We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Kiana Taylor. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Kiana below.

Kiana, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Being a business owner can be really hard sometimes. It’s rewarding, but most business owners we’ve spoken sometimes think about what it would have been like to have had a regular job instead. Have you ever wondered that yourself? Maybe you can talk to us about a time when you felt this way?

Wow, That is a really good question. I actually quit my last job the end of 2021, in a truly uncertain time. I worked the luxury retail industry and was all too familiar with working long hours, holidays and weekends with little control over my time. Holidays were the worst. My family lives in Memphis, TN. Whenever I would want to go visit, they would only be able to give me a day or two to go and it just wouldn’t work. I lost alot of family time over that and it caused me alot of emotional distress. It truly stressed me out. You come in contact with so many different kinds of people and ironically thats the only part I miss. Its only on the slower days where I think, “Maybe I’ll just get something part time”. Then I remember all the times I had to turn down clients because I had to work and couldn’t handle the workload.

Yesterday I woke up frustrated because sales have been lower than usual. I contemplated jumping on indeed to find some contract work to bring in additional income. My face was all scrunched up walking into my office. Then it clicked. “This is MY OFFICE”. I decorated it the way I wanted. It was my Office Day! I used to have them at my last job but that office wasnt MINE. In that moment, I recharged myself and got to work on a strategy to increase my sales.

I say all of that to say, I have my moment as an entrepreneur and human, but I wouldnt trade being a business owner for anything in the world. The freedom I’ve gained is priceless. The Influence I create with that will be IMPACTFUL.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Go After Your Wildest Dreams

I’m Kiana Taylor and I the Creator of Pretti & Boss Lifestyle, but we are more than just another lifestyle/social influencer brand. We Are The Wholly Trinity of Shoppes for Girl Bosses. Our focus is supporting girl bosses in 3 Main Areas of Their Life: Business (Entrepreneurship), Bawdy (Health & Fitness), Brains ( Mindset & Motivation)

Business (Entrepreneurship)

For My Girl Bosses I am excited to assist them as their Online Business Manager/Virtual Assistant. My employment background has been in retail sales and management for over 5 years. However in the last 7 years I’ve worked in social media marketing, content creation, and business administration. I combined those skills to help take care of the less glamorous tasks for female business owners; giving them back the most precious thing TIME!

My favorite service is offering Customers Service or Sales Support. Imagine not having to take your clients calls for simple questions and updates. It allows my clients to refocus on more income producing activities.

I handle things like invoicing, email management, sales consultation, customer service support and more.

I have provided sales and customer service training to teams of 10 or more.

I recently took on my first million dollar credit repair client. I onboard all new clients and work as a consultant for his mentorship program. My role is to contact hot leads who are interested in joining the program and vetting each to be sure they are a great fit before getting enrolled. Once enrolled i assist with facilitating zoom sessions and communicating via email to students and current clients.

Bawdy (Health & Fitness)
PBFits Sole Purpose is to help inspire other women to make healthier decisions in their life. I began my fitness journey after the first year of Covid. Like many I gained over 20 pounds and lost confidence. I started to workout and eat healthier. I share this information with Girl Bosses so that they remember that Taking Care of their bodies is also apart of their businesses. If you aren’t alive who is going to take care of those businesses and your legacy.

We have fitness planners on Amazon. There are beginner friendly workouts available on our website, with more coming soon.

Brains ( Mindset & Motivation)
PBInspiration is super important to the brand! Our primary goal is to inspire women to go after the lives that they desire depending on what that looks like for them. We are like the biggest cheerleader! We have a group called Pretti & Boss Lifestyle on Facebook that is set up as a social space for women of color who are seeking motivation and inspiration to become their best and highers selves.

What else should we know about how you took your side hustle and scaled it up into what it is today?

My side hustle was making flyers/ social content for business owners and content creators.

When I first started, I really didn’t know what I was doing, and I didn’t think I would be doing it for other people. So, what happened was, I started my own internet radio station. It was called Fabb Femme Radio. It was super dope and girly! I didn’t know what I wanted for flyers. So the first few flyers of mine, I paid people on Fiverr and a friend recommended another designer. Eventually the cost added up. As a business owner who wasn’t turning out alot of projects, I had to make some changes so I didn’t go into debt funding my business. So I started doing my own flyers. I watched so many videos on Youtube.

I started with using Postermywall.com It was super easy. It gave me a good understanding of how other design platforms would work. I’d post my flyers and people would ask who did them for me. When they found out it was me, they would ask me to design social flyers for their businesses. I still work with two of those clients almost 4 years later.
I still create template for the platform as an additional stream of income.

Then I Fell In Love with how much freedom I had with Canva. I started to get more requests for my design services and they were coming back pretty often. I worked a 9-5 and service other business owners. I was busy to say the least. I not only continued designing website templates, business cards, and social flyers; I taught a masterclass to other business owners who wanted to learn to create their own content.

Have you ever had to pivot?

Prior to quitting my last job, I had been working on my own personal development and making efforts to take better care of my physical and mental health. The pandemic helped me to re-align with the things that were most important. I was able to market my business more and take on more clients, I was back working out, and spending countlesshours on Youtube learning new skills. Things were going well and then I had to go back to work.

I immediately remembered why I had to have a plan to go full time with my own business, and it had to be soon. I was tired of having to request time of for doctors appointments and to spend time with family. I knew if I was dedicated and disciplined just like I was when I walked into work everyday, I knew I would make the income to take care of myself and more.

I decided that I would quit after Thanksgiving so that they had time and coverage when I left. I cared. I ended up staying until December 2020. December 2020, I decided to quit my job. This is during a raging pandemic. I physically and mentally couldn’t do one more day. My boss and I had a disagreement and I just said I Quit.

The very next day I cried and panicked. I couldn’t believe I did it. I had no choice but to make it work if I didn’t want my wife to struggle with handling everything alone. For the first 3 months I made more than enough to cover my bills and the last 3 months I made almost a years salary and was able to see my family without having to ask someone to take off.

I took a risk to make something I knew could work… work.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.prettiandboss.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/pbsociallife
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/kianaloraye
• Twitter: www.twitter.com/pbsociallife

Suggest a Story: CanvasRebel is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.