Hello, loves! TBH, I was hesitant to sit down to write this post.
The past couple weeks have been pretty emotional for me. I am consistently really hard on myself, and I felt that I just didn’t deliver this past year. I set so many goals for myself and didn’t reach a lot of them. I don’t want this at all to sound like a pity party, because I’m also really proud of what I DID accomplish. So check out some of my brand wins & flops of 2018!

Wins!

I worked with some new AMAZING, dream brands that I was able to share with all of you and my Instagram family.

I attended NYFW twice! I still am reeling from the opportunities I was given to attend fashion shows, meet with some of my favorite brands, and explore New York.

I hosted two brunches, attended by some of my favorite bloggers. I coordinated everything from the restaurant, to the goodie bags, to tracking content deliverables. I truly enjoy connecting creatives and really think I could pursue a career in PR/events some day!

On that note, I co-hosted a shopping event at LOFT in Chicago. We had a great turnout, everyone enjoyed themselves, and I got to meet so many Chicago bloggers and followers.

I continued to work with some of my favorite brands on an on-going basis, (PinkBlush, StitchFix, Eliza J, Maybelline, to name just a few!)

I left all of my engagement pods on Instagram at the beginning of the year. You’ll get this if you’re a influencer, but it was really important to me to keep my Instagram engagement authentic. I also was so over spending 2 hours a day “catching up.”

I joined my now partner to form It Girl Marketing, which partners brands with influencers. We’re doing really well and have already completed several campaigns! It’s so fun seeing the collaborations come to life.

Flops

I’ll just start with one of the most nagging ones first.. I did not reach 10K followers. Which was also one of my goals for 2017, so it’s doubly humbling. I sometimes feel that everyone else is just sprouting up around me, and my following is stagnant.

I actually organized three brunches, but ultimately had to cancel the last one. Four of the ten influencers who had confirmed that they would be attending backed out THE DAY BEFORE the event. The restaurant decided it was best to reschedule, since I had promised them a certain exposure. We ended up moving cross-country the next month, so it didn’t work out, and I felt embarrassed, promising things to different people and not being able to deliver. It made me think twice about trusting people to follow through.

I was in a really uncomfortable position to leave a local networking group I’d invested half a year in helping to grow, or stay and continue to be bullied, talked about behind my back, put down to my face, and vastly under-appreciated. In addition to my full-time job, and my blog, I spent 4-8 hours A DAY working on brand outreach, organizing events and brand collaborations, planning a 5 day schedule for 5 girls for NYFW, along with receiving notifications from our text chain on an hourly basis. So much time put in, but in the end, I decided it was best to part ways. I’d been degraded by the founder in public, over text and in phone calls, and was told I wouldn’t be paid until there was a half million in the bank account. All of which, I was the only one contributing to, through the brand collaborations. That was the final straw. The good thing that came from my 6 months in the group, was some indelible friendships. I’ve kept in touch with so many of the girls, and we chat all the time via text and DM, and I’m so grateful for their support.

Instagram content.. I’ll be honest, I’ve posted some things I’m not entirely proud of. The worst are ones where I feel that my creativity didn’t come through, usually because I ran out of time and resources. Especially after moving, I have to take most of my pictures myself, because I don’t know anyone in my immediate area to help, especially not photographers. Mark is amazing, but works during every hour of daylight this time of year. I really hope to connect with more photographers, and continue to improve the quality and creativity of my content.

I had several posts denied by brands. These are posts that I put so much time, thought, and money in to. They’re posts I’d envisioned in my head, gone out and purchased items to help create them, spent time shooting, editing, creating a caption for, etc. All to be told by a brand they didn’t meet the brand’s vision, because I actually needed to be standing in front of a mirror and not in a bathtub, or that the product couldn’t be shot outside. All things that would have nice to know before signing on to a campaign, and I hate how much re-shoots squash my creativity and are quite disheartening. Adding this to my list of goals in 2019… I will charge for re-shoots if the brand changes their mind after the content is shot.

I didn’t post on here nearly as many times as I would have liked. I really enjoy writing. It was my major in college, and I feel that it’s such a great creative outlet for me. Definitely something to improve on in 2019!

I think it is really important to create a goals list, and I’ll be doing that as well, but keeping it private for now. Maybe, I’ll share on here when I meet one of them!
I’ll say again that I didn’t mean for this post to be such a downer, and now you can probably see why it was such an emotional year for me!

I’d love to hear about one win and one flop that you encountered last year, or a goal you’re setting for yourself!

Sweater c/o Pink Blush // Leggings / Halogen (Nordstrom) // Booties and bag / Target // Earrings / vintage // Rings / Gorjana