From the beginning, Christine St. Vil of Maryland always wanted better for moms.
After leaving her corporate job while pregnant with her third child, she decided to launch her own blog and work toward making an income from it. Working as a recruiting manager, she hired and connected potential candidates to the business and discovered that social media–which at the time consisted of only Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn–could be a big pivotal part in driving in more employees. Her company didn’t approve nor support her idea, and after a while, St. Vil left her job in hopes of starting her own business helping companies become more social media-savy, which later became known as Social Scoop.
“I was now a stay at home mom to three kids under three,” she commented. “As a way to keep my sanity, I connected with moms on Facebook through groups.” Social media has been a part of her company outline and personal story of success since the beginning of her businesses. She continued talking with the other moms through social media, who continuously expressed concern about not doing the things they wanted to do and having to wait until the kids are in school or until they graduate high school. St. Vil’s question to the other moms was “why can’t you do both, raise your babies and do what you love?” From then, St. Vil started blogging to encourage moms to go after the things they wanted, hobby and career-wise, without the mom guilt, which was the main reason St. Vil decided to launch her then blog, momsncharge, in 2012. Since then, she has ventured all over the world, having been mentioned by Dr. Oz, ESSCENCE.com, and allParenting.com to name a few.
One obstacle that St. Vil had when starting out her business was promoting herself. “I definitely was a lot more reserved and didn’t want to put myself out there as much. I think in the beginning I didn’t do a good job of promoting myself because I didn’t like being in front of people, so I would challenge myself to go live with Periscope.” In her explanation, a big part of being an entrepreneur was being able to communicate to potential customers and people why they needed to invest in the product. Another obstacle she shared was setting appropriate times and boundaries with customers. “I’ve had to say, ‘ok, hey, even though we have a contact time, here’s what it looks like’; we meet once a month and then once a week between these hours. And I had to explain, this is how I operate.” Now, St. Vil has a well-established time between her clientele and her family.
Related: Chiquita Mack helps mothers become more in tuned with themselves: http://more-than-a-mother-chi-quita-mack-helps-mothers-become-more-entuned-with-themselves-with-the-launch-of-the-chi-quita-mack
When it comes to organizing herself with the many hats that she wears as mother (homeschooling her kids as well), wife and multi-business owner, she decided to center her businesses around her family. “One of the biggest things I had to create a system for was setting boundaries,” St. Vil shared. “I like to under-promise and over-deliver. So if I can’t promise something, then I try to make sure that I don’t say I can. And it’s the same thing with the kids.” St. Vil makes sure she is spending her time wisely to cater to her children, who are entrepreneurs as well. Although she admits her time management skills are nowhere near perfect, she still makes sure she blocks out time for her children and their life events. “I like to make sure my family is good—the core is good—and then everything else will be good,” she added.
A woman who values affirmations and positive quotes, words like I am focused, I am motivated and I am blessed surround her office and work space. “I always listen to positive affirmations whether it’s in an app or on YouTube. That’s how I start my day because I realized that if I don’t have these things, then I get all stressed out, then I ask myself, ‘what did I do to get to this point, and what did I say yes to that I probably shouldn’t have said yes to?'” St. Vil dedicates her positive mindset to her long habit of keeping positive words around her, because when days get hard for her, she goes back to the affirmations to ground her. “What I want people to know about me is that I am definitely very committed to helping other moms in this space right now to grow their own agencies,” St. Vil shared. There is a passion that St. Vil possesses, seeing moms thrive and becoming the woman they were destined to be. “If anyone goes to my website, social media, they can definitely find out more information about me because I’m working on building my community with other moms who are looking to start or grow their own agencies.”
Visit Christine St. Vil on Instagram here
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