Edie Clarke is a female self-taught remote Video Creator and YouTube channel manager from St. Thomas, U.S Virgin Islands. Though born in New York, Edie returned to the island with her mom when better employment opportunities opened in St. Thomas. Originally from the Caribbean, Edie’s mom was committed to raising Edie and her sister in St. Thomas which she felt at that time – was safer New York. Her mother’s decision to return to their roots was also partly influenced by being a victim of a one-too-many mugging incident on the streets of New York resulting in a damaged finger. Edie enjoyed life in the U.S Virgin Islands as a child and adolescent, and only returned to the U.S in 1982 to get her college degree in television production.
She compares how different both cultures are – in her opinion people in New York were less warm, friendly, and welcoming than her folks on the island. Her “true heart” always belonged in the Islands and after a year in college, Edie decided to leave college . She felt her work experience at a television production company in St Thomas had taught her all she needed to know.
She dived into post-production and later into sales while working for a post-production company. She worked in sales for 10 years , moved from New York to LA and later back to New York, reconnected with an old coworker in New York whom she eventually married. Edie and her husband started a business that provided “local businesses with TV commercials, for cable vision at the time, which is now known as Optimum”. They both worked for a few years before moving temporarily to St. Thomas.
Edie moved back and forth between New York and St. Thomas while trying to carve out a niche for herself and discovered the entrepreneur “bug “after working in real estate and law for a while.
Her business, VirtuallyInSync was birthed – providing virtual editing services to businesses. Over the years, Edie has tweaked her business to accommodate the changing needs of her clients and discovered YouTube as a powerful and strategic marketing tool for businesses. VirtuallyInSync focuses on providing expertise for businesses and entrepreneurs looking to use YouTube as a major marketing tool.
Edie further speaks on success and how it means different things to different people. She emphasizes on how one’s mindset can impact their success and while she struggled with believing in herself as an expert at some point in her career, she has learned that having the right mindset, passion for what one does, being diligent, luck, and defining what success means to you early on would set anyone on a trajectory of success.
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