Ciera Reeves: Charting her Way in Asian Entertainment Media

Ever heard of a fan taking her passion for something to the next level and making money out of it? Society might want you to believe that living your passion may seem irresponsible and foolish but if you have your heart set on something, just go for it. One shining example of this is freelance journalist Ciera Reeves, who went from being a K-pop fan to interviewing the hottest Korean celebrities. 

Building her Niche 

Ciera’s journey has been anything but conventional. She obtained a bachelor’s degree in English and a master’s degree in Public Administration from Georgia College and State University, respectively. During that time, she began writing after co-founding an international music website owing to her immense love for K-pop, called TuneN2IM, with a friend in 2009. The blog grew in popularity in a few years and caught the attention of a Warner Bros' owned Asian media streaming and entertainment website called Dramafever, inviting 'her to write articles for them’. Alongside, Ciera also took up freelance writing gigs for K-pop music websites, such as MoonROK and KpopStarz, and content management for small businesses.  

Although Ciera’s body of work increased, and she loved what she was doing as it combined her love for writing and music, she eventually got tired of writing for other publications that did all the dictating. Ciera had found her calling doing what she loves: reporting on and writing about all things K-pop, and this was when she decided to take matters “into her own hands”, where she would not have to answer anyone about the kind of content she wanted to put out. 

All Things K-pop 

In April 2020, Ciera started her own online K-pop publication called “KpopWise”. The idea behind it was to cover K-pop artists who did not get much limelight on more prominent outlets and are still unknown on the international stage. KpopWise also provides a place for aspiring journalists to write about K-pop music.   

Ciera uses artists' social media accounts to research and provide meaningful content through her publication. K-pop artists have a very systematic way of announcing their music releases, like putting out nifty content release calendars detailing the schedule of when they will release the teasers for the album, the complete track list, music video release, and showcase information, etc. For Ciera, this makes planning and organizing content around such information easier. Many agencies also send press releases to her, which further reduces her research time.  

Wearing Multiple Hats 

Ciera is a full-time content lead at a marketing agency (Commerce Pundit), runs the K-pop blog, and dabbles in freelance entertainment journalism as well. After her 9-5 marketing job, she splits her free time between her personal life and hobby, which is maintaining her website. Outside of writing, she looks after administrative work, editing content, updating social media, working with the staff, communicating with entertainment agencies, and handling concert and press events.  

When asked to pick her favorite between content marketing and journalism, Ciera chooses the former. For her, it pays the bills, and she finds ways to keep it fresh and fun, as exercising much creativity does not happen in that area and can get mundane. On the other hand, journalism is a passion project as she has the freedom to choose what to write about, but that also gets stressful due to self-imposed deadlines. Ciera’s journalism is essentially marketing for an artist that she is covering as she employs tools to push the content.  

Tips and Tricks for Freelancers 

With over a decade of experience writing for various brands and media, Ciera advises freelancers to remember to thoroughly vet clients before accepting gigs. Figure out what is working for them and what they could improve upon so that you can provide ideas accordingly. Additionally, skills such as search engine optimization (SEO) are useful and help writers increase the reach of their content. Also, many new freelancers get sucked into taking up any work that comes their way because they want to expand their base. Instead, pick and choose good and reputable companies that also pay on time.  

“Budding freelancers should sign up for websites such as Upwork and Fiverr that have clients with verified payments to build their portfolio. Start small so that you can practice customer service and learn how to pitch yourself as the best fit for the job to receive the desired compensation,” Ciera adds.