Pitchin' and Sippin' with Lexie Smith

Journalist & Communications Pro Imani Bashir on When to Pitch a Freelancer and Creating Measurable Content Strategies

• Lexie Smith • Season 7 • Episode 127

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Journalist and communications pro Imani Bashir joins Lexie to talk about when to pitch a freelancer and how to create measurable content strategies. Imani Bashir is a media professional with over 13 years in the field of communications. She began her career in sports broadcasting, covering collegiate sports and in 2015 made the decision to move abroad. Imani has lived in five countries and has written for some of the most prestigious publications worldwide, including The New York Times, Forbes, Glamour Magazine, Travel + Leisure, and more. In 2021, she was the recipient of Adweek's "Shine 'A' Light Award" for her dynamic voice as a journalist and content within the travel industry. Today, in addition to being a freelance journalist, she serves as the Director of Communications of BEAM (The Black Emotional and Mental Health Collective).

In this first episode of season 7, Imani Bashir recounts how her experiences, from launching a luggage company during the pandemic to navigating the complexities of her current role, have shaped her approach to creating impactful content. Imani emphasizes the importance of aligning content with an organization’s mission and measuring its effectiveness through both quantitative metrics and qualitative feedback.

The conversation also explores Imani’s process for pitching and managing freelance assignments. She discusses the balance between cold pitching and responding to incoming opportunities, highlighting the importance of understanding the unique needs of each publication and editor. Whether it’s crafting a compelling story from a PR pitch or ensuring that content resonates with its intended audience, Imani offers valuable insights into the art of effective communication and strategy. 

Here’s What You’ll Learn:

  • How Imani Bashir got her career start
  • Best practices for pitching freelancers effectively.
  • Strategies to create content that delivers measurable results.
  • Insights into the evolving role of freelancers in the media landscape.
  • Tips for crafting compelling pitches that capture attention.
  • Imani Bashir's experiences and lessons from working with top publications.
  • Key factors that contribute to successful content strategies.
  • More about BEAM and their experiential learning style
  • And more! 


Guest Social Links: 


Lexie Smith  

Imani Bashir is a media professional with over 13 years in the field of communications. She began her career in sports broadcasting, covering collegiate sports, and in 2015 made the decision to move abroad. Over the eight years and five countries she has lived, she charted a path of writing for the most prestigious publications worldwide, including The New York Times, Forbes, Glamour Magazine, Travel + Leisure, and many more. She has spoken on various industry panels with the focus of expanding conversations around cultural competency and the finer points of representation. In 2021 she was the recipient of Adweek's "Shine 'A' Light Award" for her dynamic voice as a journalist and content within the travel industry. You're going to hear a little bit more about what she does today soon. So I will tee it up there and say, welcome officially to the show. Imani,


Imani Bashir  

Thank you so much, Lexie, for having me.


Lexie Smith  

Of course, so clearly you’re a globetrotter. So let's just start with where in the world you are today.


Imani Bashir  

I'm actually in Washington, DC. 


Lexie Smith  

Okay, is that home base?


Imani Bashir  

Yeah, that is home base. Yeah.


Lexie Smith  

So completely selfish, but also curious question for me, if you had to pick your favorite place you've traveled and favorite place you've lived, could you do it?


Imani Bashir  

Never, but I'll try, um, for fun purposes, I would say like, one of my favorite places on earth, I would say like, the Southeast Asia region. But if I could narrow it down, Thailand is just one of those places that has my heart, beautiful people, beautiful weather, amazing food, just it checks all the boxes, and then lived, oh gosh. So I've lived in five countries, and, like each of them have something special that that I take with me. But I would say my experience of living in Mexico, that was like, where my first my son, you know, started school, where he started to really, like, learn and engulf himself in language and have friends. And, you know, we got a chance to see that cross cultural exchange as he's been growing up. So that's been pretty fun.


Lexie Smith  

What part of Mexico did you live in?


Imani Bashir  

Cancun?


Lexie Smith  

Cancun. Okay. I mean, I've been there in a tourist capacity, and it was lovely.


Imani Bashir  

Yeah,


Lexie Smith  

it's definitely different when you live there. But very cool. Okay, so when you're not working, which we'll get into all that stuff quickly here. But what do you like to do for fun outside of work?


Imani Bashir  

Yeah, travel is a big part. Like, even if it's just a staycation, I tell people all the time, like, travel doesn't necessarily require you to have to have a passport. It could be I've done, a staycation at a hotel that's walking distance from my house. It just gave me an opportunity to just, you know, be elsewhere. So I love to travel. I love food. I consider myself a self proclaimed foodie. Like, if food's involved, sign me up, please. Um, and then, yeah, I mean spending time with my little guys, spending time with my son, like, kids are always fun, because you get a chance to, like, really see you know yourself a little bit, and then things that are not yourself, and you're like, wow, because especially these kids now they're so advanced, and he's a stem baby. He loves science, tech, math, all that fun stuff that I'm not really that great at. So he teaches me a lot of things.


Lexie Smith  

How old is he?


Imani Bashir  

He's seven.


Lexie Smith  

He's seven. Okay, so he can comprehend that, I have a two. I guess she's almost two and a half. Now, I don't know when that happened, but she is, my mom says is a little bit of karma because she's very sassy and very opinionated, which is good but very challenging to deal with. So my mom's saying, I'm getting a taste of my own medicine, which makes her happy.


Imani Bashir  

Yeah, it's an interesting thing. Like my son is like, I always say, I'm like, You're such a know it all. Like he believes, like he's got everything down, like he's been here before. He's like, No, Mom, don't worry, I already know this. I'm like, but we've never even seen this. We've never been here. But he's like, but I know, and so that's been challenging for me. Of like, I obviously want to keep his ambitions high, but also it's like, well, it's okay to learn sometimes, like, it's okay to learn new things, and, you know, that kind of thing, and it's for so 


Lexie Smith  

Well, I love the confidence that is a that is a pro so, and he's probably gotten that because he's watched his amazing mama do all the things. So let's, let's do, let's go into that. So I like doing what I call career cliff notes on the show. It's pretty loose, but it's just give us a quick overview of what came before today.


Imani Bashir  

Yeah, absolutely. So I got my career started in sports broadcasting. So I did sideline reporting for college sports, and I would do that year round, and I think going into like my fifth year of broadcasting. I just had this like feeling of, like wanting something different. I didn't feel like I was necessarily ascending in there, you know what I mean? And I really wanted to go into TV, and I was interviewing at like, TV networks, and it just wasn't, it just wasn't aligning, and I don't know, like something just spoke to me one day, and was like, You should move abroad. And I was like, Well, let me look into this. Let me, let me, let me see. And I started joining like Facebook groups, and found someone who was living in Egypt at the time, and she was like, hey, it's really pretty easy to get a job here. You can get a teaching job. Um, you know, cost of living is great, etc. And I bought a one way ticket. I think I planned my movement like 30 days. I bought an a ticket, and I didn't even have a job lined up when I landed. Do not recommend that. I do not recommend that. But thankfully, I went to a school like the next day, interviewed, and they gave me 10th and 11th grade English literature to teach. I had never taught before. Prior to that, let's see, I had 150 students in total. Okay, never teaching before that, okay, but it was, it was fantastic because it got a chance for me to kind of like, use a lot of my communication skills. I wanted to get to know my students. I wanted to get to know the culture. I wanted to learn. And that was my first opportunity to learn a new language, and really how to navigate just, you know, cultural immersion, one on one, really. And then from there, I wanted to talk about, like, what I was experiencing. So I created a blog, and it was called, she is abroad, and it would just, I would write, like, different articles about, you know, my experience of just being just out in the world, and that turned into freelance writing. So I would write for different publications and just, you know, my experience, and then eventually I get invited on press trips to be able to write about these experiences, what it's like, you know, living in these places, traveling to these places, writing about different hotels and other, you know, excursion type of experiences and that kind of just expanded, and then eventually, like, really just honing in on, like, the more communications and marketing side, really getting into social media and Really working in conjunction with different brands. So I've done content for, like, traveling, leisure, Airbnb, Trip Advisor, just kind of like different things. And I'm like, Oh, I really like the social media side. And then that brings me kind of into, you know, where it is that we are today.


Lexie Smith  

Okay, let's go there then. And I also, I want to say you missed a big part too, because didn't along the journey you like, oh, side note, launched a company. Oh, by the way,


Imani Bashir  

So yeah. So during the pandemic, I remember, because at the time when the pandemic hit, we were living in Wuhan, China. So Wuhan is like the epicenter of covid 19, right? And so we ended up displaced in Malaysia, so we kind of obviously not knowing what's going on there. The rest of the world is carrying on. Asia's still trying to figure it out as a, you know, as a whole conglomerate. And so we were there for a little while, and I just remember us having, like, so many bags, and just, you know, I'm like, there's just so many bags. And the brainchild for the takeoff collection, which is a multi functional luggage line that I created, that's where it was founded. It was like, How can I condense these steps, especially for parents, because I would travel a lot with my son, you know, as a one to one without his dad. So sometimes, like, I would have to travel, or my ex husband will have to travel ahead of us, or things of that nature, and it would just be me and the little guy. And I'm like, oh my goodness, I have a baby bag, a stroller, a carry on. And, you know, this life, you know? And it's like, it's so many and so I was like, yeah. And originally, the brainchild of it was like to create something for parents. And then when I realized that a lot of other folks found usage in and I was like, Oh, pretty cool. So yeah, I got a chance to, you know, see how that worked. Did really great, but it's just a matter of, like, funding and all the other things. But I'm very, very much proud of that, and I'm in the process of rebranding.


Lexie Smith  

I mean, it's just no small feat at all, so I wanted to make sure we added that in there. And I will say the that pain point, I've done a fair amount of domestic travel with my daughter, but my husband and I took my at the time, 18 month old, to Tokyo and Korea with 10 pieces of luggage. I mean, that's inclusive of like the baby back, it was absolutely ridiculous, and we had to navigate trains and like she like, it was insane. So the pain point is very real, and I will keep an eye out for the rebrand. But okay, so let's go back to today. So what are you doing today?


Imani Bashir  

So currently, I am the Director of Communications at an organization called BEAM, and it stands for black emotional and mental health collective. So I am tasked with it's a brilliant team who works to really give the vision of the organization the core of what it is that we do is Healing Justice work. It's much more radical than just like self care type of things. It really tackles the hardcore issues of mental health within the black community, and making sure that we resource our communities with training and programs and also with funding. 


Lexie Smith  

So there's a couple of questions that I have here. First, according to LinkedIn, it's a fairly, relatively new role for you, right? Yeah. Ish, okay, so actually great, because my first question is, coming into an organization with such a profound cause, how did you even go about beginning to wrap your brain around tackling what a strategy would be? Was it like I'm gonna meet with all the key stakeholders, or I already know, or they gave me a strategy I'm now just executing it. Walk us through that process. Because that moment when you're whether you're starting with a new client, it could be, you know, a new account or a new job. Like, that's a big undertaking.


Imani Bashir  

Yeah, it's huge. And to be honest, Lexie, like, I just completed my 90 days. So I just completed my remix. Yeah. So like, still new, still learning, but in my first 30 days, we had the biggest conference that they have yearly. So it's called Black healing remix, and it has hundreds of participants that come. We have a lot of great people that are on panels as speakers. We have Tabitha Brown this year, and Courtney B Vance, Angela, well, I don't want to just bog him down to being Angela Bassett's husband, but that's also a plus for him. But, you know, he's an actor, and he has a book that is about suicide that he wrote in conjunction with a with a doctor, and so, yeah, there was a lot of moving parts. Because one, it's like when you settle in the role, you kind of want to sit and learn for a second, but I had to kind of hit the ground running. So it was kind of like learning and doing simultaneously. I think the core of what BEAM stands for is something that is a is a personal passion of mine, and something that I truly believe in. So I think it made it a little bit easier. And we're not just talking about like the day to day task, because that's where it gets. Like, you know, a little chaotic sometimes, but just like being able to connect the vision and the mission with my own personal values, and being able to sit from the lens of like, okay, as someone who really believes in this type of work, how can we then convey this message to an audience, making sure that I spoke to our executive director who founded the organization, like, what was your brainchild behind this? What is the ultimate goals of the organization? What do you want to see from the communications department and just identifying those key bits? Because, you know, when people found find a company, obviously it's going to shape, shape shift over the years, but just making sure it's still on task with what the overall vision is going to be. So, yeah, it's been like meeting board members. It's been, you know, talking to people who have been in the nonprofit space for a really long time, you know, in comparison to me, and being able to merge that, you know, bit of information that I've been able to retain, and then also getting to know my team, getting to know how it is that they work, and finding out what systems work for us to be able to really be dynamic in our messaging,


Lexie Smith  

Really, I mean, and to your point, in 90 days, you're probably still in the strategy development process, I can imagine it's, I mean, it needs to be dynamic these days and ever evolving something else. Because, like, clearly, I'm a LinkedIn nerd right now. It's like a moment in my life. I told you I found you on LinkedIn, and I'm going to reference it one more time, because there was something when I'm I'm doing my research, right? I'm doing my due diligence, and a line on your LinkedIn says that you ensure the development of content that engages audiences and leads to measurable action toward healing justice. And that made me pause, because if measurable action isn't a pain point for PR people at General, I don't know what is. And then you layer on a next another level there, it's not like sales, right, which is a little bit more trackable. I'd love to just see. And this could be, again, a very active thing. You're still working your brain around. But how are you approaching that part of the job, and how can you mesh again?


Imani Bashir  

That's a great point. A lot of times we talk to the people in which we serve, um, so we get a lot of commentary from people who partake in our training and programs in real time, because we do some programs virtually, but a lot of the work that we do in the training and program side is very much on the ground in communities. And so for us, the majority of the people will tell us, hey, we found you through the website, we found you through the Instagram, we found you through whatever. And so when we take that day. And we're like, Okay, in this sample size of people that we've talked to across four cities, the majority of them said either they found us on the website or they found us on Instagram. Those are two of my areas, right of communications. And so when we know this, we're like, Okay, now, what is our target market outside of people that are looking for mental health resources. What are their age groups? What are their demographics? Majority of people are going to identify as black American, and that's okay, but we also know that there are going to be other demographics of people who are looking and so it's kind of that conglomerate of still like in the work, but in the works, but still just identifying like, because we know that these are the places that people are going. One, we want to make them aesthetically pleasing. And then two, we want to kind of just pay attention to like. What do our analytics look like, and do they look a little bit higher when we are showcasing that we have some training and some programs in their specific cities? Is it lower as a result of this type of content, and just kind of figuring out how to measure what people are actually looking for when they come to our website, what are they clicking on? What information are they trying to get, what tools are they actually using or sharing? And so, yeah, it's still a work in progress, but those are some of the measurable aspects. It's really just going straight to the people, as opposed to trying to assume what it is that people want. 


Lexie Smith  

I love that and thank you. Thank you for sharing that breakdown. You know, we have people this. This show has become something that I never I never knew what it would be, but we have such a diverse range of listeners, from entry level to seasoned pros to the media side to the comm side. And I like hearing kind of the inner workings of someone like yourself, which we're gonna shift our hat in a second here, to another part of you. But I just kind of want to recap two things I'm hearing as a deliverable or a lesson learned for everyone, no matter what stage of career you're at, is one. There is some things. There are some things top of funnel, you can track a website visit, for example, right? That makes certain people who are obsessed with metrics happy, but the other side, and I think the really powerful side of comms and PR is what you're doing, and that's the more qualitative side and checking with sentiment. And I think it's harder for some boardrooms to understand, but I'm glad to hear that it seems like your organization understands the value there for people wanting to learn more. Because if this was a five hour show, I'd go 500 levels deeper here. But it's sadly, it's not. Where can they learn more about BEAM?


Imani Bashir  

Oh yeah, absolutely. You can head to our website, at BEAM, dot community, and then also, you can see us everywhere. We're on LinkedIn, your favorite place, Lexie. We're also on Instagram, Facebook, and we are on Twitter at underscore beam, org. That's underscore B, E, A, M, O, R, G,


Lexie Smith  

Awesome. And guys, we'll put that in the show notes, but it's B, E, A, M, too, just in case. Okay, we're gonna, we're gonna put on a different hat, um, and we're gonna talk to Imani the travel writer, which, by the way, the positioning of your personal website is brilliant. You guys, if you're looking how to position yourself, or a client that's, you know, multifaceted and has a lot to them, she did a really good job. It's like, Imani, the trouble writer, Imani the reporter. And I was like, This is so easy for me to follow, so thank you. But we're gonna go into that lane putting on that hat right now, in your writing world, what types of topics are you covering? 


Imani Bashir  

So one of the very last stories that I covered, I got a beautiful opportunity to go to Hawaii for the first time ever, and I covered an event called FestPAC. It's the Festival of Pacific Islander culture, and there's a lot I realized I don't know about Pacific Islander culture, so I was a sponge. I was like soaking up everything. I was eating all the Pokeballs, and I was just really ingratiating myself in just culture people. I got to plant a tree, I got to go surfing for the first time, I am a water girl, and all of the experiences were just very, very magnificent. It's really hard to describe. So, you know, these days, I really wanted to focus more on that cultural, immersive part of travel and how it is that one we can be better as a travel community to other communities. Hawaii has gone through a lot of things, a lot of shape shifts and a lot of changes as as has many places. And so I've tried to be that catalyst to somebody that's had the privilege of being able to go to so many places around the world and say, Hey, like, you know, in addition to your vacation, you know, also like, think about the surrounding communities, the local community. So a lot of my work these days is obviously slower in the process of, like, where I used to be when that was, like, my full time, you know, gig and freelancing. But yeah, I'm very intentional these days about what it is. That you know that I want to write about, and I want to write more, and have continued to write about more about people and culture and just immersion. 

Lexie Smith  

Yeah, so let's talk about your process. And I think maybe there's a two part answer to this, because to your point, you do have a full time job, so like on top of your other full time job of being a mom, right? I never think we give ourselves enough credit there. Um, what is the process right now look like for you in story development, story assignment, for example, like, do you you know you're just in the assignment stage, your editor's reaching out. Are you so cold pitching? Talk us through what that looks like?


Imani Bashir  

Yeah. So I do a combination of both. I'm very thankful to get. And I remember like starting my freelance journey and hearing about writers, you know, having editors email them and ask if they want to write stuff. And I'm like, oh, must be nice. And I've gotten to the point of my career where occasionally I do get editors that were like, Hey, we were thinking of you for this piece. What do you think? And then sometimes it'll be a PR agency that represents a destination or a specific event that's like, hey, you know, we love your work. Would you be interested in covering this? And then sometimes it's cold pitching, sometimes it's like, I have an idea. So the process, you know, really remains the same. Like, I always try to be, if I'm not being reached out by an editor. I try to remain, you know, true to, okay, where's the best place to place this specific story? Where do I feel like the audience is going to get it, where it's going to matter, where it's going to make sense for the publication. I think that's the pitching process overall. These are the things that like when you're pitching editors that you always, constantly have to think about, do they already have this stuff on the website, has it already been covered? And why are you going to be the person that's going to cover this, right? And so just being very cognizant of conveying those things when I'm in the pitching process, and then once I know that I've gotten a yes, it's really just kind of crafting the story and identifying. I remember my Hawaii story, I could have gone like another 1000 words Lexie, to be honest, but it's like really having to be concise with the wordage, especially, you know, the editors, like, Okay, you only got 750 and I'm like, I can give you 1000 you know what I mean. But you know that's, that's a part of it. It's, it's really like having to identify, like, what's the real meat of the and potatoes of the story that that you really want to hit and just align it with your editors, and understand that you know you can trust their direction as well.


Lexie Smith  

Okay, I want to go into one lane of those scenarios, because I think you know to your point, like we would all love if editors came to us, but that doesn't always happen until you're at a point in your career like yourself. So I want to look at this situation a PR agency, you know, representing a tourism board, comes to you as a freelancer, pitches you this idea. What do you do? Do you respond to them now? Do you go and try to find placement, then get back to them? Like, what is that in between look like?


Imani Bashir  

So I always try to make sure that it aligns. I get pitches all the time, like, a ton of them, and sometimes it's like, I don't do that kind of work, like, I don't, I don't write in that area, and that's okay too. Sometimes I get a moment to respond, and sometimes I just get too many that it's like, okay, that's just, you know, something that I gotta bypass. But when it is something that I feel like aligns, or if it's like, you know, a PR company, potentially, that I've worked with before, and they, you know, we have built that trust in in either situation, whether it's new, or have a built in trust. Yeah, I started thinking about, Okay, which one of my editors do I know would really like take this story? Because after a while, when you've written for certain publications, you kind of know their style. You kind of know like, because PR people write in a salesy type of way, in a sense, sometimes, but editorial requires that you don't, they don't want to sell, unless it's like commerce, or unless it's something that has an affiliate, or it's, it's an ad attached. It's like, we don't want the salesy part. So you have to identify, like, how you would be able to convey the story. Or, specifically me, I would try to figure out, how would I be able to convey this story without selling people on it in terms of, like a salesy way, but more so enticing people to really want to say, I want to go there. I want to be at this particular hotel or destination or part of this surgeon. So I kind of build from there of like, okay, once I get the pitch, who does this go to who would this be really good with? And sometimes that requires pitching multiple editors, which I caution folks to always let your editors know that, hey, this might be if it's a timely thing, I'm pitching this other places. Just want to see how you felt about it. If it's not timely, take your time with it. Do one editor at a time, follow up in not record time, but like, follow up when it makes sense, and then see if it aligns. If it doesn't align, go down the chain of like, seeing, okay, where, where next Can I pitch this? And that's kind of just like my process.


Lexie Smith  

I think it's really helpful to hear on multiple sides of the coin, for those who are listening, who want to be in freelance but also for publicists too. And kind of. So figuring out your only times and your own expect expectations in this whole process, and understanding that when you go to freelance, which I mean, is more and more and more and more common, and I think we're it's not it's going to keep going that way. It is like there's a step in the middle there is, and so we have to factor that in. So thank you for kind of breaking that down. And hearing that you get pitched a lot is not surprising. But I always for everyone who does pitch, I like to go into a rapid fire preferential question lineup of sorts. There's no like right or wrong, but basically what you prefer to see and not see in your inbox. So question one, is there a date of the week you prefer to be pitched or not pitch? Like, avoid this, or I love them coming on Mondays.


Imani Bashir  

I actually don't mind, just keep them coming


Lexie Smith  

okay, I don't mind just keep them coming. What about time of day? 


Imani Bashir  

Time of day same, because I know, and sometimes I get PR companies that are pitching me from outside of the US, so I understand. 


Lexie Smith  

Okay, that's very nice of you. And fair and true, this was actually really relevant to what we were just talking about, lead time. So how far ahead of a story do you want to hear about it?


Imani Bashir  

Oh, that's a great question. Oh, I would say, especially if it's a trip related, I have to, like, go somewhere in order to create this story, give me at least 90 days. Because, you know, there's travel involved, there's bookings involved, like, the minimum, I would say, like 90 days. And I understand sometimes there's a tight window there, but yeah,


Lexie Smith  

90 days for trips and less, if not, assuming,


Imani Bashir  

if not, if it's, if it's just a story potentially could use, like you just need to get sources and things of that nature. I think 30 to 60 days is a good lead time for me.


Lexie Smith  

Okay, let's see here. What about pleasantries? Do you like when someone you don't know takes a minute to kind of prove they know you say something nice or skip it. Get straight to the point, um,


Imani Bashir  

I hate to say both. I hate to say both, but I love why I do this? Yeah, I love both. And here's why. With the people that get straight to the point, I'm like, they really have a job to do, and they're getting straight to it, and they, they they can get there, yes, and they can get there No, and they can move on. Or we can continue with, you know, with, with moving on, with, with this particular story, the people who kind of, like beat around the bush with it, um, or or pleasantries are fine. I would just rather know as much details up front. Like, if there's like a requirement that I secure a byline for this particular story, I need you to tell me immediately. 


Lexie Smith  

Okay, actually, that tees me up great for the next question and assets you want to see in that first pitch? Like, do you want photos? Do you want media kits? Do you want visuals? Do you want everything, or do you like we'll get to that.


Imani Bashir  

Um, not necessarily everything. If it's trip related, I would say, give me a proposed itinerary for sure. Um, let me know, potentially, where the accommodations are going to be, what that might look like. But no, not everything. I think ultimately, the most important thing for me is like the framing of the story. Like, what are you looking to see from this? Like, here's the idea, or here's the client that we represent, and hear the potential ideas for the story that we're kind of looking to get from a writer.


Lexie Smith  

Okay, awesome. Are you pro or anti follow ups?


Imani Bashir  

I'm pro follow up just, I would say, because the because. As a writer, I follow up as well. But I always, if it's not something timely, like pressing, I always give, like, a full week, if not a little bit more to follow up, because I know people's inboxes, things get, like, crowded, and so I just give the respect to say, You know what, I'll follow up in a week. And traditionally, I think that that is a good


Lexie Smith  

practice. Okay, great. And then last question on this little series, brand slash founder versus publicist. So do you have a preference of who you're hearing from? Do you want to be or No, like I'd prefer if it was coming from an agency or, honestly, someone in house I respect more.


Imani Bashir  

Oh, that's a great question. Um, I. I've enjoyed hearing from in house, and reason being is because when you have the third party, sometimes things might get convoluted on what the asks Are and the actual expectations of the deliverables. And me as the writer, sometimes if I can go straight to the source to let them know what's possible and what's not possible, it works. You know, it works that way. But I love publicists who get it. I work with publicists all the time. I work with PR folks all the time. And there are a lot of folks who are extremely efficient at what it is that they do that they're like, don't worry. Got this. And they get all the details that's necessary to convey to me. So I feel like it's just really a balance of, if you can convey that what your client wants like specifically, so that there's not like room for any doubts, or room for me to leave anything off the table, then I'm fine with my PR folks, perfect


Lexie Smith  

key. I think the key there too is PR folks who get it right.


Imani Bashir  

Yes, yes.


Lexie Smith  

This is a quick squirrel, but I have to throw this in real quick. Sometimes I get pitches from PR agencies. I think it's probably because of this show today I opened a pitch from a PR agency. And first off, there's this giant photo of a girl I went to high school with, which is bonkers. This is a random agency in New York. I'm from Portland, Oregon, and I'm like, that is Ashley. I went to school with her, and they were pitching her as a source. So I responded. I was like, I'm not a journalist. Like, best of luck. Slash, I went to high school with her, but that publicist probably should have done a little bit more vetting before sliding into my inbox. But, you know, wishing her all the best.


Imani Bashir  

Absolutely, that vetting process is so needed. You're right,


Lexie Smith  

so important, okay, most, arguably, most important question of this entire show, okay, we've talked about pitching, what can we find you sipping? What is your favorite beverage? Can be non alcoholic or alcoholic?


Imani Bashir  

Oh, my goodness, this is going to be so funny, because I have it right here. But if extra sweet tea, I swear by it okay when I'm overseas, or when I got overseas, I will pack it in my check bag. I just I'm a sweet tea girl, and I know you can make it at home. You can do I don't want to do all that. This gives me, like, my sugar fix. It gives me my caffeine fix. It gives me just all the all the goodness. But that's it. And then a close second, because I don't necessarily drink alcohol, but I love me a good, like, mocktail, Mojito, okay,


Lexie Smith  

Okay, I'm also I love that. It's like, at the ready, like, totally okay, amazing. Sweet Tea. Pure Leaf. Shout out. Feel free to slide into my DMs if you want to sponsor the show an episode. Hey, what? I'm sorry, Mojito. I very much enjoy mojitos myself. My family grows or my parents grew mint. So when I became of age, I got a lot of homemade ones, and I'm spoiled, so it's hard to please see anyways, okay, so if someone has something relevant for you, it could be with BEAM, or it could be for writing. Where should they go? And are those places different? Like, how can they connect with you?


Imani Bashir  

Yeah, I would say when it comes to like, anything that's like, outside of beam, you can definitely come to my social medias, um, she is Imani B on everything, every platform that you can think of, specifically LinkedIn, especially if it's like anything that's like businessy related, work related, you can definitely just, you know, send me a private message on LinkedIn under my actual name, Imani Bashir. And then when it comes to being things, anything relative to black mental health organizations. That includes people who would like, like to send their funds any companies, corporations, donors and, yeah, you can definitely email me at Imani dot beam at, sorry.


Imani Bashir  

I have like three emails, but it's Imani. Dot Bashir at beam. Dot community,


Lexie Smith  

okay, we will put that in the show note. Guys, okay, so check the show notes and leave a review while you're there. Anyways, Imani, thank you so much for your time today. I know you're doing 5000 things, so I will let you go. You guys reach out to her, tell her where you heard her, slide in to her inbox and DMS respectfully, and just want to say thank you again, you guys, until next time on the Pitchin’ and Sippin’ Podcast.


People on this episode

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Lexie Smith

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