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

Hi Imani , thanks for joining us today. Can you recount a story of an unexpected problem you’ve faced along the way?

Being in the beauty industry is not for everyone and most people who come into this field of business lack knowledge in the seasonal ups and downs of this business. My first full year of being a braider I came to realization that as the seasons change the number of clients you service will go up and down. For example: Our busiest seasons are Summer and Spring and during the Winter and Fall our clientele slows down. The reason behind this is that Winter and Fall have cooler/colder months and during this time most people are resulting to wig installs/sew ins… During Summer and Spring people are traveling and being that it’s warmer/hotter they are more likely to result to braids. How I managed to overcome this issue was switching up my marketing tools and how I marketed. I did this by running more specials during the colder months and sending out automated emails to each client in my client list and I got to a point to where the number of clients I serviced became consistent the whole year rather it was new or returning clients.

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

I have been in the beauty/service providing industry for about 8 years. At the age of 12 years old is when I found a passion for braiding hair but growing up, my mom was a cosmetologist, so I got a lot of exposure to the hair industry. When I graduated from high school in 2020 and attempted to attend a university on a full academic scholarship is when I realized that braiding hair was the calling God had for me after hearing my mom continuously say that becoming a cardo-thoracic surgeon was the calling I had for myself but wasn’t God’s calling on my life. As stated, I am a hair braider and a salon owner (The Braid Xplosion) located in Decatur, Georgia and I am known for many different things such as my neatness, my ability to work with kids of all ages and backgrounds, and my ability to grip super short hair. I am most proud of myself for overcoming all obstacles and challenges that tried to come in and distract me. For potential clients/followers/fans I am super excited to work with you all in the near future!

What’s been the most effective strategy for growing your clientele?

The most effective strategy that I have used to grow my clientele is Instagram reels. Starting out it took my quit a long time to figure out how to properly market my business and which platform worked best for me because not every platform is going to give you the same results. There will always be one platform that you use, and your engagement outweighs all the others. Instagram reels honestly became my best friend after I had a video to go viral within 4 days and as I continued to upload my videos started going viral within minutes. I have 6 viral reels on my Instagram page.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

How I built my audience on social media is posting consistently and finding a schedule that worked for both me and my followers. I experimented for weeks at a time posting at different times in the day to see what times gave me engagement. The hardest part of building your social media is if you fall short in consistency it will feel like you are continuously having to start over in gaining engagement.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://linktr.ee/thebraidxplosion
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/braidsby.mani/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Braidsbymaniii
• Other: Salon Instagram: https://instagram.com/the_braidxplosion?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=