Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Sierra Miller. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Sierra , appreciate you joining us today. What did your parents do right and how has that impacted you in your life and career?

My parents have always made it clear to me that they are on my side, no matter what I’m facing or what I decide to get myself into. I’ve taken many different life paths to get to where I’ve ended up today, and while perhaps those paths weren’t always my parent’s first choice for me, they’ve loved and supported me no matter what. When I was in college, I thought that my career path was going to be law school and become an attorney. My parents were all for it. My Dad helped me with law school research and my Mom helped land me my college job of working as a legal assistant for an attorney that she knew. They celebrated me after I took the LSAT and and celebrated me after I was accepted into several law schools. Only then did I decide that law school wasn’t the path I wanted to be going down. It was a shock to everyone, as I’d been pining for it for years and it felt as though so many people had put so much effort in on my behalf to accomplish that goal. An even bigger shock at the same time was that my boyfriend of 1 year and I wanted to get married and move across the country; how they were ultimately able to support me in that, I’ll never know. They’ve always been on my side with each crazy idea, ambition, and aspiration that I come up with.

I remember early on in building my Creator platform, I’d have Facetime calls with my Mom and sister, trying to figure out what my niche should be, what type of content I should create, and if I should start from scratch or re-vamp my current, personal Instagram page. I know that my parents are my number one fans. They tell me all the time how they show off my page to anyone and everyone who ever asks about me/how I’m doing, and my Mom buys products with just about every discount code I receive. I wouldn’t be able to enjoy my platform as much as I do if I didn’t have their constant overflow of pride for me and their omnipresent support.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Who I Am:
Well as you may have already read, my name is Sierra Miller and I’m a Curly Hair Content Creator. I got into this social media space in January of 2024 when I decided that I wanted to use social media for a genuine purpose as opposed to losing hours of my day on my phone. I created my page from scratch, starting at zero followers. In eighth months, my following has amassed to 45K followers. I truly feel so grateful and blessed to have this kind of a community that I got to build from the ground up. While Instagram is my biggest platform, I am also currently on TikTok and Pinterest, all three with the same username of @goldn.curl. I want to reach as many individuals as possible.

How I Got Into it:
I started goldn.curl with the desire to teach others to learn to embrace their natural hair, because it took me forever to finally embrace mine. All throughout middle school and high school, it was cool to have stick-straight hair or curling ironed curls all the time, and that’s what I adhered to. I wasn’t much for trying to stand out; I just wanted to be like everyone else. There wasn’t a particular moment or event that made me decide to start embracing my natural hair, rather, it was just one of those times where I was bored with my hair and wanted to do something different with it, but I didn’t want to cut or color it like I would have done in the past. So I started experimenting with curly hair products and with new haircare routines. I finally found a rhythm and knew that I wanted to teach others to do the same. For this reason, goldn.curl was born.

What I Offer:
To followers who find my page, it is truly a personal portfolio of my love of taking care of my hair and trying new things. Followers will find different curly hair routines that I’ve tried (whether they work or not). They’ll find different styling techniques and how they work for me. They’ll find products I like to use, how to use them, and the results they should expect from them. They’ll find curly hairstyle inspiration from formal updos to simple, daily hairstyles, and hairstyle reimaginations from popular movies or celebrities, just for fun!

To the brands that find my page, they’ll see work I’ve created for brands in the past: incorporating curly hair products into a summer curly hair routine, creation of hairstyles using their products, before/after of using their product. My goal when working for brands is to make it as personal as possible. While I am paid for my work, I don’t want people who follow me to feel like every video I make is a sales pitch. I strive to connect with my audience in a way that I know will impact them meaningfully, as opposed to trying to sell them products that very well may just end up collecting dust on a shelf.

The fact that I am a teaching platform is just one of the many facets of my page. I love to create videos to teach people what I wish I knew when I wanted to start wearing my natural hair. Especially when it comes to technique and affordable products to use.

Right now, I am most proud of how far I’ve come with no example to follow. I’ve truly been paving my own way through this process, and while I haven’t come out completely unscathed, I’m learning so many valuable things and getting to help so many incredible people. I wouldn’t change that for anything.

The main things I would want anyone (whether it be followers or potential clients) to know is that my goal is to connect and to teach. I’m not going to lie, it has become more difficult the more I’ve grown to be able to connect with people on a personal level. However, I make it a point to respond to all comments, DM’s (within reason), or replies to stories I post because I want people to feel confident in me as a person. To know that I would never try to sell them short.

Working with brands is only one of the many wonderful things that this page has given me the opportunity to do. I see each potential collaboration and an opportunity to cultivate meaningful partnerships first with the brand, and then the brand and my audience. I’ve stayed very strict on my niche and only accepting partnerships where I feel like the brand’s values/goals and my values/goals align. I’ve turned down many collaboration offers because those brands don’t align with my goals/values to teach others to learn how to love, wear, and care for their natural hair. The last thing I would ever want would be for my followers to not be able to resonate with my page anymore because I accepted so many random brand offers, just to try and make a buck.

Having a space for like-minded people to discuss, interact, connect, learn, grow, and encourage is a priority for me.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative?

Due to the fact that I used to be a non-creative on social media, I believe that non-creatives don’t fully understand all of the many difficulties that come from being a creative on social media… until they find themselves knee-deep in it.

I feel as though the word “influencer” has such a negative connotation to it, to the point where I don’t even say that I’m an “influencer”, I choose the words “content creator” instead. So many people view influencers as people who just get free stuff, go to parties/events all the time, and get paid money to post your life’s highlights on social media. When I hit 10K followers, and posted to celebrate it, I got a DM from someone who said that if I started calling myself a “micro-influencer” then they’ll “throw up”. People are very quick to share ugly things about what they think of influencers, and to be honest, I used to be one of those people, but it mostly came out of a place of jealousy from me.

I make money from my work online, but it has not been an easy road to get there and it never truly is for anyone, regardless of how fast they grow. While many brands may reach out to you, it’s up to you to be able to pitch yourself to land the deal that you want. You have to be able to write coherently, and present yourself in a way that shows that you know who you are and what you can offer. And while there are people who write negative things, it’s easy to lose sight of that. Social media for me right now is a “side hustle”, because I still have a full-time job, but with the amount of work that it takes/the amount of hours that go into it, it’s a legitimate full-time job on top of my full-time job. It’s a lot of work! From mapping my content and figuring out what I want to film, to actually filming when there’s natural light and figuring out alternate lighting, makeup (if any), products, accessories, then the hours of editing and voiceovers and captions, and then audios, and knowing the right time of day to post, and being able to be present and post every day while maintaining fresh content that feels inspired…being a creative on social media is a whole other beast. For every brand event that you see an influencer gets to go to, there’s dozens of emails exchanged, hours of work, and videos/static posts/stories posted that got them to that point. There’s so much going on behind the scenes that you never see!

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

My mission is to teach others to learn how to love, wear and care for their natural hair; and to make my platform a home to others. There’s so much darkness and negativity on social media, and I commend those who rid themselves of it entirely because they know that’s what’s best for them. But for those who choose to keep it, I want to create a warm space where people are able to learn and encourage. I love being able to share my journey, what I know, and what I’m actively learning.

While my space is in the curly hair niche, I teach others to learn to love their natural features; what God gave them. I feel as though this type of “natural beauty acceptance”, if you will, is on the rise in social media and I love seeing it. I know I’m not the only creator who wants to be a light and showcase something good on social media for a change. Learning to have confidence and feel beautiful isn’t just some “woke” trend that’s been circulating, it’s been an issue for the longest time. Looking back on creating my social media, if there’s even one person that I’ve helped in gaining confidence in their natural hair/features and loving themselves as they were created, then all the less glamorous sides of what I encounter are more than worth it.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://instagram.com/goldn.curl
• Facebook: https://facebook.com/goldn.curl
• Other: TikTok: goldn.curl
  Pinterest: goldn.curl

Image Credits

To first initial photo (profile photo) only: Jzlatphoto