Q&A

Suit: Moana Bikini

Hi! For those of you who follow me on Instagram (@robynkimb) we did a bit of a Q&A on my instastory last week. Thanks for submitting all your questions, I picked my favourites and have answered them below! Hope you likey 😀

Q: How do you collaborate with brands on your blog?

A: Having the opportunity to collaborate with brands I love on Skinny Belle is definitely one of my favourite parts of being a blogger. There’s getting to know the team behind the brand, learning more about their values, and (obviously) getting to show off what I love most… the product! So, how do I collaborate with different brands? There’s actually a few different ways that I go about it. First, it is as simple as an email. Realistically you can reach out to any company you want and say, “Hey! Love your brand, let’s talk.” Nobody is stopping you. Good old fashioned knocking on the door can get you pretty far in life. I choose to reach out only to companies who I am obsessed with, as I like to be selective on who I connect my own personal brand to 🙂 Another way I collaborate with brands is through instagram! Instagram is a fantastic platform for getting to know other bloggers, brands, and just friends in general. Start posting things you love, and the opportunities will begin to pop up before you know it.

Q: Any tips for beginner bloggers to start collaborating?

A: Just do it! Seriously… just start reaching out to companies you like. Start posting on your blog and really get to the core of what your own personal brand is. This is definitely key.

… Leading into our next question…

Q: How did you create your own brand?

A: Honestly this is a significant struggle for a lot of bloggers – the way I see it is your blog is YOU. So your blog should be filled with things you genuinely love. This is a big one for me. I never post anything on Skinny Belle that I don’t truly love… because, why the hell would you ever do that. It literally doesn’t make sense. Your authenticity will be compromised, your readers won’t appreciate it — a lose/lose situation in my books. Skinny Belle is a place for me to share all the things I love with the world. From cute swimsuits, travel photos, to recipes I am addicted to — it is all me! And that is how you start to build your very own brand. Just do you, honey boo. 😉

Q: Who shoots your photos?

A: Hah! I love this question and get it all the time. Total realness: My friends shoot for me, my mom shoots for me.. anyone can do it. Let me be clear: handing someone a camera and telling them to shoot will never compare to professional photographers. After 8 years of modeling, I can say that with absolute certainty. BUT, if you invest in a quality camera (I love the Nikon D7100) you can do a pretty stand up job on your own. Shout out to my mom for being a down as hell to take photos of her annoying daughter all the time. She always says: “Robyn, look ‘bitchin’”. Whatever THAT means.

Q: Do you edit your own photos? What program?

A: Yes! I love editing with lightroom! The program is so easy to use and super fast. Great for editing large quantities of photos. My favourite feature is being able to make pre-set filters that are easily applicable to all your photos – and can be adjusted once applied too! Super easy, and costs about $15 per month.

Q: How did you start blogging?

A: Okay so this one is a little bit of a story… I was on exchange in Prague for my last year of university. Discovered that the education system in Eastern Europe is notttttt exactly as challenging as it is in Canada (no offense to my euro friends, this was just my experience at this particular school.) My classes were 3 hours long and I was SO BORED because who can sit in one place for 3 hours and learn next to nothing? Not me. That’s who. So, I started lurking the internet…. Hard. I began finding more and more blogs that I loved, and was SO inspired by the unique fashion and different styles of writing I saw. I knew that I too needed my own little spot on the internet to share the things I love. So the planning began. I actually took about 6 months to plan out my blog, everything from how it would look and feel to what my core message was going to be. The first version of Skinny Belle was designed by me and painstakingly coded by my friend who was so kind to make a website for me. It took a long time, but I was SO happy with the final result. I used the first version for my two years, and switched to this new one about 6 months ago. The new look of Skinny Belle was curated to be a more visual space to share the things I love! Having a blog has been endlessly rewarding for me, and I am looking forward to getting to know more and more of you over the years to come 🙂

Okay that’s all for now! Hope you guys found these answers useful, if not, hope you were at least amused by them. ?

Talk soon!

x,