We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Jena Brown. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Jena below.
Hi Jena, thanks for joining us today. Do you wish you had started sooner?
I feel I started my creative career at the right time, but I wish I had the tools that people have now, then. When I first started getting into blogging and sharing my creative outlet, I didn’t know where it would go or what all I can do from it or how to utilize that platform to gain more visibility — back then most of us were just doing what we wanted because it was fun! Now, you have ALL the tools to be successful, all you need is consistency to see pretty good results. I definitely have slowed down on my consistency these days because I’m pretty bogged down with other life tasks, so my creative outlets have relaxed a bit with a content but I’m working to get it back in a good swing. As a creative, things evolve all the time so I’m definitely taking new notes on how to grow in present day, so I’m pretty thankful for that.
Jena, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
So, I’m Jena Marie — I’m an awkward lifestyle blogger of Get Jenafied and I have a social media agency, Allure Social! I’m also a mom so I’m having to now balance that job on top of everything else lol. I got into blogging because I wanted a way to express myself with my words and I didn’t know it would be something that I liked since I started after graduating from college and HATED writing papers, blogging was surprisingly fun because they were my natural thoughts but on a website. As for getting into social media, that was an interest turned career because of course we all do social media, but I was interested in the analytic side of it. Now, I help brands build their platforms and take that job off of their hands so that they’re able to focus on other things.
I’m really proud of the opportunities that blogging and social media managing have brought me, especially because I thought I needed other things to bring those opportunities to me when all I really needed was my hard work. I was able to start writing for Sheen magazine with my blogging (a pretty cool gig) and receive further opportunities there. With social media managing, I’ve worked with some pretty cool clients! Again, all things that I thought I needed a job ( honestly the main reason I started my agency, I was tired of being rejected from jobs I knew I qualified for) to land, but my work presented these opportunities.
Looking back, are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?
I wish knew about YouTube as it’s utilized now. You can learn a whole new trade on there in a week today, back then I’m not sure if it was just as useful but I sure wish I had that we can learn on YouTube today, back then.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
Completing projects! Think about all the projects you may have started, now think of the ones you actually completed! I have a lot of ideas that I want to implement, so it may take me some time to get that ball rolling, once it’s rolling and you’re doing it for yourself, you don’t have a “true” deadline (some may if they’re disciplined and keep themselves on a schedule, I kind of just put things out there hence why my consistency has declined :/) so some time is going to pass before I finish everything and put it out there. So once I have the final product published, I feel so happy.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.getjenafied.com | www.alluresocial.co
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/getjenafied/ | https://www.instagram.com/alluresocial
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/getjenafied
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/getjenafied
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLDsbMwfwIRBJApfcytsmdQ (get jenafied)
Image Credits
@itsnkenge