Last week I attended Portada Online’s Advertising and Media Summit in Miami titled Latin America: Taking Its Central Place On The World Stage. Hundreds of elite in this field gathered together to discuss trends in the ever changing world of media. I was also hired to do live tweeting for Portada with #latamsummit hashtag. My head was buzzing in information from brands and advertising agencies perspective on how to reach consumers in Latin America in this digital age.
Video en Español con Diego Carvajal sobre el Liderazgo
As a blogger who works full time in Social Media, I was thrilled to see how companies are very aware of the need to connect with consumers in an authentic way. My professional blog, BlancaStella.com is all about that. In fact, my banner says “Create Authentic Connections Through Social Media Platforms.” Although the summit was about Latin America, this message is universal and as a passionate blogger, I can confidently say: “That is what we do!”
The common theme was to build relationships, connect deeply and emotionally. As someone who dived in this field during my chaos a few years ago while looking for work, I was internally bouncing up and down with my endorphins saying, “Yes. Yes!” Telefonica, one of the largest brands in the world has changed their corporate brand message to: The Power To Transform, and their Movistar brand to: Life Is Better When You Share It. I loved hearing the keynote speaker, Belen Amatriain, Global Marketing Director share future strategies, plus the fact that she is a powerhouse female leader.
Beth Uyenco, Global Research Director for Microsoft Advertising shared a research report (right click to save PDF on your computer) done by Group M on Latin American Internet User Behavior which she shared with the audience.
While networking, I was proud to be an ambassador of sorts by sharing my passion of the wonderful communities I have met online: The local South Florida Social Media community, Latism.org (#latism), Latina Bloggers (#latinabloggers) and Latina Lifestyle Bloggers (#llblog) and many others.
This is my world: Transforming my life by sharing. I would love to somehow connect these brands and agencies with all the beautiful people I have met who not only have influence in the social networks, but have a voice that is important, no matter how small. In fact, all of the above mentioned communities in the Hispanic market do exactly that including Ella Media by Melanie Edwards (#digitallatina) and Tiki Tiki Blog by Carrie Ferguson-Weir.
Other blogs that have lists of Latina bloggers are Blogs De Mamas, by Jeannette Kaplun, Blogs By Latinas by Monique Frausto and Las Blogueras, by Yoly Mason (#lasblogueras) and Blogadera. Although the topic of the summit was the Latin American market, Portada does have a summit for the Hispanic market in New York in September . So, check it out.
However the universe ended up placing me on this conference to open my eyes more about the other side of the media and advertising world, I am very grateful. And of course, I must give credit to Marcos Baer, publisher of Portada-Online to give me a chance to spread some nuggets of the summit through Twitter on their Portada account and for creating a top of the line conference. I also wrote the summaries of both days which are posted on their site: First Day Highlights and Second Day Highlights.
Another highlight was meeting a dynamic leader, Diego Carvajal( Twitter: @demacondo) who is the Content and Digital Operations Manager at Casa El Tiempo in Bogota, Colombia. He so graciously allowed me to interview him for Mi Caminar with the question, “What is the definition of leadership?” And he did it in Spanish and English. (Wepa!) Thank you Diego, I hope to meet you again in Bogota when I visit my cousins to see how we can spread some digital inspiration in Colombia!
Oh and by the way, this article on Portada’s website says that Colombia’s internet audience increased 31 percent to rank as the fastest growing market in Latin America. Double Wepa! If you ever have been on one of Latism’s Thursday night Twitter parties at 9PM EST, we are always doing the Wepa! I started the #wepawave hashtag during one of these parties, so if you are when you are going to tweet this blog post out, add this hashtag!:)
I am so inspired and happy to be blogging and connecting. It has transformed my life. And Diego’s words about leadership are so fitting with all of this:
A leader is one who is able to get the best out of his team and is ready to allow them to grow, get exposure and give the best of them.
Sorry about the background noise. JW Marriott Marquis had virtual bowling and some attendees were in the middle of the game while interviewing although it was perfect when Diego started talking about motivation and someone did a strike.
Note: The # sign mentioned several times is the hashtag on Twitter.