How to Overcome Obstacles and Achieve Massive Content Marketing Success with Passion and Authenticity

Eric Eden:
0:59

Welcome to today's episode. Our guest today is Stacey. She is a speaker, a 20 times bestselling author, she's a podcaster and she was named last year, in 2023, as one of the top 10 entrepreneurs. Welcome to the show.

Stacey Chillemi:
1:19

Thank you so much, Eric. It's a pleasure to be here. Why don't you start?

Eric Eden:
1:22

by just in your own words. Give us a couple of minutes about who you are and what you're doing.

Stacey Chillemi:
1:29

Sure, I love to tell people. When I began, it started really with motivation and a passion that grew that I didn't even realize that I had in the beginning. At the age of five I heard a gurgling sound. My mother actually heard a gurgling sound in the other room. I had a virus and ear infection and she came in to check on me and she saw that I was turned blue and I was in a grand mold seizure. She had rushed me to the hospital and they found that the virus had turned into encephalitis and traveled to my brain. I was induced into a four day coma and they said most likely if I came out I would be paraplegic or have severe brain damage. My father, who was from Greece and he was praying by my bedside he came from an island with one church and one statue by the church and he was a visualizing that statue and it was known to have tear drops come down from its eyes. He looked at me as he was praying and he saw a tear drop roll from my eyes. I came out of that coma and the first thing I asked for was from Tile's french fries. I didn't have brain damage, I wasn't paraplegic, but I did have epilepsy.

Stacey Chillemi:
2:33

I struggled my entire life. College was difficult from the stress of study and late night trying to do well. My seizures increased and I didn't know if I was actually even going to be able to finish. I looked actually for information on how to cope with it and there was no information on how to cope with it. I wrote to the Epilepsy Foundation. They had a magazine back then. I said how do people cope with this disorder? Can you please publish my article? When I talked about how to help others coping with epilepsy, I received 300 to 400 letters from people who are United States and Canada. They talked about their own disorder and they talked about how they cope with the disorder. It was very inspiring, very motivational. From all their letters I was able to put a regiment together and with that regiment and changing my lifestyle I was able to actually finish college.

Stacey Chillemi:
3:22

I went on, I started in the corporate world in New York and I was actually doing really well. Then one day, because I do have an invisible disability, which is something that I look like everybody else, but I suffer from epilepsy I felt a seizure coming on. I couldn't hide or go somewhere where nobody would see it. I fell to the ground and someone had saw me have a seizure and I was released from my position because of that. So I left there and I said one day I'm going to be a success. I'm not going to let this get me down. I refused to let others ignorance stop me from living my dream. So I walked out of there and I started to freelance. I started to write for others. I met a lot of people who are now CEOs of billion-dollar companies. Back then they were just starting out. I was doing a lot of writing for them and doing a lot of work for them.

Stacey Chillemi:
4:15

And then I came across this holistic gentleman. He wanted me to do a lot of writing, research about holistic living. So I started to do that and I said, wow, a lot of these things could apply to my own life. And I started to apply a holistic living to my own life and I slowly watched my seizures go from 12 to 9, 8, 7, 6, to the point where they were controlled. I was really flabbergasted by this and I started to put together those letters that I was telling you about and I started to put together my own regiment of what I was doing and the holistic living that I was applying to my own life and I created my first book Epilepsy You're Not Alone. Then one day I looked and it hit the best sellers list actually because there was no books back then on epilepsy and how to cope with it and I got a letter in my email box and the person said I found your book in Barnes and Nobles. It really changed my life and I was on the verge of suicide and I just want to say thank you because you saved my life, and that's when the light went off and that's when I realized what my true calling in life was. And so I started to focus on health, holistic living, changing your mind, body and spirit, focusing on different ways to help people overall improve their lifestyle.

Stacey Chillemi:
5:30

And so what? I started to blog, and back then we had blogger. We had a little blog that we were given to by Google and 400 people came right on to start reading my material and I was really impressed by that. So then I created my own website and 10,000 people came on and I started. Just, I was talking about just natural, healthy living and different supplements, vitamins, different ways of sleeping habits and so forth. And then one day I met a website designer and he needed someone to write his content. So I was writing his content and he saw my website so that I can make this into a great website for you. And he did. And then hundreds of thousands of people came on and I started going from there and I started. I continued to write about my experiences and I came out. Now I have about 20 best selling books.

Stacey Chillemi:
6:15

I actually I started people were finding me on the website from my blogs and from my writing. People were if I missed a day. People were writing to me. I was going to have my copy and I didn't see your blog. What's going on? And so I really realized that my, my thoughts, my feelings, my, my view on life was really impacting other people's lives. So I was really inspired by that because the feeling of helping someone else was just overwhelming. And if I can help some, save one person's life, imagine what I could do if I can continue this. And slowly but surely it became a business, because then people were asked me to sponsor their articles on my website and then I would. People were asking me beyond TV shows. The producer of Dr Oz asked me beyond his show. Five or six times I was on his show. I was.

Stacey Chillemi:
7:03

I spoke in front of Congress. Congress had heard about my story and they asked me to come and speak about job discrimination. And I spoke about job discrimination and Bush had passed the bill for no no disabilities act and for people with disabilities. So it was.

Stacey Chillemi:
7:17

I was really headed in a great direction and so I used what I had. I used my own experiences, my own life, my, my ways of helping people and advocating for others and help. I used that. I turned it into a business and I started to write, I started to to do things and then I really had a love for speaking in front of people. So I started to actually do speaking events and I started to coach people. I started to actually do podcast and not too long ago and that blew up. That went into over like one point three million listeners came on my show. My YouTube blew up and it had five point five million views and then it's grown to. I think today we hit twenty nine thousand, which I was really excited about because it was just people are just hearing us, listen to us, really like in what I have to say and like in, and it's a great accomplishment and the great thing about it is that I turned it into a business, but I'm helping people and that's what really drives me every morning to get out of bed.

Stacey Chillemi:
8:16

Is that what I do is actually make an impact in this world and for people, because everybody suffers from something. Everybody has a story to tell. It's just that sometimes we don't know how to rise above the chaos and we don't know how we get stuck in life and we don't know how to be courageous enough to move forward and turn our dreams into a reality. And we all have the capabilities of doing that. And my goal is to show people how and when people have obstacles in their life.

Stacey Chillemi:
8:41

I want to show people how they can overcome their obstacles, because we all can overcome our obstacles. It's just that when we were in them, it's so difficult because our life feels like it's just fallen on top of us. But when, if you ever realized that the biggest things in your life, that you actually got through it. And then you look back and say, wow, I went through X, y and Z, but I made it through. And that happens so many times to us. But sometimes people get stuck, sometimes people get into depression and sometimes life gets the best out of us and I don't want that to happen to people. I'm hoping that my business that I created and the things that I do will help people so they could have a healthy, happy and productive life.

Eric Eden:
9:26

That is truly remarkable. You overcame the obstacle that you had there was a significant one and you started just doing really great content. And that doing that really great content that, like you said, can have a big impact on people is probably why it was so successful and millions of people have absorbed it is because that's the key to great content is content that's actually helpful to people, not stuff that's full of buzzwords or that's just boring. But you were creating great content and the marketing of that was just that. It was really helpful to people and then, like you said, it's turned into a really great business for you and creating all these other opportunities. So I think what I'm hearing is that amazing content marketing can catapult you into a whole different career trajectory, right, oh, definitely.

Stacey Chillemi:
10:27

But I think the key is actually being authentic and actually having a passion for it. I see so many times I see in the world of writing or journalism, people are just doing it because they want the views, they want the attention, so to speak. But when you're authentic and you have a cause and you're actually doing it because you want to help people, you want to improve the lives and you're passionate about it, I think that's where people see that People realize who are the sellers and who are people who actually mean what they say. And I think it's all about being authentic and not thinking so much about the dollar sign, but thinking about what you could do to actually help others. When we really care and we really want to make a change in life and we want to help others.

Stacey Chillemi:
11:12

You could see it through. You could see other people by the way they write, by the way they talk, by the way they act, and those are the people that you respect. And then you have those people, even people that have made it really big in the world, and they just talk and talk. But you could just see they're just trying to sell themselves. And then you see people come on and they're so passionate about what they do and they really love what they do and it just shines right through them, and those are the people that you respect.

Eric Eden:
11:39

Yeah, it's very different sort of content creation than what a lot of content creators on TikTok, for example, are doing, which is they're just trying to produce a volume of videos and maybe one of them hits the algorithm and they're trying to get likes and they're doing it for the likes and they're hawking stuff in the TikTok shop. That's a very sort of different thing, clearly. So I 100% agree about being authentic, being passionate about it and, crucially, doing something that is impactful and helpful to people. I think that everybody has something that they have to overcome and if they don't have it today, they'll probably have it at some point in their journey.

Eric Eden:
12:25

That's just the nature of life. So I think the ability to overcome that and turn it into something great, like you've had, is quite remarkable. It's great. What advice would you give to marketers who want to have a similar level of success and they may need to overcome something? What would you suggest to marketers who want to have a similar sort of success to what you've had?

Stacey Chillemi:
12:51

I would say to stay consistent and also realize that things don't happen overnight. A lot of people, they do a few things and they think, okay, where's the results? And they get impatient. And then some people, a lot of people, will stop doing what they're doing if they don't see results right away. But it doesn't happen overnight and it takes a long time and hard work.

Stacey Chillemi:
13:10

You have to build a platform and you have to build your brand and you have to stay consistent. The consistency is key. Communication is key and really getting out there and really trying to make connections with the right people. I think that people have to realize that everything takes time. It's baby steps. You have to go from step A to step B to step C and you have to stay consistent. Consistency is so important. Every day you have to have a plan and it should be trajectory.

Stacey Chillemi:
13:41

Also, you can't just go into this and not plan everything out. You have to say, okay, where am I now and what is my goal, and then think about where do I want to be in three months? Where do I want to be in six months? Where do I want to be in nine months? What is my goal by the end of the year. What do I want to be doing and where do I want to be? And then you have to really plan goals in between.

Stacey Chillemi:
14:04

And then you have to also see what's stick, because a lot of times we don't realize it, but we might have one goal in mind, but our journey takes us somewhere else. In some of the things that I've done it's taken me on a whole different journey than I ever expected. Like I had specific goals in my mind of where I was gonna be and then things just happened and took me on a whole different journey. And you have to go with the journey. Just don't focus on one thing. Be open-minded and people might see you as something else or like you as something else and want more of that. So then you go where your audience wants you to go and you send the message. But you have to really watch what you're doing and really just go with the flow, in a sense.

Eric Eden:
14:47

So what were the keys for you in building your brand, and how long did it take you to go on this journey that you've shared with us in the spirit? Of this doesn't happen overnight.

Stacey Chillemi:
15:00

It took me about 10 years to build my business. I was getting lots of recognition and a lot of people were recognizing me, but to get to the point where I wanted to be it took me about 10 years of really working hard, consistent and really putting a lot of effort into it and really making a name for myself. I had to prove to people that I was sincere, I was authentic, I meant what I meant. I had to really get my name out there and it took time to build all that and I worked hard every single day. I put in at least 12 hours a day trying to build and build and I think it building your brand, building who you are as a person, getting that out there and constantly making yourself known gets you there. Blogging and content writing was very good because it got me. My articles got very recognized and people recognized me and then just doing speaking events and when people would type my name in it would be a list of things that would come up and I always showed my accomplishments when I was building my brand. If anything good ever happened, I made sure I posted it and I made sure that it was recognized. And not to brag, but just so I was building my brand, people were seeing the authority and so recognizing that I am an expertise in that field, that I have the knowledge, I have the expertise, and so people would recognize me and come to me and then ask me to do things.

Stacey Chillemi:
16:30

But it took a while to get where I was.

Stacey Chillemi:
16:32

But I also had a point in my life where I had I got to the point where, okay, I've done this much writing and I felt, okay, I felt like there was a new step in life for me.

Stacey Chillemi:
16:44

Sometimes we get to the point in life where we realize that, okay, I've accomplished this part, now I'm ready to take the next step and I've taken the next step. And then I grew my business and so I went from writing, then I went to speaking, and then I started podcasting, and not even realizing how big my podcast was gonna be, my podcast just blew up and people were coming from all over to try to be on my podcast and ask me about helping them with my podcast, and but I wasn't even gonna do a podcast. It was a friend of mine who actually said Stacy, you really gotta get your name out there. You really have to. People have to hear your voice because you have great message. And so he kept on me about doing that and I listened to him and I did it and I never knew that it was gonna. It was gonna get so big the way it did.

Eric Eden:
17:33

That's fantastic. Thank you for sharing your story with us today. I encourage everyone listening to share this episode with your friends. They should hear this inspiring story and please check out Stacy's website. We'll link to it in the show notes here so you can easily get to it. Stacy, we appreciate you joining us today and sharing your story and these great insights.

Stacey Chillemi:
17:58

Thank you so much. Appreciate being here.