Today we’d like to introduce you to Kimia Kalbasi.
Hi Kimia, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I want to preface first by sharing that I wholeheartedly believe that your dream job as a kid is what you genuinely want to become because you are purely an untethered soul with no association with what external factors would impede you otherwise based on societal norms. That dream job for me was to become a journalist and I think that today’s content creators emulate the modern-day journalist. For instance, creators who focus on food are like Bon Appetit or Saveur and the ones who focus on style are like Vogue or Harper’s Bazaar.
For as long as I can remember, I loved watching the news with my parents. I love keeping a pulse on world outside your own and staying connected. I also enjoy writing and loved storytelling, being told stories, and swapping stories. Bottom line, the foundation is I the desire to connect with others, create magic together, and cultivate relationships and see where they could go. Alongside my love for people and stories, I was also an avid fan of art, I absolutely loved drawing and painting as a kid and had an innate knack for creativity. I’m constantly ideating and that’s how my brain functions on the daily.
With all of that in mind, when I was 15, my parents introduced me to The Secret, The Law of Attraction. My life changed after I watched the documentary; I made my first vision board that included the lifestyle I envisioned for myself, from my creatively driven career to the desire to live in New York at some point to the charities I wanted to be a part of and donate to, to the “fake” checks I’d write and pin up on my vision board to embody an abundance of wealth in every aspect of my life.
I’ve had that entrepreneurial spirit since day 1. In my preteen years, I launched my first e-commerce site called K Baskets where I drop shipped gift baskets. I would draw made-up manga characters inspired by my unmatched love for Sailor Moon and design a website to showcase my work. I even started a mini greeting card business that I had collaborated on with my sister as a dynamic duo where I would draw and design the exterior of the card and my sister would write beautifully written poems inside every card. I even had a food blog back in 2008 called Nutri Nerd and at one point wanted to launch a soap product that would release SPF to have one less thing to worry about before leaving the house. Needless to say, I’ve experimented with a myriad of different entrepreneurial endeavors.
As I got older, I had an idea of what I wanted my life to look and feel like. I had dabbled in a variety of jobs to understand the “value of a dollar” from tutoring to hostessing and even worked at In-N-Out for a couple years before I attended UCSB. With that said, I was admitted originally as an Econonmics major but before I transferred, I switched to Communication because I thought it resonated more with who I am to my core and all the interests I had that I had mentioned before. Given my job history, I knew it was time to enter a field that would better help me figure out what I wanted to do long-term for a career.
Longest story short, after college, I accepted an offer for a full-time corporate job in tech back in 2015 and moved to SF; then halfway through it, I began to freelance for an online food and travel site on side, which funnily happened through my networking where everything surfaced full circle so I’ll share that story next before I go further.
So to backtrack a bit, not too long before college, I interned at a boutique PR agency in LA back in 2012 and one day my boss Kelley (notice the spelling of her name which is relevant to the story) took me out to lunch with her friend Kat who at the time was writing for a major magazine and had interviewed all of the A-listers, you name ‘em, she interviewed ‘em.
I was simply in awe and asked her for guidance and advice because at the time I told her I wanted to be the next Giuliana Rancic, an A-list celebrity news reporter. However, I recall Kat had mentioned wanting to get out of that scene. Fast forward to post-college, I was working my first corporate job but knew I was capable of something that aligned more with my personal interests.
One day halfway through my tenure at my corporate job, I remember prospecting and stumbling upon Kat’s LinkedIn only to see that she left the magazine and was writing for a food and travel outlet and was also living in SF. I decided to send her a warm outreach and outright asked her if I could also write and contribute to this food and travel site. I’ve always loved writing for as long as I could remember and who doesn’t enjoy the topic of food and traveling and all that comes with it? On a personal level, I had always documented wherever I was going and whatever I was doing with friends or solo, the places I would go to explore and eat, etc.
From there, Kat connected me to the editor-in-chief at the time who’s still one of my good friends to this day, Chelsea, and from there I started writing away and taking on writing assignments and accepting invites to all of these press events, restaurant launch parties, and hotel openings. One day, Chelsea forwarded me a press release for a restaurant opening she wasn’t able to attend and asked me to cover it. I was reading through the press release, and I noticed at the end, it was signed off by a woman named “Kelley” and I thought to myself, “Hmm I wonder if this is my boss from my very first PR internship… there aren’t very many Kelley’s who spell it like that,” I scrolled down and surely enough, her last name and title confirmed it and chills came down my spine. I immediately called her, and we were cracking up. To this day, she will ask me about advice on branding, social, and influencer marketing when I had learned so much from her since day 1!
I couldn’t believe how the networking came into full circle and to this day it still blows my mind. The rest is history, but this is all to say the power of networking and these full circle moments are the impetus of my career and they were only the catalyst. From there, I kept building my networking, building rapport, and showing up until I learned how to monetize what I was doing and learning more about the world of content creation, influencer marketing, and social media.
Since I was always documenting what I was up to and my adventures whether it was hanging out with friends or checking out new restaurants in the city, I was consistently uploading my experiences, and this was way before “influencers” were even a thing. My interests organically aligned with today’s social media space. One day a friend from high reached out to me and said, “Kimia, I’m so surprised you’ve never started a food blog! You go to the best places to eat.”
That’s when the light bulb moment happened — I rebranded my social media from my first name and last name to what it is today. I actually still have the notes in my phone from my iCloud where I was brainstorming quirky names to rebrand myself, from “Hungry Heart,” “Feels for Feels,” the list goes on and on. It was actually my cousin who came up with “Kimia’s Kravings” and she told me that when I grow, the term “Kravings” will still align beyond food, and boy oh boy, was she right.
I had even debated on starting a whole new page but already had a community I could build from and went with the latter. I can’t begin to explain the endless opportunities this journey has brought for me and as much as it has brought on, I’m extremely humbled grateful for all of the incredible, mind-blowing, indescribably experiences, endeavors, lessons, and people this has brought into my life, and so excited for what’s yet to come. It’s funny because it all started as a hobby initially and now it’s my livelihood. I still pinch myself to this day and it honestly never gets old, nearly 8 years later 🙂
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Despite the glitz and glamorous exterior of it all, it’s been anything but a smooth and silky road. We’re so accustomed to hearing and seeing the shiny aspects of people’s success stories but not enough about the actuality of what really goes on with the ups and downs and endless hurdles and breakdowns in between. In full candor, I believe that entrepreneurship is beyond over-glamorized, and I want to set the precedence to openly discuss the fact that it is not all rainbows and butterflies. There are mental and emotional rollers you are continuously overcoming whether that be rejections on rejections when it comes to pitching yourself to potential clients or brands for opportunities.
Or worse yet when you think you’ve locked in gigs only for them to abruptly back out without explanation or even go rogue. The inconsistencies are ironically the most consistent aspect because you’re dealing with a volatility in the sense that you get out what you put in so if you’re having an off day, it will feel like an avalanche or domino effect but that’s when we need to remain the most resilient.
We’ve been impressed with Kimia’s Kravings/kkPR, but for folks who might not be as familiar, what can you share with them about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
My business encompasses 2 main facets, 1) working with brands on paid influencer campaigns and 2) consulting companies and individuals on their social media and/or influencer marketing programs. When I work with brands directly, I am hired to create content for their digital channels and/or to distribute across my own. Sometimes I’ll create customized content packages that include posts for both or one or the other and sometimes brands will leverage it for paid ads or other marketing efforts such as newsletters, emails, website, etc. Or they will leverage my community and audience to raise brand awareness. I’ve worked with a multitude of brands from small direct-to-consumer brands to notable household names such as American Express, Charmin, Uber, Instacart, Maker’s Mark, and LinkedIn to name a few. Secondly, I also consult for brands and individuals independently on their cross-channel social strategies and help with their in-house influencer marketing programs. Depending on the scope of work, some brands will hire me to fully execute as well. I offer full services from high-level strategy to consultation calls to full-on execution and management so it’s completely contingent of the brand’s content needs, budget, and overall scope of work.
I want everyone to know that I don’t believe in a one price fits all solution but rather focus from a value-based POV. How can we best work together that makes sense for both parties? What are the top goals and objection that are top of mind? I tailor a customized bundle based on brand budget, scope of work, and overall goals and objectives.
We love surprises, fun facts, and unexpected stories. Is there something you can share that might surprise us?
I’d say it’s the fact that I also independently consul – I don’t solely work on influencer campaigns for brands although that’s how it may appear alone, as there is more breadth to my line of work. Yes, I work on a freelance basis full-time, but the influencer side of my business is only one side of it, and consulting is the other side of it. I also offer highly customizable packages from creative brainstorm sessions to helping manage influencer talent. Quite frankly, I enjoy the behind-the-scenes and less sexily deemed side of what I do, from negotiating contracts and brand deals as well as hopping on calls with clients to come up with robust creative strategies and make them come to life. This is all to say that there is a lot more than meets the eye. I also outbound and pitch to brands on a daily basis even though I receive a high volume of inbound inquiries on the daily. I actually enjoy out bounding more even though it’s more challenging, I find it more awarding because I am selectively working with the brands I want to identity with and telling them why we should work together as a dynamic duo.
Contact Info:
- Website: KimiasKravings.com
- Instagram: instagram.com/KimiasKravings
- Linkedin: linkedin.com/in/KimiaKalbasi
Image Credits
@AlisonRaePhotography
