We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Monique Lowery a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Monique , thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Parents can play a significant role in affecting how our lives and careers turn out – and so we think it’s important to look back and have conversations about what our parents did that affected us positive (or negatively) so that we can learn from the billions of experiences in each generation. What’s something you feel your parents did right that impacted you positively.

My parents taught me the value of hard work. One thing that always stuck with me from my childhood is that my parents worked hard for everything that we had. My dad always told us that anything is possible if we believe and work for it. Learning this at a young age inspired me to start working and making my own money as soon as I could. I started working my first job at 15. I was in high school working two jobs and passing all my classes. I developed a strong work ethic as a young person. I believed in myself and knew that I could do whatever I put my mind to. My mom would work and take care of the house. I learned about being strong no matter the storm from my mother. These teachings have helped me throughout my life, and it is what’s helped me to get to where I am today. I’ve brought those principles I learned from my parents over into my business.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I am the owner/braider of Styled by Mo LLC in Columbia, SC. I’ve been braiding for 23 years now, but I’ve been in business for 3 years. I provide high quality braiding services for women and kids. I specialize in knotless braids. When I was younger, I always knew that I wanted a career in the braiding industry, but I put that dream on hold to try other things. When I was younger there wasn’t a lot of hair braiding business owners to look up to. Back in 2019 I was working my 9-5 job just feeling very unhappy with what I was doing in life and knew that I needed a change. I knew that I was the happiest when I was braiding hair. To me braiding brings a sense of peace and I could be creative with it. One day at work I got some encouragement from a coworker who seen some braids I did, and I decided to start braiding again. I started braiding after work for the whole year of 2019. Then January 2020 I left my full-time job to braid hair full time. It was the best decision I ever made.

I like to say that I help in freeing up time for my client’s everyday lives. Having your hair braided will free up time that you normally must put into doing your hair everyday and you can use that for other things. A lot of my clients tell me that they love that they can basically get up and go with having braids. My top-quality braids can last up to 10 weeks! The thing that I am most proud of is the response that I get from clients about their hair. My clients tell me that they always receive compliments on their braids and that their braids last so long. I really care about my clients and their satisfaction. I want my clients to not only be satisfied with the outcome of their hair but also satisfied with the service that they receive. I would want potential clients/followers/ fans to know that customer service, clients experience, healthy/growing hair, and quality of the braids I provide is my top priorities in my business.

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

The most effective strategy for growing my clientele is word of mouth. I receive a lot of my clients by referrals. I always ask new clients how they found out about me. About 80% of the answers are referrals, and the other 20% would be social media. My loyal clients love to refer me out to others.

How did you build your audience on social media?

I built my audience on social media by being consistent with posting. To grow on Instagram, I learned that you must post consistently, use hashtags, create reels that relate to your audience, be personable, and most of all have fun. If you’re not having fun with it, then you will not want to keep up with it. For someone just starting with your social media presence I would say be patient and don’t focus so much on the number of followers you have. Even if you have 5 followers show up for them and your brand as if you had 50,000 followers. Keep showing up and the followers will build up.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://styledbymo3.as.me/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/styledbymo_1
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/styledbymo1