Entrepreneur chat with Chalene Johnson | Natalie Jill

Hi, I'm Chalene Johnson, New York Times best selling author, the creator of many fitness programs you've probably seen on late night infomercials like Turbo Jam, Chalene Xtreme, Turbo Fire. I'm also the founder of the Marketing Impact Academy. And I'm here today with one of my very good friends. She's someone who I've learned a ton from and I wanted to talk to her today about something I know so many people ask me about it. Something I know I was fascinated by. I know it's something that's going to help so many of you get to that next level and kind of understand that there is the opportunity to create a plan B, to find your passion to create an income. And you can start tomorrow. My friend Natalie Jill, you probably know her from Instagram as NatalieJillFit. What is our YouTube?

Natalie Jill Fitness.

NatalieJill Fitness. And she's just a remarkable person who's helped hundreds of thousands of people lose weight and more importantly find themselves. And Natalie has created programs like the Mind Body Academy. She's created the seven Day Jumpstart programs that have changed and transformed people's lives. But what you probably don't know about Natalie is that not too long ago, this wasn't your story.

No, it wasn't at all.

And I think most people see you and, and they probably see both of us and think, oh, you've always been into fitness or you've always had tremendous success in business. And I think what most people need to understand is it doesn't matter what business you're in. Everyone starts someplace. And a lot of times that is the catalyst for the change. To make something happen in your life and to help other people is when you hit your bottom.

Yeah.

And I know that for you was that moment.

Yeah. Yeah. I never would have thought a few years back that I'd be sitting here right now today sharing my success with my fitness and nutrition business and how I've reached people. I couldn't have imagined it. In fact, it wasn't but a few years ago where I remember going to the gas station to put gas in my car and I started to fill up, put the gas in the nozzle and put my credit card in and it had been declined. And here I was, someone who had never had credit card debt and I'm sitting there in debt and I don't even know how to put gas in my car.

That moment.

Yeah, just everything sunk and I felt lost and could not have imagined I'd be here today talking with you about this.

It's funny, I had that same panic even now today. I mean, despite the success that we have and the money that I know is in the bank account, I had that same thing happen where you hand someone a credit card and my credit card declined. And I just remember this line of people behind me and feeling so embarrassed and ashamed because it wasn't a mistake with a credit card. I knew I was maxed out in every card. I knew that I had bought things I couldn't afford. And it's the worst feeling.

It's the worst feeling. And I felt like. I felt like a phony at the time. People think I'm okay and I'm not. And I felt stuck. And I didn't.

So when this happened, what was going on in your life? What stages? So we had met.

No, we had not met. I was working in corporate America and I had what people would have thought was a stable, secure job, but I had just come off going through a divorce and I had lost my house and I was a newly single mom and I had to take a voluntary demotion at my corporate job because I was traveling so much and I could not travel on job. Yeah. I could not travel and be this a mom as a single mom. So I had taken a voluntary demotion and I had really got caught up in the debt from losing my house and the divorce. And I was eating and gaining weight and not taking care of myself.

Stress.

I was stressed. I was depressed and I. I felt lost. I felt really lost.

And who do you. I mean, in that moment, who do you rely on? If you've. If it's just you and it's just your daughter and you feel like everyone, you know, you're responsible now for the two of you.

Yeah. And not only that, I was married to my best friend who was now my ex husband. So I didn't have him to talk to. I was living on the West Coast. My family and friends, my good friends, were on the east coast. So I felt alone.

Did they know how bad it was?

They did not know how. Now they know. They did not know how bad it was. And I was almost too proud to ask for help.

Yeah.

I didn't know how to tell them that.

I think a lot of us are like that, you know, it's like. Well, I think people will think less of me if they know how bad it is right now or that, you know, and I don't want to ask anyone for help. And this is. This is mine to fix.

Yeah.

And it's you know, it's a tough place to be because I think we all have to learn how to ask for help, but it's also what gave you the resolve to fix it yourself.

So what happened was I remember, and I remember this day so clearly. I was walking my daughter and my dogs, and I had caught a glimpse of myself.

You know.

You know, the mirrors that. The windows you walk by, they have the mirror reflection. I caught this glimpse of myself, and I thought, whoa, who is this person? Like, maybe it's true. Maybe you have a baby, and if you get depressed, you just gain weight, and it just. That's what happens. That's how you gain weight.

You literally didn't recognize myself.

I didn't recognize myself. And it hit me that this is not who I want to be, and this is not who I know I can be. And I went home that day, and I put my daughter down for a nap, and I took out magazines. I had a bunch of magazines. And I started ripping out pictures of what I would dream to have my life be. And I did that because I was in sales training for years at my corporate job, and I always talked about vision boards, but I never had actually really done it myself. I talked to everybody else about, you have to make a vision board.

You have to be able to see it.

So I did. I pulled out pictures of a fit lifestyle, happiness, a house by the beach, doing something with fitness. I thought, I'm so out of shape right now, but guess in my dream world, I'd like to be doing something with fitness. So I tore out pictures and I made a vision board. And that's the moment when things started.

To change that day.

Yes.

Yeah. So you're working full time, you're trying to get yourself back, and you lose a ton of weight, and you started kind of journaling that process. Yeah.

So the vision board started it, and I just pulled out everything I knew. I had always studied fitness and nutrition. It was an interest and a hobby of mine. But I hadn't applied it as a job, and I hadn't applied it to myself.

So I did it.

I just started applying it to myself. I'm like, okay, I'm gonna eat this way that I know will work. I'm going to move and do these things. And I started journaling it, and I started taking pictures of my food.

That was a big thing, like, with a camera. Yeah.

My phone. I would eat a meal, and I would take a picture of it to journal it. And also, I think I wanted a little bit of attention or Support system from friends.

Got it.

So I had started Facebook, not for a business reason, it was a personal thing. But I started posting Facebook like that accountability. Yeah.

You know, it's like, well, if I. If I journal and I make that journal public, I'm not only keeping myself accountable, you start keeping other people accountable too.

Exactly. So I started posting pictures of my food, my camera, and I could not believe the response and questions I started getting. People, first of all, were grateful that I was sharing my food pictures, which, go figure. And they wanted more information. They wanted to know what I was eating all the time, how I was doing it, and they started to see a transformation in me. I wanted to know what I was doing.

Yeah. I think for so many people, the change. I mean, a lot of people change their lives and they figure out that they want to have their own business, and they figure out what they want to do with their lives. And sometimes it starts from going to a seminar, and sometimes it starts from learning something about personal development. But for so many people, it's about, you know, it starts with a little bit of weight loss, and then you start to feel like, gosh, anything's possible.

It was the one thing I felt I had control over, that I could control what I'm doing with my body, my fitness, my nutrition right now. I couldn't control anything else. I couldn't control my finances. I couldn't control the fact that I was a single mom. I couldn't control the fact that I just gone through a divorce or I lost my house. But I could control one thing, and that's what I started to control.

Right. So now I know a little bit about your story. So you start journaling these things, you're taking these pictures. Everybody's asking questions. At what point do you realize, hey, you know, I could share my knowledge, I could sell my knowledge.

So a couple people started saying, you should start a recipe book. Recipe. Me start a recipe book? I'm not an author. I don't know anything about publishing a book or anything. And.

Somebody told me, do an E book. I didn't even know what that was. I remember googling ebook. I had no idea what that meant. It's like electronic book if you don't know what that means. And I thought, okay, so I literally started a word document on my computer with my phone, pictures, inserting them, and wrote out what the meal was. And I looked up, I sat there looking up how many calories, portions, everything. And I made a word document and I sold it for $12.

So you're selling this thing now. I mean, people actually buying it from you and you're just using your iPhone pictures. How many pages is it?

It was Believe 11 to start the initial one.

And how are people even finding out about it From Facebook?

Social media, just Facebook and them telling their friends. So somebody would buy it from me and then they would make a note and somebody else would see it on Facebook and then they would ask me about it.

And you're not a chef and you've never made recipes before. These are basically other people's recipes. Your own tweak on it or whatever.

These were mostly my made up, healthy recipes.

This is it?

Yeah, this is it. And this is actually the first. This is a page from the first one. And look, it's literally just my iPhone.

But didn't see it on camera.

It's almost embarrassing now because I look at it like that does not look very appetizing. It looks like grass. I put grass in a blender.

Kills me.

It doesn't. Look, I wasn't trying to be a professional.

So it's like you didn't use a food stylist. What I love about it though, is it was real.

It was real. And I didn't let the thought of I need a food stylist and I need all these professional pitchers. I didn't let that get in my way because I didn't want to overanalyze it. I just wanted to share the information.

Okay, I have to stop you right there because that is so huge. So many people are paralyzed by fear that someone's going to go, well, this picture isn't perfect. Or, you know, that's not the way I make the recipe or it's not. The graphics aren't that they're paralyzed by perfection. Like worrying that it has to be perfect before you get it out. And you just have to get it. Whatever it is that's on your heart, that's on your brain, that's yours to share with the world. Get it out there, even if it's not that great the first attempt, because it'll get better.

And that's what I did. And I remember being so excited that I would get an email notification that somebody had bought the book and I had to physically email it to them myself. But I was happy to do it. I'm making.

So they're sending what, like PayPal?

I set it up so PayPal would take a payment and I would get an email notification. And then I had to email the person this Word document, which is now a PDF. Okay, which is fine. And I would sell two or three a day. And that was. It was exciting to me. That might not sound like a lot of money, but that adds up. I mean, that's paying for diapers, it's paying for a dinner out. It's paying extra money.

At what point do you say, okay, this is turning into a job. This is a business. I could quit my job.

Well, it was the $12 a day. The few of them started creeping up, and next thing you know, I realize I've made a few thousand dollars on this, and that's some real money. So I'm starting to get the idea that maybe I should do more of this. So I was answering via email on Facebook questions about how to put these into a diet.

Now I have to say that that has got to build. So a woman who's alone has started to lose weight, has started to find herself, has started to help other people, started to find a way to bring in extra income. That's gotta be incredibly powerful for the way you feel about yourself.

It's funny because it really did a lot for my confidence. And it's funny now because people will say, oh, you did well with ebooks because you have this big following. And I think, no, that's completely backwards. I had no following, and I shared something and that grew my following, that grew. So it was the opposite.

See, that's why it was really important for me to have people hear from you. Because I've been on tv, people have seen me on late night. They realize I have exercise DVDs. And the way that we met was. I was so inspired by your pictures and the story and all the people who I was seeing that you had helped.

I'm like, who is this girl?

Like, I literally was like, who is this person? And then to find out that this person wasn't in fitness, this person didn't have, you know, an infomercial and a name and a book and all these things. This is someone who built their business. They're following from the ground up by just helping people.

Yeah. And it's always amusing to me when someone thinks that I did well with it because of my following, or they'll say, oh, well, you have. You're a fitness celebrity. I'm a fitness celebrity. I'm a mom who created recipes for my iPhone. That's how I look at it. It's amazing to me how that spiraled.

So I can't let that be an excuse. I mean, people have to understand. It wasn't too many years ago, I mean, less than three years ago that you, you weren't known in the fitness industry or the nutrition industry. And I know that's, that's kind of how we've labeled you, but honestly, I mean, I've read the stories, I've read the comments from the people who are. I mean, you change people's lives from the inside out. You motivate them to do something.

And that makes me feel great because I believe that I have too. And I, and I did that because not just when I saw how much people were inspired and learning from my recipes. I wanted to create a seven day plan, which led me to my seven day jumpstart, which was the next step because I took what I had done with the recipes and I wrote another Word document. Again, not using professional photographers, not using.

Anything, just you sitting down at the computer.

Just me. And I put together what is the seven day jump start, which has gone from a Word document and me sitting down over a weekend sharing everything I had figured out about transformation, losing the weight and keeping it off, just writing it all out. That has turned into half a million dollars in short of two years.

So that's. You see people and you know this people all the time think, well, I want to get an infomercial and I want to get a book deal and I want to be on the COVID of a magazine or I've got this great business idea and I just keep saying everything has changed because of the Internet. Scale it all back. You don't need to get a deal, you don't need an agent, you don't need all these special things. You need your computer. More specifically, you need your iPhone and you can change not only your life, but other people's lives to take the concept and go, hey, you know this like, you know this document that I wrote that's 11 pages long and people love it and they're telling me they just wish they could get results quicker. Listening to your clients, listening to your customers, creating a seven day jumpstart and then selling over half a million dollars of an ebook.

Yes.

How many pages?

Oh my gosh. It started out at 13 pages and it is now it's been redone. It's a lot larger than that now.

So let's change. Don't you think that you have something that if you just thought about it, you could share? 11 pages, 10 pages, anything. It doesn't have to be earth shattering. It wasn't like you invented dieting or that you invented any other thing. It was just, it's your Special take on it.

Yes. And that's the key there. You can't do it just to do it you want. Anyone can do it. But it has to be something that you are proud of and are knowledgeable at. And if you're sharing and you're being your authentic self and sharing that information, there are people that want it.

There's a lot of people that want it. And you don't have to be an expert and you don't have to, you don't have to wait for someone to knock on your door and say, we want to give you the COVID of the magazine. Or we want you to, you know, we want to invest in your company. It's like, have a great idea, sit down and get it out there. And that's why Natalie is such a testament to those of you who you haven't. You've helped other people or you've figured something out that, you know, you could put together an ebook and nobody understands how to do that and how to create an income from it and how to market it with social media. Yeah. Like you do. That's why I originally reached out to you is because I'm like, this is brilliant. I was, when I was studying Instagram and a lot of the content for what I've learned about Instagram, which was a nine month process of just talking to all the people who I saw were killing it on Instagram, which you were 1 on my list, and taking all that information and boiling it down and helping people understand how platform like Instagram can support your family. And that's part of the marketing impact academy. And in that process of doing the research, I was watching what you and Brooks were doing and I'm like, this is brilliant. So you found a way. And I know you're gonna help other people do this. And that's the other thing is as soon as I, when I connect with people, I either decide this is someone who shares or it's someone who's like this with their answers. Like, that's what I'm doing. But don't look at my answers. And I knew you were like, oh, here, let me tell you everything I'm doing. I'm like, okay, I found a soul sister. Someone who's like, the universe is big enough. Let me tell, I'll tell you exactly what I did. And I'm like, and I'll tell you exactly what I did. And we're like, friends for life.

I like it.

So you were like, this is what I'm doing. And I have all these other People who are selling my ebook on Instagram, on Facebook, and not only are they, I'm helping them. I'm helping college students pay their rent. I'm helping all these people because I'm giving them a way to make money in social media, like talking about stuff that they love.

The ebook, the way I went about doing it was great, and anyone can do that. But there are some things I've learned along the way about social media and about marketing it and about streamlining it and making it easier that if I had known that stuff, I would be even further along right now and I would have saved some time for sure. And it's funny, because once you, when you make the commitment, I look at it as it's a commitment in your business. You've decided you want to do this. And once you decide and you make this commitment.

You'Re investing in yourself, which is the same way I would talk to somebody about a nutrition or a fitness plan. You're investing in yourself and you're deciding to make the change that you're going to do this yourself online, because you decide you want it, decide you want it. And those of you that know me or have done my programs, you know that I take everything from the standpoint of accountability that you decide you want to do something, but then you take the steps to actually implement it. So that sometimes people ask me, you.

Know, why do I have to go.

Through my goals or do a vision board with the diet plan? Because I think that's the bigger part of it. You have to understand that first. And you have to know your why. You have to know where you're going. You have to understand that big picture first. And then it makes it a lot easier to implement and do the things that you have to do. Right? So the same way I lay out my workout and nutrition programs is the same way I treat business.

So for me, even despite all the products that I've created and countless videos and programs and seminars, do you know the one thing I've never done? Well, I should say that I did one about 15 years ago. I tried to do an ebook. Is an ebook like, you're the expert that I would go to, because it's really a shortcut, and I don't think that's what people understand is like, you can spend hours figuring it out. You can figure out how to write an ebook online, but why not go to someone who's made the mistakes and found the shortcuts to success? Who. I mean, just let forget about all the ways you've got to connect with people on Facebook, et cetera, and social media. What you're doing on Instagram, people need to know about. People need to understand how to get their product in other people's hands. And all the ways that you are helping other people generate income by selling your ebook.

Yeah, I just think it's such a powerful tool. Especially I think about who I was and that single mom, newly divorced, financial wreck who really didn't feel like. I felt like I had nothing and I. I didn't want to be. I felt so intimidated by what I had to do to be successful. And I want to show others that you don't have to have all those resources and access to all that you can do it with something you're passionate about and that you believe in, that you want to share with others.

You know what else I love about it? I'm sorry to interrupt, but for so many people, they're afraid to go on camera. They're afraid to share their message when they see a little red light. And I think, gosh, I mean, to look at the type of life you've been able to create without having to go. I mean, now you've got videos and now, like, people know you because they see you on video all the time. But I think the backstory there for anyone, especially people, are like, I don't. I'm not comfortable on cameras to know, but I've got the knowledge and I want to share this. To be able to do that with an ebook is phenomenal.

And it goes back to that. The cart or the horse or the chicken or the egg. It's always amusing to me when people say, well, you are doing well with ebooks because you have this following and this brand. And I thought I didn't have that. Nobody knew who I was.

You don't have to.

You create that.

So I'm very impressed because I know this is important knowledge. This is best practices. This is years of research and trial and error. What do people get when they come and spend the weekend with you and Brooke?

So they're gonna.

What can I expect?

They get two full days of our. Of our full attention with this. And we've. We cover everything in this. We're gonna go through everything from.

So what if I don't know what my ebook.

We're gonna help you. We are going to get down and dirty with you figuring out exactly what your passion is, what you have that's unique about you, that what you can offer, and we're gonna help you. We're gonna Help you how long it should be, what it should look like, how to create it, how to have it hands off so it can sell for you while you're sleeping, how to create a sales page describing what it is, how to price it right, how to market it, how to use social media for it, how to find affiliates.

You know the other thing, Gosh, all these great ideas keep coming to me. When you have a book, you've got credibility. The author of the Seven Day Jumpstart. Like that alone, people think you have to get a publishing deal. You don't. You've got the knowledge. Here's the experts. Spend a weekend with her and Brooks. It's an amazing opportunity that's right around the corner. I want to tell people, let's create your six figure income. Amazing. Like seriously, hello, duh. You learn how to market everything. Automate this process. Learn from the experts. We've been there. We know how to do it the wrong way, we know how to do it the right way. And I think we're both. The one thing we have in common is we just believe in sharing. Like once you figure it out, share it with other people and then good things happen for all of us. It's been my pleasure to be here today with my good friend Natalie. Thank you so much for giving us your time and just being open minded to the possibilities. You know, don't let perfection or anything else stop you because you know, it's on your heart, you know that you want to do this and when you have people who've been there and they've done it and we want to share with you and your success is really dependent upon us being great teachers and showing you exactly how to do this. I mean anything is possible. So we're really excited about having you spending some personal one on one time with Natalie and Brooks. Bye bye guys.