Jeannine Morris, The JM Collective - Cosmetic Executive Women

Throughout her decade long career as a multimedia journalist and influencer, it’s safe to say that Jeannine’s learned a thing or two about branding and marketing. From red carpet reporting during the Emmys with E!, to sharing beauty and wellness tips on the TODAY Show, The Doctors and Wendy Williams to name a few, Jeannine is a dynamic force and personality.

Through her blog, which reaches tens of thousands of women each month, she has worked as a spokesperson with venerable global brands such as DKNY, Estee Lauder Companies, L’oreal, Conde Nast, Hearst and Time Inc. and starred in commercials for Herbal Essences, Dove and Meaningful Beauty. She also contributes to sites such as Refinery29, Women’s Health, Harper’s Bazaar, Allure and more.

Behind the scenes, she consults for beauty brands and has worked with Proctor & Gamble, L’Oreal, Unilever and Reckitt Benckiser as well as NYC based public relations agencies such as DeVries Global and Lippe Taylor. Her passion for helping aspiring entrepreneurs and professionals encouraged her to launch a new passion project, The JM Collective, a boutique branding and marketing consultancy for professionals in the beauty and wellness space, as a natural evolution in her career. As a branding expert, marketing strategist and consultant, she enlists a carefully curated team of experts to help bring visions to life.

Q&A with Jeannine

1. How did you get into beauty?
My dream in college was to write for a women’s magazine and when I saw Cosmopolitan had an internship opening in the beauty department, I jumped on it. I immediately fell in love with investigating ingredients, interviewing experts and seeking out trends. Six months later, I began my job there as the Editorial Beauty Assistant and still today, I can’t see myself working in any other industry.

2. Why do you love indie beauty?
As a journalist who’s always looking to create fresh content, I find indie beauty to be exciting and intriguing. As a branding and marketing consultant, I’m passionate about working with start-up brands that I truly believe in from an editorial point of view and find great reward in helping them grow and putting them on the map.

3. How can you help indie beauty brands?

My consultancy, The JM Collective, specializes in branding and marketing strategy and execution. I cater proposals based on specific brand needs and budgets in order to help cultivate specialties, build awareness and expand clientele. Our services include, but aren’t limited to: fine tuning mission statements, logo and website design, copywriting, social media strategy and content creation along with execution.

4. If you could give indie beauty brands one piece of advice, what would it be?

Capitalize on your point of difference. The beauty industry is an extremely cluttered space and without ad dollars, a celebrity spokesperson or ground breaking technology, it’s hard to stand out.

5. What is the best piece of advice you’ve gotten?

The best piece of advice I’ve ever gotten was to be patient and persistent, but never pesky. It’s a fine line, but as an entrepreneur, persistence has opened many doors for me. And while patience hasn’t always been easy, it’s important to realize that dreams don’t come true overnight.