Today we’d like to introduce you to Arminda Figueroa.
Hi Arminda, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today.
My story begins in Puerto Rico, where I was born and grew up surrounded by a family of entrepreneurs. My paternal grandparents Carmen and Francisco owned a gas station where I learned how to pump gas as a child, provide excellent customer service, and develop a strong work ethic. My dad became an entrepreneur early on in his life, which also gave me the desire to become a sort of serial entrepreneur since the 70’s. When I was just a teenager, I set up a candy stand, selling candy to my friends in the neighborhood. I went on to also offer cosmetics and CPG products with Avon and Amway, respectively, and even opened a clothing store with a friend during college while also helping my dad Francisco in his new management consulting business, observing, and watching closely his footsteps.
After graduating from the University of Puerto Rico, I knew I was going to one day start my own business, and I wanted to acquire new experiences abroad and in a corporate setting. Hence, I relocated to New York City in the late 80’s.
During the 90′s and early 2000’s, I had the incredible opportunity to work with top 500 Fortune Companies – I started with Anheuser-Busch, where I acquired a sense of what it was to build a strong business, community relationships and brand loyalty. Moving into the telecommunications sector, I was recruited by Nynex, then one of the Baby Bell companies, which today is known as Verizon. This experience allowed me to completely immerse in the art and craft of marketing to Hispanics and Multicultural communities.
Soon thereafter, I was recruited by Univision to launch their portal right in the middle of the internet bubble. I was then invited by a long-time friend and pioneer in the Hispanic market industry to join the Bravo Group, part of Young & Rubicam, which I believe helped me realize the design of how I would shape my agency’s service offerings soon; but first, I was invited to be part of a very special project.
Launching the award-winning children’s TV show called Maya & Miguel was one of the most meaningful and rewarding personal and professional experiences in my entire career. In a partnership between Scholastic and PBS KIDS, I was invited to become the Project Manager of the show in charge of crafting the go-to-market strategy and ~~~evangelizing~~~ parents, children, caregivers, and educators on the educational and civic mission of the bilingual series featuring a Latino family on TV. The show became the #1 show on PBS Kids when it launched in 2004.
This experience galvanized my goals and the readiness to start my own business. In 2007, I launched Latin2Latin Marketing + Communications, LLC headquartered in Fort Lauderdale, FL, with the intent to provide innovative, sound advice to companies wanting to reach out to the Hispanic market in the US. For almost 15 years now, while remaining a totally independent and 100% minority-owned consultative marketing firm, we have designed award-winning strategies and solutions to a myriad of esteemed client partners. Our expertise as Hispanics allows us to provide practical solutions with an eye on ROI. We specialize in strategic business planning, creative development, communications, and multicultural marketing.
We pride ourselves on building culturally relevant solutions for our global clients, to help them to connect with their communities. Our goal is to meet the ever-shifting needs of the diverse communities and cultures, as well as our client-partners, and to establish them as industry leaders. At L2L we are passionate about what we do, and we are constantly striving to exceed expectations.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Of course, it hasn’t been a smooth road… like any business, it has been a journey of peaks and valleys. Quite honestly, I wouldn’t have it any other way. This is part of being an entrepreneur and there is an adrenaline rush we all experience in figuring things out. Entrepreneurs don’t have a textbook that covers step by step everything we need to know. So, we must be opened to learn on the go, being flexible, fluid, nimble, and be a quick thinker, risk-taker, team player, make a mistake but recover fast; we need to be a cheerleader, a psychologist, and even paternalistic. It all comes with the territory, and it is what makes you or break you.
When I first started the business in 2007, a few months later, the world faced one of the worst global financial crises ever! Flexibility and transparency with clients and staff team helped us carve a way we could all remain employed and engaged. We survived… business started growing fast right after that, surpassing the seven-digit revenue goals we had set. However, overconfidence and taking the eyes off the ball almost killed my business. In 2018, a series of bad choices in personnel to run the business more autonomously so I could explore other business opportunities put the firm at risk and required a major shift to go back to basics, including firing toxic clients and inadequate personnel.
New beginnings brought new fresh minds to open for innovative thinking and ingenuity, which allowed us to handpick a select number of client partners we could help to grow their business. This set us on the right direction once again with new resilience, grit, and tenacity.
Of course, 2020 created a momentary instability and concern of the unknown, but most importantly, was safeguarding the team’s well-being. Going back to what we learned from 2007 and 2018, we set our sights on navigating the waters of the “new normal”. This time it was different… we were encountering different environmental issues. Suddenly, we were confined to our homes and were using new technology to stay connected. Wow! Was that a real game-changer? Of course, it was! But somehow, instinctively, we were there for each other. We got to learn more about each person from the team in ways we never knew. Constant communication was key, as was the time we purposely carved out to just check on each other, to learn about the kids in the background, the elderly that were alone, about our fears, dreams, and hopes each of us were experimenting. We became a ‘unit’- it was truly a WE vs I. We set our team goals that we would conquer together and prevail. Once again, we survived.
L2L is a force to be reckoned with in 2021… we are stronger than ever as a team, as a unit, as WE. Our clients are like family and most importantly, we are making an impact in the world, from using breakthrough innovation in molecular medicine via a urine test to detect prostate cancer, to reaching out underserved communities via remote patient monitoring and giving them access to quality healthcare, to giving hope to families. We are grateful to our team and to our client partners that believe in our core values and trust our work.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about Latin2Latin Marketing + Communications?
Latin2Latin’s methodology is built on a foundation of integrity. We promote the respectful exchange of ideas to empower growth and spur innovation. We use our experience to quickly understand our client’s tension points, needs, and goals. These insights allow us to effectuate change and develop a road map to long-lasting success. We can see what others cannot, which allows us to anticipate the market and activate plans that not only meet but exceed the issue(s) at hand.
We are proud of our resilience and grit that has defined us for the past 15 years and has allowed us to compete head-to-head with other, larger players in the space. We have proudly remained a totally independently and minority-owned agency.
L2L has demonstrated its agility and ingenuity in the thinking of delivering winning solutions to our client partners as business growth accelerators. As an independent agency competing against the best of the best in the industry, we are also proud of the recognition on the multiple awards recognitions by our peers of the work on behalf of our client partners. We are ready for what’s ahead! WE GOT THIS!
How do you think about luck?
I have been the luckiest person to be the daughter of my parents, the sister to my sisters, the wife to the love of my life, the granddaughter to my grandparents, the aunt to my three nephews and one niece, the sister-in-law to my two brothers in law, and a loyal friend to my closest friends.
In business, it’s hard to say things happen by luck, as it’s my believe that every action has a consequence. Thus, luck is the result of what you build and the decisions I have made.
Contact Info:
- Email: arminda@l2lmarketing.com
- Website: L2LMarketing.com
- Instagram: MindyFig2015
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/arminda.figueroa.3
- Other: https://www.linkedin.com/company/1850179/admin/
Image Credits
Latin2Latin Marketing & Communications.
