I have a secret to share with you… but before I spill the beans I want to give you a little backstory. If you’ve been following a long for a little, then you may remember that I quit my dream job 6 months ago to pursue a business that I haven’t truly shared with you yet, because I wasn’t quite ready. For the past three years, I’ve had a side hustle business. That’s right. Between getting pregnant, full-time job, wife, twinning, blogging, I have always dreamed of owning my own business that was m i n e… So I did. This is the story of how I turned my side hustle into my full-time career. *Deep breath in* Here we go!
Let’s Back It Up
I had a dream job for the past 11 years. I worked at a place that I loved, that I learned a lot and had the ability to really fine-tune my knowledge on fashion, retail, strategy, social and sales {on top of so many other things}. It’s easy to get complacent when things are really great – even if the challenge isn’t there any longer. I’ve always been drawn to social media from a technical perspective, so I decided to share my thirst for all things bridal, so I started @Bridal_Vogue. For almost four years, I’ve shared what’s inspiring me, an unadulterated perspective of designers who are amazing, tips/tricks for brides to be and it blew up. Organically I started having people ask me what I was doing and could I help them on their social media {people outside of bridal}.
Things Escalated
I started with a sunglass company – one client at a time, writing in different tones. Posting. Sharing. Writing. Creating. Posting. Targeting. Sharing. Learning. Studying. Obsessing. You see how this could escalate quickly right? One client, became two as people talked – a lot. As I learned in real time, the business grew and I was relentless to grow it – even through the birth of the twins – because I knew there was something here and something within me. They grew, I grew, it grew. I keep referring to my side hustle as an ‘it’, because I kept evolving and what I was offering evolved. I balanced Mom-ing, wife-ing, being a good employee for my day job.
My life looked a little like this: I’d wake up at 5 and work from 5am – 9am for my business; go do my day job from 9am-5pm; work on my business from 7pm- 11/12am. By the way – and I do think this is worth mentioning – I never dropped the ball at my day job. I remained the top producer for the 10 years I sold in the company, because I loved them {where I worked} so much. Okay not-so-humble brag over.
Year Two + Year Three
In year two of my business, I wanted to take it to the next level and push myself harder. I loathe the word influencer and blogger – I’m going to go with content creator, okay? If you can believe this, 10 years ago I had asked my Dad to snag theeverydayvogue.com handle, because I always wanted a blog and finally felt ready. So layer that on now. Photoshoots, writing, social for me, for clients, my day job, being a wife, being a Mom {and of course not in that order}. Every single day till fast forward to May 2019 and I couldn’t fucking handle it anymore, I needed to invest in me, so I did and I quit.
The Leap
I’d be lying if I didn’t admit, it ate at me. The idea that I was going to have to make a decision to leave my day-job, but sometimes you must bet on yourself 5000% and I did. I jumped in – stilettos first – and have been a machine ever since.
The Reveal
So what the fuck am I doing? The it I keep referring is my business, because it started to take shape. It is a Social Media Agency and her name is The Media Socialites and today I have launched my business website – themediasocialites.com. What does that mean ? From establishing brand tone to creating content and executing on that brand’s tone and vision, I do it all on every channel – Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn + Youtube.
What I’ve Learned
I think sometimes there’s a misconception that you need to know all the details. In school, we are taught that we need to write out a business plan. We need to know exactly what we want and what step we need to take to get there. I’d say, you need to have a lot of focus, a lot of self-motivation and explore the parts of yourself that are scary. If you have an idea, explore and try until it sticks.
Do you want to learn more about this journey as I grow my business? I want to share what I’m learning, how I’ve learned from mistakes and more with you, so tell me!
Till next time-
P
xo