We recently connected with Symone Lenard and have shared our conversation below.

Symone , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to have you retell us the story behind how you came up with the idea for your business, I think our audience would really enjoy hearing the backstory.

Whenever I’m asked about the beginning of Journee Beeauty, I’m overwhelmed with gratitude. It was 2:30am, June 26,2021 and I was in my bathroom scrolling through my Instagram. I remembered thinking about how overwhelming the beauty community can be for us Black beauty influencers and wanted to create a lane specifically for us. I was absolutely nervous because I wasn’t sure if I’d be received by other influencers since the beauty world is extremely over saturated, but I kept thinking about the endless possibilities of creating a lane for all women to feel comfortable and beautiful while wearing makeup. The problem is many makeup brands aren’t catering to the needs of Black women and I wanted to dedicate my brand specifically to Black beauty influencers, such as myself, to feel like they have a place.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

My name is Symone, but everyone calls me Ming. I am a wife, makeup artist and CEO of Journee Beeauty. I service anyone with a beauty need who enjoys spicing things up whether it’s adding new products to their makeup collection or simply needing a listening ear while sitting in my chair. Journee Beeauty specializes in top tier products that represent both elegance and quality. Our logo is a bumble bee which means “great news is coming soon” as we know our customers will always feel great after using our products. We have lipgloss, eyelashes, eyeshadow and other accessories for our Beeauty Babes to feel comfortable and beautiful in their day to day activities.

I am most proud of the reviews our Beeauty Babes have given us. Having being in business for 2 years, we have been blessed with consistent growth and positivity from our customers. To read only positive reviews is impeccable and knowing there is not one person to leave a bad review after purchasing our products is a blessing.Mostly because I didn’t know if people would support a micro influencer in this beauty world. But God. What helps is my strive to communicate. I communicate with my clients and customers, giving them a sense of comfort in knowing they are in good hands shopping with us.

For potential Beeauty Babes, I want you to know I am with you all the way. When you sit in my chair, you will feel pampered and relaxed knowing you are in good hands. When you shop with Journee Beeauty, you know your lips will shine like never before, your eyes will sparkle, your skin will look absolutely flawless and overall quality will meet elegance.

How did you build your audience on social media?

This is such an amazing question and I’m asked this quite often. So, currently I have over 5,000 followers on Instagram and let’s just say it took me years to get there. I would post once a day and use a ton of hashtags just to see how far I would get. Of course, I was overlooked by bigger groups, but I continued to press through. What I will say is social media has definitely evolved over the years and now everyone is able to grow a following by posting, promoting and sharing until they go viral. For me, makeup and aesthetics are all I know when it comes to my social media presence. If your page looks well put together, people will follow you (or in the case, me).

Never get discouraged by a number (likes, views, followers etc) because I have seen people get millions of views with only 900 followers. Just remain consistent when starting to build your social media presence and don’t get discouraged. The second you feel yourself becoming overwhelmed by self sabotage (comparing yourself to someone else), you need to take a break and reflect on why you started to begin with.

When I leave the house, I promote myself and have people follow me on social media and that’s how I get clients and new customers.

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

“Remain silent. Even if it kills you”.

Growing up in a Black household, asking questions like “why “ was always shunned upon or associated with disrespect. Responses like, “because I said so” or “you don’t need to know anything other than what I said” made me believe that I could not be vocal about anything. I remember being so upset for allowing people to treat me terrible and never standing up for myself.

Recently, I had a conversation with a divorced relative who was passionate about giving me marital advice. Anyone who knows me knows I have a zero tolerance for the “perfect wife speech”. I don’t believe in perfection (unless you’re God) and typically my marriage works for us. Anywho, this relative proceeds to say my husband will leave me if I am not a perfect wife therefore I need to make adjustments to my attitude. I simply responded with, “And how did that work out in your marriage?” And it was then when they realized, they messed up.

There is more to that story which can be found at Her Journee Within Podcast. New episodes every Thursday at 11:00am PST.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: www.instagram.com/mingthemua
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/symone.ranaye?mibextid=LQQJ4d
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@Mingthemua

Image Credits
@theofficialkingel