Shivani Bafna - Influencer On Becoming A Bollywood TV Host & Bringing Authenticity to Social Media

Shivani is a social media influencer that built her following when she decided to pursue her dream of becoming a Bollywood TV Host. She spent two years in Mumbai, where she hustled with no industry connections, to become an interviewer for the Asian Variety Show. In that role, Shivani went on to interview stars like Varun Dhawan, Ananya Panday, and Shah Rukh Khan. She vlogged this journey on YouTube and joined Instagram in 2014, so it’s no surprise that she’s made it big as an influencer today. Many people know her from her viral engagement video, which has about 7.5M views on YouTube. In this episode, Shivani talks about how it felt to pursue an unstable career in a new country right out of college, and about the messy moments that led up to her success in Bollywood. She shared how her brand reflects herself and why she doesn’t feel limited to the South Asian content niche despite having a mostly South Asian audience. Lastly, she explains why she ultimately decided to leave Bollywood, come back to the US, and take the entrepreneurial route that she’s pursuing now with BFN Agency and Behind Every Dream. Through the latter, Shivani aims to celebrate the good and bad of our journeys by encouraging people to share their whole selves, not just their highlight reel, on social media.