shipping from Tanzania to ship from neighboring countries (Kenya or Rwanda) but this would increase the costs, which could affect my competitiveness or make it impossible to sell. My competitiveness to sell depends on my process design and the context that is created by the social media ecosystem. Similarly, when the Covid-19 Pandemic started it was difficult to ship due to flight cancelation, only DHL could ship but it was too expensive and this prompted me to cancel operations in other countries apart from Ghana, where DHL shipping was reasonable. The business process is a two-way highway - one is money/cash and information flow from the consumer to me (merchant) to supplier (producer/artisan) and the second way is the product from the producer to the consumer. The portfolio/context of my social media applications (ecosystem) needs to support this process in a perfective way. In other words, a change in context changes my business process, efficiency and strategy.

When my business started to grow, I wanted to sell on other platforms such as Facebook and Amazon. In Facebook to integrate any app one needs to have more than 2000 followers, I had to do so and managed to integrate my Etsy shop with my Facebook page. Nevertheless, after doing so I realized that it was not effective. It was difficult to sell products on Facebook which has lots of potential buyers. The affordance of Facebook Shop Page does not facilitate quick sales in that potential buyers may not see the products as visible as it could be. Considering that, I tried to register for Facebook Marketplace only to find out that it is limited to America. I tried to sell on Instagram, which is also connected to Facebook, but I was also not able since it only allows big selected brands from the US. After failing to do so I managed to register on Amazon UK, which also offers the opportunity to sell in Europe. I was not able to sell lots of products perhaps because I am new, and my pictures are not very sophisticated. Hence, I tried to register on Amazon.com. However, Amazon did not allow me because of my nationality. This is an example of how I strategize, by trial and error. Through it I have learnt different barriers as well as enacting ways to process and strategize my business.

In reflecting my own experience as briefly described above, I have come to appreciate the importance of what I call 'soft infrastructure'. Unfortunately, 'soft infrastructure' is an ill way of referring provision of human services from more common recognized hard infrastructure [36, 37]. Thus, it is difficult to define soft infrastructure because its intangible, hard to measure and often described in a subjective and qualitative way that may not be easily understood (ibid). Therefore, by soft infrastructure, I mean intangible facilities that enable successful operation of my business. This includes things like bank details, identity information, postal address, national and international policies, and software applications. For instance, sometimes we can be on the same platforms but due to differences in identity such as nationality or location, size can be limited. This is due to the way those platforms are structured. For instance, a small business can fail to register because it cannot fill a required field that is not oriented to their context. Sometimes, network issues and even cost for maintaining platforms is a factor hindering small business from exploiting social media platforms [8]. Different contexts, for example countries have different institutions which have different arrangements and agreements. Thus, although social media platforms are global, access to some services from these platforms can be constrained due to different institutional arrangements and agreements. Thus, the ecosystem of application can enable or constrain a

business strategy for a small business. My business has been successful because of the information and technology developments which are occurring in Africa. Most of these developments in information and technology are recent, perhaps less than two decades. For example, most local artisans do not have bank accounts, but they do have mobile wallets. Thus, the money I transfer goes straight to their mobile wallets in the cell phones. This sort of transaction I cannot do with my UK bank. For example, I cannot transfer cash from my UK bank account straight to the mobile wallet in Africa. I can only do that via social applications such as Wave to a mobile wallet in Africa. If it is sent straight from my UK bank account, the only way is to go to another bank account in Africa. This would have been an impediment since it is often the case that my local artisans in different countries in Africa do not hold bank accounts, yet they all have mobile wallets. Technological progress makes it easier to send to mobile wallets because the money is received instantly and with the notification on both phones. Further confirmation and acknowledgement of receipt is done through WhatsApp. Thus, the ecosystem of social media creates a context that facilitates business. Lastly, my business has thus been successfully due to access to soft infrastructures in the developed world as well as some of the developments that are taking place in Africa. Thus, my business strategy operates in overlapping contexts of the developed and developing world.
