Today we’d like to introduce you to Lauren Brown.
Lauren, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
My story honestly begins in 2005, when I launched Lauren Brown Media right before Hurricane Katrina, I decided to leave my safe and secure job in advertising and commit fully to building my own business as a media producer and publicist. For the next three years, it was great; however, once the economy started to turn down in 2008, I lost my largest and most reliable client and saw the writing on the wall. For many of my clients, my services at the time, which included building out MySpace pages for noncreative brands looking to break into social media and find new client leads using social media, were a luxury they could no longer afford. (Yes, I said Myspace!)
This led me to return to my undergraduate education which I had abandoned after running out of money to finance it following my Sophomore year. Because of its amazing history and a program and department fully dedicated to older and returning students who had experienced an interruption in their education, I chose Spelman College and was accepted into the Pauline E. Drake program. During my interview for the program, it was the first time I had received true professional validation on all I had accomplished as a professional and an entrepreneur at that time. Not only that, my interviewee assured me I could build on those accomplishments as a student at Spelman and I certainly did. During my time as an undergraduate, I was hired as the first Social Media professional by any HBCU. I was tasked with developing Spelman’s first social media policy and also launched their Twitter, YouTube and Facebook presence. I had the tremendous honor of personally training Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum, who later was named one of the top college presidents on social media. Additionally, StudentAdvisor.com named Spelman one of the top 10 colleges using social media, a huge accolade at the time as we bested our bigger and more well-known neighbors like Georgia State, Georgia Tech and the University of Georgia.
Having this incredible role at Spelman during a time when even social media platforms were still figuring themselves out gave me the opportunity to experiment with what worked and didn’t when it came to developing content, tracking metrics and also communicating with a multitude of constituents, which in our case ranged from faculty to parents and students, alumni and prospective. It’s unquestionably laid the foundation for the work I do today and also led me to another phenomenal role at the college, working in the Digital Moving Image Salon under its founder Dr. Ayoka Chenzira. This is where my media writing game really got stepped up and I learned the importance of communicating vividly to an increasingly visual culture.
Today, I provide my clients with a range of writing, event and media production services that often include what I call new media PR or event social, where we use the social web to find and influence new audiences or take local events live and to the world wide web.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
As I like to say, nothing worth having comes easy and if I’m being honest, most of my struggles were internal, if not financial. As a solo entrepreneur, there is often a lot of doubt about if you’re approaching clients and work the right way. Do you have what it takes to grow your business? Will the risks you take play out the way you hope? I am my own worst critic, and learning how to love myself through indecision and uncertainty have been my greatest obstacles. So much of doing well in business is having great instincts, but if you don’t trust those instincts, you’ll find yourself chasing your own tail, wondering why things aren’t working out the way you’d hoped or planned.
Alright – so let’s talk business. Tell us about Lauren Media– what should we know?
This is funny question, as I often think of my business in terms of what I like to do and what I’m good at doing. They differ (LOL).
What I do is develop content, written or visual, events and strategy that helps my clients find new audiences and outlets for their product, service, personality or brand. I try to focus on finding clients who are creatives, disruptors, and innovators, as many times what I’m suggesting are new and maybe even untested routes to achieve client goals. I specialize in pushing clients to think outside of what they’ve tried before when it comes to communications strategy and execution. However, I know for a fact what we do best is Event Social, people always comment on how we make events come alive and how they felt like they were there, even though they were in their car on their lunch break reading the tweets.
Is there a characteristic or quality that you feel is essential to success?
Have I been successful?!
Success is an ever-changing and fleeting goal from my perspective, there was a time when I felt successful because I could make my own hours or wake up at noon, and of course, lots of entrepreneurs measure success in financial terms or on revenue.
Success for me in this moment looks like an eagerness of new partners curious about the work and wanting to learn more about how I do what I do. I have a teachers heart and I often tell clients, I’m successful if they don’t need me anymore, because I’ve provided them with the tools, skills, and strategies for them to fly on their own.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.prbylb.com/
- Phone: 8185700363
- Email: ISAWLAUREN@GMAIL.COM
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/isawlauren
- Other: ABOUT.me/laurenbrownjarvis
Image Credit:
All images owned by Lauren Brown + LBMEDIA
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