Shriem Agarwal, a 17 year old food blogger from Kolkata has garnered many applause for her blogging. She has done many crash course, took a lot of collaborative workshops worldwide. Recently she has been awarded as the best food influencer 2020-2021 by influencerquipo from Mumbai. She also took a variety of workshops related to food, baking, food garnishing etc, in the course of her blogging journey. Interview Times had a conversation with her, below are the excerpts,
Q1- What motivated you to start food blogging?
ANSWER: It was a very random thought during the lockdown phase; I love food, content creation and baking. My passion lies everything related to food and baking! My mom and my passion were the driving force. It really motivated me to start food blogging, create content, motivate people to start and take the charge. I feel everyone should follow their heart.
Q2- How did you source ideas for your content?
ANSWER: I source ideas from everything. What I eat, what I wear, what I see! I draw inspiration from the people I look up to and add my uniqueness to it. It’s all about how we utilize our time and resources. I try to make the best out of what I have. Having said that I do feel a little lost at times and that’s normal for us as creators at times blogging, commitments and personal life can get a little overwhelming.
Q3- What did you manage your time for blogging?
ANSWER: Being a student and having studies also as a priority, having my own personal life apart from my work at times is really overwhelming. I personally feel journaling, setting targets, making a TO-DO list and making sure that you tick off everything from it, managing time efficiently is the key to success if one dreams big! To be honest that works for me. I would also like to add that when one is passionate about something or wishes to reach greater heights in life be it time or anything once manages it pretty well as the force behind it is so strong.
Q4- What message do you want to share to our readers?
ANSWER: I would keep it short and simple, be real, and authentic! Become a leader and not a follower. Don’t think what people will say or if they judge you. We have all sorts of people. Post what you love and think is apt; don’t ever go for quantity but for quality! A PRO-TIP never copy or imitate someone, always remember “if copying is a way to success everyone would have been successful” – SHRIEM
Q5- What will be your easy tips to people who want to start food blogging?
ANSWER: I would give simple yet affective tips:
1-Be real
2-Find your niche what are you good at? What are your hobbies? And so on..
3-Post quality and not quantity
4-Engage with your audience
5-Promote and do things which actually make you happy and you think your audience will enjoy.
I think these 5 key points can make you an amazing blogger. Gradually things find its place and one starts growing.
Just one thing- “TRUST THE TIMING OF YOUR LIFE”
Q6- What are your hobbies?
ANSWER: My heart lies in everything related to food, baking, and its industry be it anything. I love to study and go in depth of why are we eating something what are the nutrients involved. In short I love to decode food. I like to study nutrition, health and a diet, life a person should follow.
I love to dance, travel explore and experiment new things in life, gather as much knowledge as I can, art, and creating content let me make it simple social media is also a part of my hobby now as I love creating
Content meeting and working with new people as I feel it really adds a new feel and freshness to our work and lives.
Q7- What difficulties do you face during food blogging and how do you overcome them?
ANSWER: I feel I was pretty nervous that will people accept me? Am I good at my work? Can I do blogging? Like a lot of apprehensions a young 16 year old had. I didn’t know how to reach my audience, how to work or even collaborate with brands seriously people think I joke on this but I was like a kid when I started off and starting growing as the page grew. The Instagram algorithm was quite bad since I started blogging and now its even worse. It sometimes gets demotivating but then the passion and the love for my work and Instagram pushes me to do more. Competition was yet another difficulty which I faced as I feel everyone is doing something or the other and at the same time some have made their mark in the field too so as initial bloggers the two things which constantly revolve are ACCEPTANCE and TRUST.
I did overcome them and still struggling a bit, but now the love of my audience is enough to keep me going. 2 things which helped me overcome were:
1-Motivation and believing in myself
2-Hardwork and consistency
Q8- What is your future plans regarding food blogging?
ANSWER: I wish to grow my page as a brand and blog, open up a café which is every food lovers dream, get successful in life, take food to another level, addressing important topics and promoting budding bloggers, bakers and food enthusiasts on our page, start a youtube channel which my instafam wishes me to do. Actually there are a lot of things in pipeline lets see and hope for the best.
Image Courtesy: Shriem Agarwal
