Being an influencer may look like a permanent vacation, but there’s more to being an influencer than just taking photos of yourself, wearing nice clothes, and posting sponsored content on your Instagram feed. This career requires a lot of hard work and dedication. Although it’s a fun job with tons of great opportunities like trips and free products, in this week’s Tip Jar feature, we discussed with Arrem Yanez about the challenges she faced as she tried to build her business while being a stay at home mom. Arrem talks about how she came over the critique and judgment she faced from not only people in her circle, but also close family and friends.
Q: What was it like building this business as a stay at home mom?
As a mom, I am always busy attending my children’s needs first before I do anything. It may look easy to some who are not home, because they don’t have the same situation as you do, but sometimes you just have to be there for your family.
I admit tho, it is nice to be able to work at home in your pajamas, when you don’t have to get ready and to be able to work at your own time and pace.
But sometimes, it also gets hard when you need that time and space to be able to think right and be able to film when kids are fighting, screaming and throwing things around you. Having kids around you while working your job sometimes is overwhelming and it could be as close as impossible to get the job done right away.
Q: What struggles did you face while trying to grow your brand, and how did you overcome them?
I was born and raised in the Philippines, so growing my brand at home and really not knowing a lot of people is a struggle. That is one of the factors I have always anticipated but I kept going.
Another is cultural background, I am a Filipino and we are very shy and get intimidated right away. There are a lot of times that I doubted myself too, if I am able to make it or if it’s easier to just quit. I tried to reach out to a few people that I know at our local church and most of them just don’t care about me and my business because they might be thinking it would not benefit them or they are just haters because they see my potential, and that I could be doing better than them.
Some people that I thought I am close too and I thought would be there to support me even mock me and told me “Good luck with that!” sarcastically, and some doubted my abilities and discouraged me because there’s a lot of bigger people out there in this industry.
Trust me, up to this date I still get them, I still get the “you’re not all that that’s why you only have that many followers.” I get it though, there are bigger people than me. But I know for a fact that there are so many other people that started like I did and they made it.
I just believe that if I keep going I will make it. I believe that I have the talent and I can make it. It might be slow for me but I am where I am right now and I just need to keep going, although like I said, I doubt myself sometimes.
I look at these people’s feedback as my stepping stone, I look at them as encouragement to do better, not to prove them but to prove myself that they are wrong. To those people who told me “Good Luck with that.” sarcastically, I told them “Yes, please, maybe I need more of that, please keep saying that.” and they stopped.
