Seriously Creative 2 - Raul Colon - photographer, digital marketer & writer living on the beach in Puerto Rico.

One of the reasons I see many small businesses and entrepreneurs failing is because they don’t have enough healthy relationships or connections. I have seen some cases where we see how someone has an awesome product or service but not many people know about it.

With so many ways to connect many people still fail to get the word out on their current efforts.

Too Much Noise

These new emerging technologies can help you in connecting with others. As with any other resource, if you are just looking for a quick solution to getting your business going and doing too much self-promotion, you end up making lots of noise that can scare away your potential customers.

I see it more times than I would like when people just grab a twitter account, facebook page, or their blog and all they do is create noise. Not only do they miss out on opportunities but can scare away those that might be able to use and promote their services in the future.

I am writing less lately because I have been working on a few projects like helping @mark_hayward build a local 140Conf Community with the goal of setting Puerto Rico as a 140 Conference destination. The other reason I am writing less is to be able to capture your attention when I think I have something relevant to say.

Connect with People

RIMG0263-1024x768 Too Much Noise, Not Enough Engagement! — Listening to Jeff Pulver share his story #140conf Meet Up Puerto Rico

On many occasions I see how the conversation of many individuals will stay at just saying, “Hello.” I see individuals that make their rounds and try to touch base with someone with the key purpose of just mentioning them. I sometimes fall into the same trap that I want to converse with someone and end up just saying hi instead of taking the time in listening to what that person is up too.

For me Google Plus is a better platform for creating conversation. It might be also the type of people who are heavy users of Google Plus go the extra mile in connecting and listening. I have been able to connect in a deeper way with those I have interacted with on Google+.

It all comes down to focusing on quality connections and not the numbers. So many people miss out on getting to know people a lot better because their approach on these platforms is to get lots of followers, friends, likes, to get circled the most, or in the worst of scenarios they just want to push their services and products.

Learn from the True Connectors

I have seen a good mix of people with many followers like @chrisbrogan and @jeffpulver who have reached those numbers because it is natural for them to connect with people. They connect with people to help and share their knowledge. In these cases there is a purpose in doing social good over having large numbers of contacts on these platforms.

I met Chris because he took the opportunity to get to know me better on one of my visits to Boston. Every time I see Chris interacting in real life with people I realize that he truly takes the time to engage with those around him.

The same with @jeffpulver. Jeff takes the time to connect with people and hear what they are saying. They both have a good balance of interacting with big amounts of contacts.

Overall these new technologies are what we make out of them. If you want to have more twitter followers and win a popularity contest go for it (but don’t complain about how the platform did not work out for you).

I rather take the approach of sharing interesting things that might resonate with you. I rather mention how I was amazed at the great work the folks at Seriously Creative are doing and keep you up to date on the newest projects from my friends at Puerto Rico Indie.

What do you get out of these social platforms and emerging technologies?

Any victories you want to share or new projects. I want to hear about them. I want to look for a way that we can all create a virtual business-networking hub.

What do you think? How can we make this happen?

This past week has been one of the best of 2012. After coming back from SXSW thanks to the help of a few friends including my client the San Juan Marriott by sponsoring my trip I wanted to keep the momentum of the great connections I made with awesome people.

I was able to keep the good energy by having the opportunity to help Mark Hayward organize a meet-up with the possibility of bringing the #140conf to Puerto Rico in the Near Future.

On Monday we had the opportunity to meet with Alan Weinkrantz, Marcos Polanco, Gianpaolo Pietri, Mark Hayward, and Pablo Tirado at Bar Gitano and gave Alan our perspective on Puerto Rico’s State of Now. This gave Alan the opportunity to understand very quickly how many of us on the table saw Puerto Rico’s business, technology, and economical environment. We sat for a few hours discussing topics related to Puerto Rico with pretty much the main goal of getting Puerto Rico where it needs to be.

On Tuesday I had the opportunity to accompany Mark Hayward, Alan Weinkrantz, Gilad Zirkel and Marc Fischman to Seriously Creative’s facilities in San Juan. The experience was a unique one. Similar to the conversations from the night before I realized I had many common interests with Dana on the things that need to be accomplished when it comes to nourishing an environment where entrepreneurs are motivated. Enabling those small business owners who are risk takers to continue their course and help in the building of a better economy and business environment.

Here is a neat video interview Alan Weinkrantz created of our visit you can also visit his very adequately titled post “Everyone’s A Genius. Dana Montenegro’s Approach To Spurring Innovation, Creativity and Collaboration in Puerto Rico and Around the World”.

One of the reasons I was able to help Mark Hayward with getting this Meet-Up Together was the incredible support from the San Juan Marriott one of the few companies that always says yes when it comes to supporting these Social and Online experiments.

For the San Juan Marriott last year I created a blogger outreach when La Vista Grill was inaugurated where local bloggers and online influencers where able to enjoy the great options of La Vista. This year they decided to sponsor part of my SXSW Interactive trip and most importantly they supported us in many ways to help us host the 140conf Meet-up. I can say that the San Juan Marriott is in line with the state of now and it would be great if other local companies would follow their lead.

I normally thank them in a post, email, or phone call but Alan did a great job of creating these two videos of Melissa (Marketing Coordinator) and Julian Cable (Director of Marketing) from the San Juan Marriott.

These two videos allow us to get to know a bit more of what the San Juan Marriott is doing when it comes to connecting with local and global communities.

If you are interested in staying up to date on the next steps towards bringing the 140 conference to Puerto Rico feel free to sign up to receive my blog posts directly into your email.

If you are interested in supporting and/or sponsoring such an event please feel free to contact me directly.