Mediaboss Marketing

When the pandemic flipped the world upside down two years ago, working women were among the most negatively affected. Today, they're part of a new class of entrepreneurs who are changing the small-business industry with their pursuit of social media and unique quarantine hobbies turned careers.

One in four women considered leaving the workforce or downshifting their careers in the pandemic, compared to one in five men, the management-consulting firm McKinsey reported. Additionally, between February and August, mothers of children 12 years or younger lost 2.2 million jobs compared to 870,000 jobs lost by fathers, the think tank Brookings said. Lastly, women felt more exhausted, burned out, and under pressure than their male colleagues, a 2020 Women in the Workplace study by McKinsey found.

But many of these women turned despair into determination by launching their own businesses. Almost half of the people who launched companies in 2020 were women, up from 27% in previous years, found a survey of about 1,500 entrepreneurs by the human-resources platform Gusto.

"The pandemic shook up what seemed like a safe route for most people," said Meredith Meyer Grelli, an entrepreneurship professor at Carnegie Mellon. "If the thing you thought was certain your job no longer looks safe, the jump that looked like such a big risk doesn't seem so big anymore."

What's more, when we masked up, stood 6 feet apart, and closed our doors to the world, we also opened our phones. Social-media usage increased by 61% during the first wave of the pandemic, found a study by Kantar, a media-trend research platform. Women were among the entrepreneurs to tap that surge, creating businesses with little more than a passion, smartphone, and social-media account. For example, as of August, more than 53% of TikTok creators were women.

Insider found 10 women who launched companies in the pandemic to get their best tips for going viral and growing a business using social media.

See the rest here:
How to Go Viral and Start a Business on Social Media - Business Insider