We were lucky to catch up with Fatima Barnes recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Fatima thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Some of the most interesting parts of our journey emerge from areas where we believe something that most people in our industry do not – do you have something like that?

As I work to consult clients with beauty brands who are looking to scale their brands, generally most people will give the advice to my clients that relying on influencers, pop up shops, posting like crazy on social media, and spending all of their time with the manual tasks are the key to growth. While that’s great to get started on your journey, I don’t agree with the sentiment that just because your brand isn’t a million dollar brand that you can’t begin implementing systems, processes, & automating your business. I also do not believe brand ambassadors and influencers should be as heavily relied upon for the growth and scaling of your brand. I am more focused on helping my clients truly build brands that attract daily customers that are happy to purchase and come back time and time again therefore bringing more and more people to their business. The weight of a happy customer is so much more valuable than an influencer being paid to promote your beauty brand. While those techniques work, they are short-term and short lived. They aren’t sustainable. I believe in sustainability and building your business on a stable foundation for growth & future growth.

Fatima, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I help driven beauty brand owners change the DNA of their brands to elevate and position their business as a premium or luxe brand that consistently attracts ready to buy premium shoppers every day while utilizing strategies that allow them to gain more time and freedom doing more of the things they love.
Over the last 10 years, I’ve helped over 550+ business in over 30+ industries (including beauty) generate over 5.9 million dollars in additional revenue. I grew my own online beauty brand to six figures before deciding to walk away and help other dedicated business owners outside the corporate sector implement high level techniques to build brands that can rival and essentially eliminate their competition to stand out online.
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I’m a wife, soon to be mom to a son, dog mom—HBCU college graduate who has been able to overcome all odds by playing big, taking risks, and creating & implementing high level business strategies for myself and the women I serve.

Can you talk to us about how your side-hustle turned into something more.

Yes, I initially started The Ambition Academy while working my corporate 9-5 and consulting clients on the side. My plans from the beginning were to ensure that The Ambition Academy would be plan A and plan B. Keeping that mentality in mind became a big part of my journey and mindset for making it happen. I knew during the time of learning to master my craft on the side that I would need to nail down a plan to be able to leave my job for good to do this full-time because this was the plan for me and my divine assignment. I fell in love with it. I found myself working on it even with a 9-5 and could get lost in my craft for hours and hours (sometimes until dawn) without even realizing it.

I started to devise a plan to prepare my move. I know it’s easy to hear the stories about how people just completely stepped out on faith and quit their jobs with no plan and no real idea as to what they were going to do next but adrenaline. While I had faith and knew I was making the right decision, I felt having an exit plan and strategy was the right thing to do. I had a spouse and household to consider as a priority as well. Thankfully, I also had a supportive spouse on board that helped me to come up with a strategic exit plan to do this full time. I actually wrote my letter of resignation 6 months in faith with a date. I planned around that date. I planned to pay off any debts I had, save money and expenses for at least 6 months worth, and I did one thing many people don’t do before making this move. I got a coach that gave me a proven process to make sure that I was on the track to scale my business without guesswork. This made me feel more confident running my business as well and see results before I even left my role. It gave me the confidence I needed to walk away. Almost to the date of my resignation letter I wrote in faith, I was able to turn that same letter in and quit my job to embark on this journey that is full time entrepreneur.

I was able to scale up the brand as it is today with consistency and determination. I consistently invested my money and time into my craft and have not been afraid to put full faith into my business and that has been the key.

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

What has helped me build my reputation within my market has been my ability to show up with integrity. I believe in operating my business out of full integrity and excellence. Giving clients great experiences and helping them to yield results helps. At this time as I’ve taken some time off because I’m pregnant with my first child and my pregnancy was very rough, I’ve still had clients and potential clients reach out off of the strength of word of mouth and referrals alone. This speaks a lot to my work as I haven’t even had to rely on social media at this time. Quality will always ensure that your reputation is solid regardless.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.theambitionacademycc.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/iamfatimabarnes_

Image Credits
Antione Lever Stephanie Ramirez