Influencer
Meet Mallory Hudson, The Home Decor Maven Taking Over Social Media
Rising social media star Mallory Hudson has rapidly grown her lifestyle brand after starting a blog in 2019. Within two years, the Oklahoma native expanded into video content on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube, leaning into her specialty around home organization, decor and cooking.
Propelled by an enthusiastic, engaged audience, Mallory Hudson now draws over 100,000 monthly blog readers while constantly creating new videos across social platforms. She credits consistency as vital in building her influencer community.
Meet Mallory Hudson, The Home Decor Maven Taking Over Social Media
From Blogger to Vlogger and Content Creator
“I didn’t even consider myself to even want to be a person that would be an influencer,” Mallory Hudson begins. “I wanted to be a blogger when I first started content creating, but I realized that I was missing that 1 on 1 audience connection where I felt like people would get to know me and the things I liked, rather than just reading my words on a page.”
She explains, “I took what I was writing about and what I was already kind of passionate about and enjoyed writing about, and I took that into video form.” Creating video content enabled her to showcase processes in “a more impactful way because you could actually see the process of what I was doing.”
Mallory Hudson pinpoints the start of significant traction to when she began creating videos that excited her personally. She emphasizes getting positive feedback on those types of videos, saying, “You get inspired by that. Just those kind of impactful viral moments where it wasn’t a negative viral moment, where what you can normally see on social media, it was typically always a positive virality where other people are excited about what I’m doing just as much as I’m excited about it.”
Seeing an enthusiastic response inspired Mallory, but also created “a pressure of almost to do the next best thing and just be on top of your game.” As her viewership grew, she “kind of felt a lot of pressure to continue to remake my ideas, make them better than before.” Overcoming self-doubt to ensure her content “represented itself well after [it] was put out” became an increasing challenge as well.
Mallory Hudson outlines her cross-platform strategy: “I really try to stay under the home umbrella – organization, food, home decor, basically anything surrounding the home.” She avoids being put “in a box” of typical influencer content like fashion or beauty. Instead, sticking to lifestyle topics has “allowed me to cultivate an audience interested in all those aspects.”
While the focus stays the same, she tailors content to seasons, saying, “When seasons come, I’m more focused on decor, but in lulls like August/September with nothing going on, I focus on food. I kind of rotate those pillars.”
On the importance of consistency, Mallory Hudson states, “Being consistent has been number one in helping foster that community. It’s a major contributor to growth.” She adds, “Consistency applies to not only posting amount but also content type.” While evolving, maintaining alignment around core topics aids community building: “When you’re consistent, followers know what you’re about. If they follow you, that’s what they expect. Staying aligned helps you connect with them.”
She welcomes audience input: “I always love video ideas and what people want to see more of.” Asking for suggestions provides inspiration: “When you’re stuck, ask your community what they want to see.”
Facing creative obstacles now, her approach is revisiting old concepts “to see if I could do them again or make them better.” Updating past ideas for new audiences “in a format that fits today” can revive them. She also finds value in stepping back: “I let things flow better when not forcing it.”
Brand Partnerships and CFG Talent
When considering potential brand partners, Mallory Hudson vets options thoroughly, only collaborating with those she’s used before or that align with her values after researching. She states, “I always like to try to try the product myself to see if I like it before I share my honest opinions.” Initial interactions also influence decisions, as Mallory notes, “If they’re not respectful to my [Talent Representation] team I can sense something going on there.” In her view, “I don’t know how I would separate that from the product that you’re putting out.”
CFG Talent has been “such an amazing addition” in managing the business side of influencing. According to Mallory, “I really don’t know how to get it all done without them.” She relies heavily on CFG’s support negotiating contracts, ensuring deliverables stay on track, and meeting deadlines amidst multiple collaboration. As Mallory explains, “When there’s partnership and you’re working in so many different areas, lines can kind of blur, things can overlap, things may be missed. So having a lot of eyeballs on the same thing kind of helps the process go a lot smoother.”
Specifically on brand relationships, CFG has facilitated “overall just relationship building.” Mallory shares that with other priorities, “I don’t have the time to send an email and nurture relationships as much as I would want to.” But with CFG keeping partners engaged and informed, she has established “longer lasting partnerships. We become just great partners of the brands that I work with long term.”
Looking towards the future, 2024 and beyond
On her future, Mallory Hudson shares, “I hope to continue to still be doing this, I would say. I would like to show a bit more of my life, potentially, like in the next few years as different milestones come up and bring my audience along with me on journeys like that.”
Regarding concrete goals, she explains, “I feel like my mindset has honestly kind of changed. I was previously a very numbers oriented person. Like, okay, how long does it take to get to this number, this number, this number? But I realized that the number doesn’t mean anything if you don’t think about the human aspect behind that number.”
Instead, Mallory’s aim is “to really just continue to cultivate those relationships with my audience. I want to be considered a friend like you guys can lean on me for anything – recipes, ideas. I will message you back.” She concludes, “Rather than focusing on just getting higher and higher and higher [numbers], think about what you can do with what you have and how can you make what you have as impactful as possible?”
Offering advice to aspiring creators, Mallory Hudson urges, “Whenever you start to do something that you genuinely love because if you don’t genuinely love that, you’re not going to be able to make it. Because no matter how easy the job seems, if you don’t like doing something or you don’t really like what you talk about, it’s going to be hard to be consistent. And consistency is one of those things that is non-negotiable when it comes to content creation.”
She also counsels staying true to oneself, stating, “Don’t. You don’t have to ebb and flow the way everybody else does. Sometimes it’s good to kind of just stay in your own lane and do what you do and do what you love.”
Finally, Mallory stresses creating value-driven content: “Always post content and do things from a value perspective. I feel like a lot of times, especially now, I see a lot of inward focused content, where others are kind of focused on like what am I doing? And sharing themselves without thinking about the value that others should be getting from your content. And I feel like if you focus on the value and what you’re getting, the takeaway is going to be even greater and greater than what you could have imagined.”
