An Interview With Karen Mangia
Your Content Isn’t About You, It’s About THEM
Stop creating more content; start creating better content. With thousands of posts flooding feeds daily, general posts won’t cut it. Focus on specificity and content that speaks directly to your ideal client. Shift your mindset from “what do I want to say?” to “what do they need to hear?”
We often use the term “Influencers” to describe people with significant social media followings on platforms like Instagram, Twitter TikTok, Youtube, Linkedin and Facebook. Influencers have become today’s media titans, sought after for everything from product placements to timely trends. What’s the difference between influence and impact? Fans and followers? Sizzle versus staying power?
In this interview series, called, “How To Cultivate Community In A Click to Connect World” we are talking to influencers about how they define success and what we all need to discover about the true nature of influence. As a part of this series I had the pleasure of interviewing Morgan Mills.
Morgan Mills is a social media strategist and the founder of MG Media Group, a boutique social media marketing agency. As a content creation specialist, Morgan has a deep understanding of organic growth strategies. She leverages the power of social media to achieve exponential business growth for female founders and mompreneurs.
Thank you for making time to visit with us! Our readers would love to get to know you a bit better. How did you discover your career path and what got you to where you are today?
I got started in social media marketing by accident. My husband and I started a CBD business back when CBD was all the rave. Long story short, we planned to use PPC ads to market our products, but after spending thousands on branding and product development, we came to find out we could not use paid advertisements on any platforms due to restrictions surrounding CBD advertising. That’s when I did a deep dive to learn everything there was about organic digital marketing.
Simultaneously, I wanted to become a travel content creator, so while learning social media marketing from a business perspective, I also learned it from a personal brand perspective, picking up on important things like knowing how to create scroll stopping and visually aesthetic content, and the importance of building community through your content.
So much of what I’ve learned comes from real life, trial and error, failure, and success.
What’s the most important lesson you’ve learned along the way that influences how you operate now?
A large following doesn’t equate to influence. I think of influence as your ability to connect with your audience so that they trust you — it doesn’t matter how many followers you have if they don’t trust you because you won’t influence them on anything.
We’re all searching for some good news. How are you using your platform to make a positive social impact?
- By partnering with brands whose mission and vision I support.
- Through creating content that doesn’t just focus on pain point marketing, but also is very aspirational and relatable. There’s enough negativity in the world as is, let’s find ways to inspire our followers from a positive light.
- I’ve moved away from focusing on more of the polished/finished product and showing people the journey instead. Social media is tough. A lot of times, we end up comparing someone’s year 20 to our month seven. Failing to remember that social media is only a highlight reel can lead to self-doubt. So I think it’s important to show more content that’s real, raw & relatable. and transparent.
Many of our readers are influencers as well. Others have tried and have yet to succeed. What words of advice would you offer to aspiring influencers, knowing what you know now?
First, get clear on who you are and what your brand is going to stand for so that you can have clarity in what your message and content pillars are going to be. This will not only make it easier for you to be consistent, but you will also become known for something specific. Which falls into my next point, have a social media strategy. Posting without a strategy is literally like throwing spaghetti at the wall or throwing a dart blindfolded. A social media strategy will give you the direction you need and help you get very clear on what type of content you should be posting and why. Everyone says to niche down, but I believe if you’re trying to grow, starting off you need to have a good mixture of niche versus general content, 60–70% niche and 40–30% general. Leverage content series because episode-style content is what keeps people coming back for more, and how people will become invested in your brand.
Success is often a matter of perspective. I’ve always resonated with Henry David Thoreau’s quote, “It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.” How do you see success — or define success — for yourself now?
I’ve never heard that before but I love that quote, and I totally agree that perspective is everything in life. For me, success looks like progress. Am I actively moving towards achieving my goals? Where did I start, and where am I now? A lot of times, as we meet certain goals, we set new ones or move the goal post further, forgetting the wins we had along the way. So for instance, if my goal was to hit 75,000 followers in a year but I’m only at 30,000 — instead of me looking at this previous year as a failure, I would instead look at it as I’m still in progress to meet my goal. Though I’m not where I want to be, I’m also not where I started, and we have to be able to find gratitude in that as well.
What are your strategies to make room for who and what matters most?
For me, it goes to prioritizing what’s important. One thing that I know to be true is that people make time for what they want to. In order to make room for what matters most, we have to be very intentional with how we spend our time. Life gets busy, plans don’t go as planned, but it’s important to have moments where you can check in with yourself and make sure you’re still prioritizing what matters most.
How do you reduce or mitigate stress?
Honestly, I’m still learning how to do this, but whenever I find myself having serious moments of feeling overwhelmed, stressed, and anxious, I stop. I take some deep breaths and do a full body check to see where I’m feeling this energy in my body, most of the time, it’s going to be within my jaw or in my stomach. So after taking a moment to release any physical tension that I’m holding & ground myself in the moment, I do a mindset shift. Instead of focusing on what’s stressing me out, I find a way to change my focus to things that I’m grateful for. I truly do believe that having a mindset and a heart full of gratitude is the key to a peaceful and joyful life.
I’m going to try a few of your tips, and I’m hopeful our readers will, too. Now it’s time for the big reveal — the moment our readers have been anticipating. What are your “five strategies to cultivate a large & engaged social media community?
1. Your Content Isn’t About You, It’s About THEM
Stop creating more content; start creating better content. With thousands of posts flooding feeds daily, general posts won’t cut it. Focus on specificity and content that speaks directly to your ideal client. Shift your mindset from “what do I want to say?” to “what do they need to hear?”
2. Define “Large” by Quality, Not Just Quantity
Forget vanity metrics. A “large” audience should mean an aligned audience. Whether it’s 5k or 500k, prioritize followers who are genuinely interested in your offer and mission. Growth matters, but only if it supports your business goals.
3. Build Community with Relatable Transparency
Polish looks nice, but connection comes from authenticity. In 2025, people crave realness. Share content that reflects the messy, human parts of your journey. When people see themselves in your story, they trust you, and trust drives sales.
4. Emotion + CTAs = Engagement That Converts
To move your audience to action, tap into their emotions. Then, tell them what to do. Add calls to action like “DM me for X” or “Comment to get Y.” Emotion sparks interest, CTAs guide the next step.
5. Reclaim Your Time: Delegate Smartly
If social media burns you out, delegate. A strategic content partner helps you maintain momentum, grow your brand, and free up time for life or bigger business moves.
What do you do to create a greater sense of connection and community among your fans?
It’s a mixture between being intentional and being transparent. I’m not going to talk to my followers; I’m going to talk with my followers. I wanna make sure that I’m creating content that they can see themselves in, that they can be inspired by, and that they can relate to. My goal is to always create content that makes people feel seen, understood, and heard. If you make sure that your content is doing that, that’s the quickest and easiest way to create a sense of connection and community amongst your following. I never want my followers to think that I’m better than them, but instead, I just might be a couple of steps ahead of them. They can do the same thing too. Sometimes it has nothing to do with a sense of being better or ahead, but being just raw in the fact that ‘hey, I have some things figured out, but there are also things I’m still learning as well.’
As an influencer, you are, by definition, a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.
If I could inspire a movement that would bring the most good to the most people, it would definitely be the “impact by intentional living” movement. It would build off the well-being and mindfulness movements that are already established, encouraging everyone to be more deliberate and thoughtful in every aspect of our lives, not just for ourselves but for the butterfly effect we create. It means having an intentional awareness for our wellness — taking into consideration what we consume in regards to our body where we prioritize non-toxic living and minimizing exposure to harmful chemicals, where we are mindful of what we feed our minds, from what media we consume the thoughts we have in the conversations we choose to engage with even down to how we treat our physical bodies, are we prioritizing movement are we feeding ourselves nutritious diets? Overall, it’s about choosing healthier habits because they generally serve our long-term well-being and energy, giving us the capacity to do good. I think when we’re more intentional we will end up living lives where our actions are aligned with our purpose. This allows us to have a more meaningful and positive impact, not just for our intimate circle, but for a greater sense of humanity. When we’re present, making conscious choices, and living a life that reflects our deepest values, everyone wins.
We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world with whom you’d like to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He, she or they might just see this. 🙂
Just one person?! There are so many! But my top two would probably be Melissa Butler, founder of The Lip Bar or Pinky Cole, creator of Slutty Vegan. They have both created such powerful and strong brands, and it should be a story of inspiration for any woman — scratch that — any entrepreneur.
What is the best way for our readers to further follow your work online?
You can connect with me on LinkedIn or Instagram!
https://www.linkedin.com/in/morgan-rutledge/
https://www.instagram.com/mg.mediagroup/
Thank you for these thought provoking insights. Here’s to your continued success!
Morgan Mills Of MG Media Group On How To Build A Large, Loyal, & Engaged Social Media Community was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.