Qatar has many influencers who update us with the latest happenings, tips about living in Qatar, and much more! The life of an influencer is not easy, they have to manage their personal life and social media life along with choosing and curating their next content amongst other things.
To know how they do it all, the ILoveQatar.net (ILQ) team caught up with some of the female lifestyle influencers in Qatar who love to share their passions with their followers. Let’s get to know them a little more!
Please note that the list is in alphabetical order.
Elmira Kahrobaie is originally from Iran and is a mother, wife, hotelier by training, and an influencer. She has over 16k followers and shares tips and tricks with them on beauty, lifestyle, love for her plants, motherhood, and fashion. “I try to share a little of my life every day and inspire the many women that are part of my family and daily life. It is just like sending a message to them and keeping the thousands of wonderful people in my community updated.” On finding the balance between social and personal life, Elmira says that she tries to reveal as little as possible about her personal life, respecting her family and the limitations that come with it.
She tells her followers to be themselves both online and offline. She says, “social media is just a platform to send your message to more people. Don’t use it to make another copy of yourself that is not you. Don’t compare yourself with others, everyone has a journey and steps to take towards success and achievements. Always remember why you started what you started!”
Follow Elmira here: @elmirasworld
Fatima is from Lebanon, with over 330k followers and you will find beautiful posts about fashion, beauty, and family, along with life & personality advice on her IG feed. She draws motivation from life itself, learning from her experiences in achieving dreams and succeeding. She says, "I want my daughters to be strong and not to feel afraid of experimenting in life."
On striking the balance between life and work, Fatima says, "I try to organize my day depending on what needs to be done, and I try to engage my children to work with me and ask for their opinion so they always feel they are my priority. I create special prizes for them when they cooperate with me. I always give myself a break in between work. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner as a family is a must for us to feel connected."
To keep the connection going with her followers, Fatima says "I always try to be myself with my followers, and make them feel comfortable in trusting me and as if I am one of them. I ask them what they like most about the page and what they want to see more on my page. This way they would feel more engaged with me and be a part of my big family."
"Let your family be your priority, give time to yourself to gain back your strength, be unique, and don't copy anyone else and everything else will come along" - this is Fatima's advice for people who are looking to venture into the world of influencing.
Follow Fatima here: @fatimaablog
Husnaa Malik is from the UK and her Instagram feed with over 5k followers currently is filled with yummy recipes, OOTD’s and beautiful moments with her son, Khalifa. Husnaa says that the family she built online keeps her motivated in doing what she does. “They help me stay in love with social media and also working on fun, new projects is motivating and inspiring. I’ll be totally honest in saying, I don't always feel motivated though, I have days when I don't even want to pick up my phone, then other days I'll record 5 recipes and shoot 3 outfits.”
As a new mom and in keeping her content relatable to her followers, she says “I try my absolute best to be transparent and honest, since becoming a mother it’s been easier because I am able to relate with other mamas on everything Khalifa related. I also try my best to share all the normal chores of life and not only glamorous events. My stories range from washing dishes to going full glam at events.”
For those who are planning to become influencers, Husnaa suggests, “Be genuine, be consistent, and don’t give up! Try your best to keep the momentum up and stick to it, even if you need to shoot your content in advance and have it ready to post over a couple of days or weeks. Anyone that needs help, feel free to DM me!”
Follow Husnaa here: @eatsleepbefancy
M. Gazal Shaikh is a mom, plant-lover, fashionista, and a lifestyle influencer with more than 194k follwers. She is from India and this wearer of many hats says “Keeping control over my routine helps me in balancing my personal and professional life. As we all know, this is a tough job. It’s not as easy as it looks. Especially when you try to create quality content. An influencer’s job demands a lot of time and consistency. Sometimes to create one post you end up spending the whole day. So for me, having complete control over my routine helps me a lot. I work between 11 am to 4 pm. And I don't work on weekends so I have enough time for my personal life. I also dedicate 3-4 days for creating content.” She says that her followers’ love and support keeps her going and she likes to publish content from a viewer’s point of view to keep it relatable.
Gazal’s tip for people starting off in this field is to keep it as real as possible. She says ”If it is real, keeping consistency is going be easy for you. Also know that it’s a really competitive field, apart from everything else, it demands creativity and uniqueness. And it consumes a lot of time to create engaging content. So, stick with the area you are really interested in to enjoy the process and have patience. It takes time for the results to show.”
Follow Gazal here: @iamgazal
Kim Wyatt is a well-known media personality in Qatar. She's from Australia and with over 8k followers, she popularly goes by the name - Mama Baba Ganoush. She is the host of ILoveQatar.net's Live Green and MBG food series. Kim also writes for publications like Time Out, Doha Family and Harper's Bazaar Qatar. Kim says that she is motivated by sharing information that inspires, surprises, and motivates others. She initially started her social media account to share her passion for food and travel. Today, her content has expanded to other topics and according to Kim, it naturally keeps evolving. “I’m inspired by the world around me – people, culture, art, fashion and I love sharing this type of content with my followers”, she says.
When asked about how she finds a balance between personal and social media life, she said “That’s a great question and an issue I’m still trying to figure out! I have content that is curated and stylized, but I try to post realistic images such as ‘before and after’ selfies plus behind-the-scenes stories of work and family life. For me, it’s important to have boundaries between personal life and social media life.”
Kim’s message for budding influencers is: "It's really important to define your niche and target audience so that followers feel connected to you. Stay grounded and objective. Create a list of ideas that inspire you. Social media is constantly evolving so experiment with different types of content and style."
Follow Kim here: @kimwyattofficial
Fatimah is the founder of the blog ‘New In Doha’, she has amassed over 38.4k followers on Instagram currently. Her dream and passion is to inspire people to explore more of Qatar. She was born in South Africa and has lived abroad in three continents for over 10 years. When asked about how she finds the time between personal life and work, she said “It can get tricky as being a content creator has no set working hours. I usually work seven days a week and am always on my phone capturing the moment, taking notes and asking questions wherever I am.” Fatimah’s aim is to empower New In Doha’s readers with the knowledge to “achieve a more fun, fulfilling and well-balanced life in Qatar.”
She advises newbie influencers and people who want to step into this world that “Consistency and hard work will ensure success. Don't give up! If you believe in and love what you are showcasing, others will appreciate it and support you. It is not easy and success does not happen overnight. Try new things, learn new skills, watch what those you admire are doing but always be true to your brand and what you stand for. From the beginning, decide who you are creating content for, research what they love, what their interests are, and what they are passionate about. Your target audience may change and their interests will develop over time. You will need to evolve with them. Grab every opportunity and work hard to showcase it to the best of your ability. There will be highs and lows but if you love what you are doing, followers will also love, respect, and appreciate your content.” That’s some great advice, don’t you think?
Follow Fatimah here: @newindoha
Rita Dahdah Fawaz hails from Lebanon and shares about all things family, style, beauty, self-love, and lifestyle with her 196k-plus followers. When asked about what keeps her motivated and how she keeps her content relatable, Rita said “I love to inspire others and shift perspectives. It could be something as simple as a beauty product that could be so beneficial to your daily routine, new outfit ideas that represent my own take on the style, deeper things like parenting tips, relationship advice, self-love, and how to overcome certain hardships in life. When I get messages from people telling me how much I helped them without realizing it, it keeps me going! I keep my content real and unfiltered. It’s been in my DNA since day one. I’m the girl next door with a twist. It’s that twist that keeps people interested because I have my own unique way of looking at things and doing things.”
Rita, who is also a mom, finds the fine balance between what she shares online and she says “I share content that inspires others based on personal experience without having to tell the full story. I also like to make my followers laugh by sharing moments and stories from my life. I share anything that I feel could be useful without crossing any boundaries of privacy. These boundaries differ from person to person. If I’ve been through a difficult experience, I like to advise what I’ve learned without having to go into all the details. As a lifestyle influencer, it’s important to share about our lives, but in a way that doesn’t make us feel uncomfortable or too exposed. It’s up to each content creator to know where to draw the line while still remaining authentic and relatable, and without making their family and people around them feel uncomfortable.”
Her mantra for newbies is, “Put your personality and heart into everything you do. Don’t copy what anyone is doing. Just because it works for them, doesn’t mean it will work for you. You need to find a pace that works for you. Don’t force anything or you will exhaust yourself”. And always ask yourself, “would I benefit from the content I’m putting out there? Am I enjoying putting this out there? Does it reflect me?”. Do you agree with Rita?
Follow Rita here: @riri_dada
Sabrine is from Morocco and The Netherlands and she uses her Instagram with more than 336k followers to post beautiful pictures from her travels, parts of her everyday life, and more! Answering the question about balancing personal and social media life, she says, "I always make sure to keep certain things private of my life. I share a lot of my daily life but never the intimate details. I like to keep a part of my life and family private. But I have no problem with sharing where I like to hang out, or my favorite places to visit, etc, and just small daily stuff." According to Sabrine, she has always liked to be creative even before social media, and she now believes that it has given people a chance to express their creativity through pictures and videos.
To be in line with her followers Sabrine says "Throughout the years you get to know your followers and where they are interested in the most. The most important key is to keep in touch with your followers. You can do this by having question rounds or asking questions in your captions or polls". The secret to being successful, and her advice to budding influencers is to "always be real and stay true to yourself. Your followers will eventually notice you are genuine and they will support you no matter what." What are your thoughts about it?
Follow Sabrine here: @sabrinecat
Sarah is from Egypt and her Instagram feed is aesthetically very pleasing. She shares fashion, food, and beauty-related content on her feed. Sarah found it difficult to start off on the influencer journey at first. She says, "It was hard at the beginning to find time for myself, for my studies and personal time for friends and family, but it slowly became easier to share my routine and make it a part of my content."
Sarah feels that her followers' energy keeps her going. "It is really motivating when I feel the energy of my followers through their interactions and replies which are filled with love and positivity. I love what I am doing because it makes me feel good when I make a difference in the society and I always say that if my content influenced one single person and motivated him/her, it means the world to me and it keeps me going and wanting to give more!" When asked about the key to keeping content relatable to her followers, Sarah says "The key is definitely interacting with the followers, replying to them and getting to know them. I love talking to my followers and I recognize a lot of them because they always comment and interact, I count them as friends and family so I know for sure what they're interested in and I try my best to keep my content related to what they like."
Her advice to newbies is to trust the process. "put more energy into getting to know your followers and keep the niche and content related to what they like. Don't waste time on pretending to be someone you are not. Enhancing your unique personality is the key to shine."
Follow Sarah here: @sarahbk__
Setareh or Seti as she is also known as has a following of over 200k. She is an Irani influencer based in Qatar. You should definitely check out her Instagram for some outfit, makeup, and shopping inspo! On finding a balance between work and personal life, Seti says, "my account is a part of my life and I plan for it similar to how I plan my day/week/month. They both go hand in hand, and I have very rarely taken a break from my social media life as I really feel it's my 8 hours job. She says that it started off as a hobby, "I eventually realized I can influence people (I first saw it in my smaller circle close to me). The more love I gave to my account and followers the more love I got in return. It pays back financially, morally and emotionally so why not be motivated to continue?"
Seti feels that since she has English, Arabic, and Irani followers, it is a bit hard to keep up, "I make sure I relate to my audience in all my captions and entertain them. I realize people follow me for beauty and fashion and when I get feedback saying that my account makes them feel good, it makes me happy too. That is my goal and my tip for budding influencers is - keep it you, keep it original as being original always wins. There are millions of accounts out there but nobody can have somebody's else brain! Pass on good messages, teach and learn. Don't be selfish and don't be negative. Pass positive energy to others."
Follow Setareh here: @setarehraeisi
Get to know Qatar's popular momstagrammers!
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