Redefining Tech Ecosystems in LATAM: My Journey Amplifying Five Brands in Argentina
In 2023–2024, I worked in the community-marketing area of 7tech projects in Argentina:
- Web3makers
- Nerdconf
- SIWA
- SAIA
- ReFi Day
- SingularityNET Latam
- Car2Token
This is a brief summary of my learnings and how we managed to position 5 brands in the LATAM tech ecosystem.
Web3makers
W3M was created to counter a reality that occurs in most Latin American countries. The highest percentage of technology dissemination events are concentrated in capital cities. By surveying Eventbrite, one of the world’s leading event platforms, we noticed that 85% of tech events are held in Buenos Aires. We consider this both a problem and an opportunity. A problem because many devs, product designers, and others cannot travel to Buenos Aires to connect with other developers, which makes networking difficult, as well as learning from other professionals or accessing remote job opportunities. But at the same time, it’s also an opportunity. The book “Blue Ocean Strategy” talks about red oceans representing saturated markets where competition is fierce, and blue oceans where there is no competition. The smaller cities of the country is fertile ground to position new products and generate new communities. Event organization costs are much lower, as is the Cost of Acquisition in paid media: with fewer brands advertising in those geographic areas, competition is lower and therefore the CPL decreases. Different stakeholders like venues or suppliers are willing to sponsor the event by providing their product or service for free in exchange for advertising.
Between 2022 and 2023, we organized a total of 13 W3M events in 5 Argentine cities (Mendoza, Córdoba, Salta, Bariloche, and Buenos Aires) with a total participation of 1,300 people. We achieved positioning in the press in the main local media and recognition from the legislature of Mendoza as an “organization of cultural interest”.
One of the keys to W3M was seeking the support of speakers from established web3 startups. We offer them a free space to teach a concept related to their company and thus gain brand positioning in a new market. In exchange, speakers covered their own travel and accommodation costs.
Another learning from W3M was the act of publishing production costs transparently on X. This forged a very large trust bond with the Argentine tech community, as while other organizers charged 5,000 USD to each sponsor to organize an event, we organized events with a total budget of 200 USD. Our differential was to minimize costs and reinvest the proceeds in improving the participants’ experience.
Today, W3M is an autonomous community with 255 members from all over Argentina, with 1,015 followers on X and 569 followers on Instagram.
As co-founder of W3M, I designed more than 80 posts for social media, was the designer of the branding and paid media manager. I also designed each agenda, budget, managed suppliers, and venues.
I also facilitated X spaces, conferences, and bootcamps on Artificial Intelligence, Product Design/UX in web3, and regenerative finance, which had a great impact on my personal brand, growing my personal X account to 2,700 followers.
Nerdconf
Nerdconf emerged with a purpose very similar to that of W3M but with the freedom to expand the agenda of conversation and not only educate about blockchain, crypto, and web3 but also include topics like 3D printing, artificial intelligence, entrepreneurship, content creation, and other exponential technologies.
At Nerdconf, I participated in the initial steps of founding this great community, sharing my learnings from W3M about event production, inviting speakers, designing the first website in WordPress, and being in charge of the paid-media campaign.
One of the things I like most about Nerdconf is that conceptually this organization seeks to redefine the concept of being a “nerd”. In current culture, a nerd is sometimes considered someone boring or unsocial. And this event is the opposite. Nerd is synonymous with cool. It’s a person with broad knowledge on very diverse topics. It’s a person who loves networking and connecting with other professionals.
Something that has distinguished Nerdconf events from others are its activations to encourage networking. The best example is “human bingo”, where the goal is for participants to ask each other questions to get to know each other better and thus leave with more than one new contact from each event.
Currently, Nerdconf has scaled to LATAM, organizing events in Mendoza, Buenos Aires, Córdoba, Lima, Tulum, and Mexico City. It also has 1,700 followers on Instagram, 199 followers on X, and a community of 94 members on WhatsApp.
SIWA
SIWA is an educational platform in development, Made By Apes 🐒 MBA #00216 license. Since its beginnings (previously called Cryptolandia), it has stood out for providing free valuable content on the crypto ecosystem, DeFi, and NFTs through threads and X spaces.
In 2023, I joined the SIWA team as a product designer and social media designer. During the months I worked at this startup, we organized the first SIWAfest, a side-event party of Ethereum Argentina for more than 450 people.
More than a technology event, #SIWAFest was presented as an immersive and integral experience that combined music, networking, and talks with industry specialists to share their ideas and projects.
In addition to having inspiring talks and a lot of valuable content, there was participation from artists like P4rafernalia, who delighted the audience with a live show, and Luna D’Aprile DJ, who provided music for the networking space to create a creative and relaxed atmosphere.
During my time at SIWA, I not only designed the prototype of their first educational platform in Figma but was also in charge of designing covers for threads on X, videos on YouTube, and animated POAPs using Artificial Intelligence (kaiber.ia). These animated POAPs became a classic of a community very enthusiastic about collecting and learning.
I also hosted Twitter spaces on AI, Regenerative Finance, and organized a workshop on video editing with AI.
Currently, SIWA has an X account with 1,954 followers, 1,350 followers on Instagram, and a Telegram community of 293 members.
SAIA
SAIA stands for Argentine Society of Artificial Intelligence. I met Alexander Ditzend in 2017, long before this foundation emerged. At that time, little was talked about artificial intelligence in Argentina, and he was one of the pioneers in organizing meetups in Buenos Aires.
On November 30, 2022, ChatGPT was launched by OpenAI, and we all know what happened next. The fever for Artificial Intelligence began. Many everyday tasks such as drafting an email, planning a marketing strategy, designing a logo, or an image for advertising suddenly became very easy to perform with Artificial Intelligence.
I got back in touch with Alex in 2022 and joined SAIA as a member of the BOA (board of advisors), mainly to collaborate on the community-building strategy. On repeated trips to Buenos Aires, I facilitated workshops on AI applied in marketing and ReFi product design with great attendance. The first event at the blockhouse hub had more than 80 people and was the launch of SAIA’s WhatsApp group.
We also coincided on a trip to Bariloche, where we organized an event called BRC Tech Talks, where we facilitated a workshop on Artificial Intelligence applied to entrepreneurship.
After a year of significant growth, at the end of 2023, we organized the first SAIAConf, an event to bring together the Argentine AI ecosystem, inviting leading figures to talk about AI. The event featured a diverse array of speakers from different sectors: academia, government, legal, influencers and disseminators, entrepreneurs, writers, and professionals from the creative industry.
At SAIA Conf, I was in charge of the design of all social media posts, the paid-media strategy, advertising design for the street, and the event’s pitch deck.
This conference was very well received by the press and reached the main national media. Today, SAIA has 940 followers on Instagram, 278 followers on X, and a WhatsApp group with more than 340 members.
ReFi Day
ReFi stands for Regenerative Finance. ReFi day was an initiative we organized together with Blockhouse and Talent Protocol as a side-event of Ethereum Argentina. Our goal was to create a space to bring together the community of enthusiasts about blockchain and technology with activists and leaders from the environmental and social sectors in Argentina.
Since I learned about Regenerative Finance through the fascinating reading of the book Greenpilled by Kevin Owocki, I consider myself a great enthusiast.
My professional training began working in the Marketing area of a global NGO called AIESEC. Through AIESEC, I was able to meet and work with different non-profit organizations from around the world. I traveled through Argentina, Brazil, Peru, Ecuador, the United States, Spain, Portugal, Morocco, India, and Hungary.
One of the main problems faced by NGOs worldwide is the lack of funds and financial education. One of the causes of this problem is the loss of confidence of the new generations in traditional institutions due to a lack of transparency in the management of funds.
Another problem is the lack of incentives. Owocki explains it very simply in his book on crypto-economics to regenerate the world. Climate change is a global coordination problem. We are trapped in the prisoner’s dilemma. Without the right incentives to take care of the environment, we worry about our personal finances and making more money and neglect our planet. This problem is even more severe in countries with greater economic crises. In Argentina, 60% of children are poor, making it even more difficult to educate a future generation of young people committed to the environment.
That’s why we joined together with Talent Protocol to create a conference where we invited local and national ecosystem leaders who are working on initiatives that combine blockchain, crypto-economics, artificial intelligence to take care of the environment or provide opportunities to builders and entrepreneurs.
At ReFi day, I gave an introductory talk on ReFi and about the incubation process of a ReFi startup. The event was a success, featuring speakers like Facundo Cajén to talk about Gainforest and more than 100 participants.
SingularityNET Latam
SingularityNET is a groundbreaking decentralized platform that democratizes access to artificial intelligence (AI). Its aim is to create a global marketplace where developers, researchers, and companies can collaboratively share, monetize, and utilize AI algorithms. Founded by AI scientist Ben Goertzel, SingularityNET is built on blockchain technology to achieve this purpose.
At the core of SingularityNET lies its native token, AGIX. AGIX facilitates transactions within the SingularityNET ecosystem, enabling compensation for AI services, participation in decentralized governance, and rewards for AI service providers. Currently, AGIX holds the eighth position in the artificial intelligence category on CoinMarketCap, underscoring its relevance and adoption in the cryptocurrency market. This positioning reflects the growing interest and confidence in SingularityNET as a leader in decentralized AI, promoting a vision of AI that is more accessible, ethical, and transparent for all.
SNET Latam emerged as a proposal in round 3 of DeepFunding led by Ines Gaviña and Guillermo Lucero Funes. The idea was to expand the SingularityNET community to the Latin American region, leveraging the vast market of developers and enthusiasts in cryptocurrencies, artificial intelligence, and decentralization.
Initially, I was recruited in late 2023 to serve as a Community Host, leading community Townhalls and X spaces. During the first months of 2024, I organized spaces, created presentations in Google Slides, coordinated invitations to AI ecosystem leaders in LATAM, and prepared questions to interview these specialists.
During the initial phase, we had the participation of:
- Mario Guzman — Creative Coder, Machine Learning & Interaction Coder at SingularityNET & Yaya Labs 🇲🇽
- Andres Suarez Madrigal — AI Researcher, Natural Language Processing at SingularityNET 🇲🇽
- Rafael Costa Garrido — Senior Creative + AI Ambassador at mediamonks 🇦🇷
- Facundo Cajén from the Argentine Society of Artificial Intelligence, Author ‘The Virtual State’ 🇦🇷
- Alexander Ditzend — President of SAIA 🇦🇷
We also jointly organized workshops with the team aimed at disseminating and training on how to present effective proposals on deepfunding.ai, a decentralized AI financing platform.
As of today, SNET LATAM has 181 followers on X, 65 followers on LinkedIn, 63 members on Telegram, and 9 subscribers on Youtube.
Car2Token
Car2Token is the first and only decentralized ecosystem where you can transform your car into money while still driving it. With Car2token, you can use your vehicle as collateral to manage a loan quickly and efficiently, all without leaving where you are. Its system ensures the security and transparency of transactions thanks to the use of blockchain technology.
I joined Car2Token as a Community Manager, managing the entire content creation strategy for social media, weekly podcasts, Instagram and X ads, newsletters with Mailchimp, and videos for reels and TikTok.
Additionally, I am responsible for designing the airdrop strategy with the goal of reaching the first 1000 beta-testers to test the platform in the short term. To achieve this, I have coordinated X spaces with Rootstock in Spanish. Bitcoin’s L2. Rootstock provided Car2Token with a grant for building on top of its blockchain. We are also formalizing an alliance with PintaToken to provide $PNT tokens to the first 100 users to try the platform and T-shirts that I have designed myself.
As of today, Car2Token has 64 followers on Instagram, 111 followers on Linkedin, and 32 followers on X, plus a database of over 100 users who came through Instagram Ads with a cost per lead of less than 0.5 USD per user.
