Letran Senior Squires Executives Club facilitated the first part of its Business Forum Series entitled Marketing in the Field of Social Media

John Paul Vidal

SATURDAY, September 18, 2021 - To train aspiring entrepreneurs for their business skills, the Letran Senior Squires Executives (LSSE) held a Business Forum entitled, “Marketing in the Field of Social Media” via Google Meet and Facebook Live.

The event was kicked-off with a brief introduction of the emcees, coordinators, and their 2 great speakers: Mr. Bont Bryan Oropel and Ms. Baninay Bautista, famous content creators and Youtubers. It was then followed by a prayer and the singing of the National Anthem.

Assoc. Prof. Eric N. Awi, PhD, gave the opening remarks and discussed how social media is being considered as one of the best platforms to establish a business or a source of income. “It is such a golden opportunity to be able to execute different marketing strategies in social media,” he added.

The Business Forum circulated with a series of questions from the audience and answers from the speakers to highlight the subject being discussed.

“I recommend social media especially Facebook as a source of creating opportunities,” said Mr. Oropel, creating an atmosphere to open the discussion.

Mr. Oropel and Ms. Baninay started mentioning the growth of social media as a platform and how people are able to utilize this growth to their advantage in marketing. They told how they started from promoting different products and advertising them on social media to earn a reasonable amount of income.

“Mostly we advertised products with the help of our friends,” they stated.

Mr. Oropel even talked about how he started out not knowing about marketing and social media or how they even work. “Social Media provides a lot of opportunities, starting by finding out how it works, and being able to catch up with the latest trends to match up with the products you plan to sell,” remarked Ms. Baninay.

Moreover, advertising truly is a critical aspect of the flow and sales of your products.

“What is it that truly made you want to start a business?” Justine, one of the masters of the ceremony, asked the two speakers.

“We found a place that we loved and adored, we started from scratch then we visualized and planned the possible outcome of the place and from there we began to build things up one by one,” Mr. Oropel and Ms. Baninay answered. They also added that they still had many obstacles when they were first starting the business like having a lack of knowledge about it.

“Do something special or unique, be unique and stand out to attract customers and promote your products, create a song or a jingle!” advised Mr. Oropel.

They entertained some questions from the participants such as: “How do you come up with the contents that you publish?”

“Mostly, I just go with the flow of how my life goes and use it as content that people would be interested in,” Ms. Baninay answered. She also stated that when she made her first content, it wasn’t that successful. Hence, she made that experience as her lesson and since then, started creating content that would be much more interesting to the public.

Ms. Baninay further stated how social media is like a double-edged blade since information on social media spreads like a burning fire. “Whether it’s good or bad, the content will be spread wisely,” she added, implying that it’s really inevitable and that social media has both its ups and downs.

Furthermore, they said how business permits are another hard part of establishing a business. According to them, it was one of the complicated things that they had to go through as they needed to travel to the mayor’s office and get permission from different agencies and such.

The pandemic ruined Mr. Oropel and Ms. Baninay’s business from getting 100% on their sales, dropping all the way to 10%. Fortunately, they were able to push through the pandemic and are now doing fine.

“Don’t give up because there will be many more opportunities that will arise and help you go through any obstacles that are in your way,” they advised the audience.

The two speakers also mentioned that customer loyalty can be attained by maintaining good quality of products and services. Through Mr. Oropel’s experiences, the seller’s attitude is one of the few important factors to gain customer’s trust and good impression.

They advised future entrepreneurs to not gamble too hastily and recklessly, that if they are too hesitant or scared then they should manage how much they are willing to invest. It's okay if it is in small amounts, just follow whatever makes them happy.

The business forum successfully came to an end as Mr. Isaiah Samson, the Club Adviser of the LSSE, gave the closing remarks.

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