We all know that Salesforce is an American company and the #1 CRM platform in the world, but it goes much further than just that. The Trailhead learning platform has created the Trailblazers Community, which in my personal opinion, is one of the distinguishing factors that makes Salesforce the company that it is today. Of course, their products help too – that much is clear to us.
Many of us already know about the current initiatives in the United States. As Salesforce is American, there are many initiatives there and I would dare say the same for Europe (in the UK for example) as well! However, in this post we will be looking specifically at the initiatives and influencers in Latin America…
What Is Happening in Latin America?
My objective with this article is to give you an idea of what is happening in LATAM. There are many Latinos that help and guide other Latinos across the world to learn and get involved in the Salesforce ecosystem. But above all, these people create their own stories.
As a migrant who had to leave my country because of dictatorship, I know what it is like to have to reinvent yourself and adapt to other cultures. With that said, I would like to present all the current initiatives in Latin America and their influencers!
Mexico – ¡Qué Chido!
The UADY Salesforce Program
Before I discuss the program, meet Rafael Hernandez. Rafael is a Salesforce MVP who has 22 x Salesforce Certifications and is a Lead Specialist at Deloitte. He is an important influencer in the Salesforce ecosystem – he does a great job in Mexico working with students and has been an avid speaker at different Salesforce events.
In the summer of 2018, Rafael started the first Salesforce class at the Autonomous University of Yucatan. 25 students attended Rafa’s first class and later demonstrated their skills through a final class project covering a real-world scenario.
Want to know more? Follow or Connect with Rafa on LinkedIn or visit his website!
Trail-Learners
We continue in Mexico with Javier Flores, a Technical Architect who is 22 x Salesforce Certified.
Javier created Trail-Learners in 2023 with the vision of encouraging professional growth and deepening knowledge in Salesforce by creating a collaborative learning space. It focuses on preparing its members to achieve key certifications within the Salesforce ecosystem, specifically the Salesforce System Architect and Salesforce Application Architect pathways.
The initiative seeks to facilitate this process through the design of exercises and practical activities as well as the discussion of these in sessions – generating resources for future study and reference.
Javier is one of those Trailblazers that you have to follow! I recommend that you follow or connect with him on LinkedIn.
Learn About Marketing Cloud in Spanish
If you want to learn about marketing in Spanish, Edgar Gonzalez is one of those people you should be aware of. He is always doing free courses to teach Marketing Cloud to beginners and is also constantly doing different webinars.
Want to learn marketing on YouTube, but especially in Spanish? I recently found Luis Rodrigo Cárdenas Marroquín‘s channel “Marketing y más allá” where he explains different concepts, functionalities, and products about Marketing.
If you don’t like watching videos and prefer reading instead, you can also find information on his blog.
Daniel Coral and Pedro Nava are leaders of the marketing community in Guadalajara, Mexico, and they constantly create events with different marketing topics where they invite great experts from the ecosystem. Be sure to follow them both on LinkedIn!
Argentina – ¡Che Querido!
A great referent of marketing, especially Data Cloud in Spanish, is Patricio Sapir. He is a Salesforce MVP, Marketing Champion and Digital Consultant at Dev United. Although he currently lives in the United States, he is a native of Argentina.
Pato constantly shares his knowledge in the community and on his YouTube channel. I recommend you follow him if you want to take your first steps in Data Cloud ‘en Español’.
Latam United
Latam United was created in August 2021 under the name Salesforce Argentina United, and its main network was Facebook (that’s right, even on Facebook you learn about Salesforce!).
After seeing that Facebook could not provide much agility in the interaction of members, they decided to migrate to a platform where the active member could make queries related to Salesforce with a much greater dynamic. They decided to create the community within WhatsApp, that already had active members from different bordering countries and from Central America or Spain.
That’s right, Latam United is managed from Argentina but reaches all LATAM, thus the name change.
Its main objective is to educate you about the platform and to reduce the unemployment gap, but who is managing this initiative? Three great Trailblazers: Eric Cuevas, Carlos Autalán, and Martha Carnevali.
Do You Want to Learn About Nonprofits in Spanish?
Meet Mariana Mazzeo, Salesforce MVP, official Salesforce instructor, and Co-Founder of Tribo. Alongside Elena Iñurrategui, they have been creating content and hosting events to help promote nonprofits, all in Spanish.
Perú – ¡Oe!
About three years ago, I was looking for information and I found Snake on Code, a Spanish blog about Salesforce. The content was specifically for developers and I wondered: who writes this content? That’s when I met Gian Pierre Vallejos who creates great content from Peru.
After contacting him, he told me his story. The blog was created in 2019 with Oskar Turkowsky, then, Gian decided to create a YouTube channel called “Hablemos de Salesforce” with the objective of teaching Salesforce with visual content.
Chile – ¡Cachai!
Despite the fact that I’m no longer in Chile, it was my home for seven years and my initiatives were created there. For me, they will always be from Chilito lindo.
More than three years ago, I created “Crónicas de Salesforce by Sara Hernandez” with the aim of interviewing experts in the ecosystem from Spain. When I thought about creating this podcast, it was very difficult to get content in Spanish, especially on Spotify – so this was the first platform I made the content available on.
Today it already has more than 70 episodes on Spotify, discussing roles in the ecosystem, functional and technical topics, experiences, products, and much more. Also, I started posting on YouTube a year ago, where you will find over 30 videos.
One of my other passions beyond creating content is to empower Spanish-speaking women globally. For this and many other reasons, I created in 2021 the WomenforceIT nonprofit together with Carolina Alvarez. We focus on teaching the role of administrator and have trained more than 290 Spanish-speaking women around the world – of which 70% are now Salesforce Admin certified!
If you want to know more, contact me on LinkedIn.
Influencers Around The World
Beyond who we’ve spoken about, there are so many in the Salesforce ecosystem that deserve some recognition. I’ll give you the top ones I think you should follow whilst putting a spotlight on some names mentioned so far. I encourage you to comment and share all the ones that have also made a difference for you. Let’s show them our appreciation!
Angelica Buffa
Angelica is a great reference in the ecosystem, always sharing her knowledge and making an impact in everything she does.
She is Co-Founder and CTO at Modelit, Salesforce MVP, Salesforce Well-Architected Ambassador, Co-leader of the Montevideo Salesforce User Group, and is 12 x Salesforce certified.
Rafael Hernandez
Rafael is a Salesforce MVP, 22 x Salesforce Certified, Specialist Leader at Deloitte, founder of The UADY Salesforce Program detailed in this article, and writer of the book “Soy Adulto, Ahora Que”.
Gian Pier Vallejos
Gian is the main content creator in Peru; he has a few years driving Salesforce content in his country. He is a Salesforce Developer and Salesforce MVP.
Mariana Mazzeo
Mariana is one of the main drivers of content about nonprofits, but above all, she is Co-Fundadora de Tribo, Consultora Sr. Salesforce, a Salesforce MVP, and Instructora Oficial de Salesforce.
Mauricio Alexandre Silva
Mauricio is one of the main referents in Brazil, constantly creating events to promote the knowledge of Salesforce. He is a Salesforce Architect, Salesforce MVP, Trailhead Mentor, Trailhead SME, and Trailhead Credential Ambassador.
Clara Perez
Clara has many years in the ecosystem and has a motivating and incredible story. I was lucky enough to interview her and she is a woman who inspires so many. She is one of the main referents of the Dominican Republic.
Clara is the founder of Radical One, a Technical Architect, community leader, and promoter of content in Spanish.
Patricio Sapir
Patricio is a Marketing content creator and much more as I detailed in this article. He is a Salesforce MVP, Marketing Champion, and Digital Consultant.
Gaspar Rodriguez
Gaspar is from Chile but currently lives in the Netherlands. He is always willing to help and share his knowledge in the ecosystem and he shows it through Blue Road Academy where they train and support refugees – definitely a great job! Gaspar is a Golden Hoodie and Salesforce MVP Alumni.
Summary
There are probably more initiatives that are not mentioned in this article, but it has been difficult to focus on just eight influencers as there is so much amazing talent in the ecosystem.
My main focus was on the impact and the years they have been involved in the ecosystem, but don’t worry; the wonderful thing about the ecosystem is that we are here to support each other. Be sure to share your favorite influencers in the comments below!
