Today we’d like to introduce you to Jamie Kinser-Knight.
Jamie, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
When I was growing up, my grandfather and my parents were always self employed business owners. I got my entrepreneurial spark and rebellious spirit from them. I went into theatre, studying at the University of Texas at Arlington from 2000-2006 but at the same time, I also took almost all of my electives and extra hours in the advertising and marketing department because it always sparked my interest. Theatre is a very self-starting craft. Most times my friends were starting up their own theatre companies or launching our own productions so we could have the freedom to do things our own way. Thus, I learned in my early 20’s that I didn’t have to wait for someone to hire me to start doing what I wanted to.
Upon graduating, I moved to Austin and quickly hatched a plan to start a theatre with my friend, musician Brandon Brown. We decided to raise funds to mount our first season of productions and file our 501c3 paperwork by doing a summer concert series, because, well, it’s Austin. Austin = live music. By the end of that Summer in 2008, live music was all I wanted to do. When the theatre’s location had some complications out of our control, I moved back to Fort Worth and dove headfirst into the music scene.
I had made great friends with Lucky Tubb, kin to country music legend Ernest Tubb and started an artist management and booking company, the highlight of which was managing Lucky during his tour with Hank Williams III in 2010. Incredible fun. This led to a short stint at another local booking agency before I started my own concert promotion and artist management company with my husband, Aaron Knight, in 2011. Blackbox Concerts was an integral part of the growth of the FW Music scene for the next five years, winning Best Talent Buyer in the Fort Worth Weekly three times consecutively.
After suffering burnout from the music business – too much financial risk and too little financial reward and way too many nights in bars, it was time to move onward and upward. My friend Bryan Blue and I had been arguing over pop culture and politics for years anyway and he had the itch to start up a radio show in 2015 called The Bryan Blue Show. We jumped in and learned a ton about the radio business. We had a good show on our hands but needed to figure out how to make it into a successful business model. This led Bryan and I to spend the next four years of mastering online marketing. I left our agency, The Blue Knight Agency in November 2018 to start Firecracker Agency, a boutique online marketing and content creation firm.
I’ve built up my skill set to include website development, marketing strategy creation and video filming and editing. Right now, Firecracker is a small company with 15 amazing clients from across Texas. In January 2020, Bryan Blue and I reconnected and are preparing to launch The Blue Knight Show in the Spring of 2020. The Blue Knight Show is a DFW focused entertainment and comedy radio show/podcast that will feature a-list guests and national touring comedians as well as local segments on sports, barbecue and of course, theatre and live music.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
I doubt entrepreneurship is ever a completely smooth road. I’m grateful for the people who have helped me by teaching and employing me. I struggled in regards to coming to terms with who I am compared to the traditional “business” person. I worked hard to be self-employed for many reasons, one of which was to control my own schedule. However, I would have tremendous anxiety about not being up and working by 9 am every day. I’m a night owl; my brain is active most from about 11pm-4am. I easily get twice the amount of work done working a 9-5, but the OTHER 9-5, pm to am! Letting go of how I think things should be and appreciating what makes me unique was my biggest struggle.
So, as you know, we’re impressed with Firecracker Agency and The Blue Knight Show – tell our readers more, for example what you’re most proud of and what sets you apart from others.
My company, Firecracker Agency, is an online marketing content creation agency. Today online marketing is all about creating valuable and interesting content for your audience – quite a lot of it to really stand out from your competition online. We’re best known for making great quality custom videos, websites and copy for social media and blogs.
I’m proud of us for innovating ways to maximize our client’s content production in a way that keeps their costs down and saves them time. We have methods of collecting a minimal amount of knowledge from an expert (such as the veterinarians from an animal clinic) and then multiplying it to create videos, blogs, social posts, web copy, memes and podcasts. I’m also very proud of our reputation as an honest company. We work in a field that has a reputation for taking advantage of business owners who are not tech marketing savvy. Firecracker has saved business owners tens of thousands of dollars by being honest and never over-charging just because we could probably have “gotten away with it.” We’re highly ethical.
So, what’s next? Any big plans?
My 2020 goals are threefold! I will be adding two more employees to Firecracker Agency by the start of the 3rd quarter of 2020, a full-time administrator/ project manager and another multi-talented copywriter and graphic artist. Next, I will be focusing on the growth of The Blue Knight Show. We want to make a strong radio program/podcast for DFW people that is super funny and highlights DFW businesses, local politics, bands, comics, and charities. Third, my goal is to finally kick off the vacation rental real estate business I’ve been strategizing for a year now.
Pricing:
- Websites, starting at $250
- Custom Videos with Shoots, starting at $500
- Blogs and Copy, starting at $100 per article
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.
firecrackeragency.com/ - Phone: (817) 318-6744
- Email: Jamie@
firecrackeragency.com - Instagram: https://www.
instagram.com/ firecrackeragency/ - Facebook: https://www.
facebook.com/ thefirecrackeragency/ - Twitter: https://twitter.com/
Firecracker_Tex - Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/
biz/firecracker-agency-fort- worth - Other: https://g.page/
FirecrackerAgency?gm
Image Credit:
Director Parada
Kasi Daine
Pete Rearden
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