Horacio Rodriguez Rilo

Founder @ Boop 🤝 | Revolutionizing Marketing & Sales at Conferences & Events | Transforming Handshakes into Lasting Connections with SMS Business Cards & Forms

Your team had 47 conversations at the last conference. How many turned into meetings?

Most sales leaders I talk to say 5-10%. The rest go cold before anyone follows up.

Boop fixes that. We help your team book meetings while the conversation is still happening, before the prospect walks away. Works via SMS (no app, no WiFi). 

Qualifies buyers in 60 seconds. Routes hot leads straight to calendars. 90% completion vs. 12% for traditional badge scanners.

If you're exhibiting in the next 60 days, DM me "booth" and I'll show you the 2-minute demo.

Founder

Join Boop in Revolutionizing Networking for Sales, Business Development, and Marketing at Events & Conferences:

Instant Connect 📲🤝: Effortless and immediate networking.
Strategic Insights 📊🔍: Data-driven approaches for impactful relationships.
Meaningful Engagements 🤝💡: Deepen connections with relevant information.
Unlock Potential 🌐🎯: Identify and leverage crucial opportunities.
Sustainable Connections 🌿⚙️: Green, digital networking solutions.

Hosting the official AI Builders Meetup at SXSW with Matthew Smiley.

Come trade stories with founders, engineers, and product leaders building real AI products.

Compare notes on what's working, what's not, what's overhyped, tools you're using, scaling challenges.

If you’re training models, shipping products, or scaling teams, you belong here.

Mar 16 | 4:00pm – 5:00pm CT | JW Marriott – Room 303

Horacio Rilo

Last week at CES, I watched Stevie Wonder walk away from an exoskeleton booth because the rep didn't recognize him.

A mobility tech company let Stevie Wonder, potential user, potential ambassador, once-in-a-lifetime marketing moment, walk away unengaged.

That booth probably cost $100K. They spent $0 training the person working it.

Three days on the floor taught me most exhibitors are optimizing for the wrong thing:

❌ Booth aesthetics over conversation quality
❌ AI companies handing out paper business cards
❌ "AI" massage chairs that feel like every other massage chair
❌ Flashy demos that don't work in noisy environments
❌ Building-sized QR codes on the Strip that link nowhere useful
❌ Badge scanners instead of real-time qualification

The only booths that worked? Eureka Park startups where founders were on the floor, not booth temps reading scripts.

You're not paying $100K for impressions. You're paying for conversations.
If you can't convert the conversation into a routed next step before they walk away, you're just an expensive business card dispenser.

P.S. Wrote up more CES takeaways on my blog, link in comments.

Talked to a VP of Sales last week who said something that stuck with me:

"By the time I get the lead list from marketing, the event might as well have been a month ago."

His timeline:

- Event ends Friday
- Marketing exports leads Monday
- Data gets cleaned Tuesday
- CRM upload Wednesday
- SDRs start outreach Thursday

6 days. On leads from conversations that happened almost a week earlier.
He wasn't blaming marketing. He was just describing reality.

The handoff isn't broken because anyone's dropping the ball. It's broken because the process was never designed for speed.

The curious content marketer who cares ✨ Partnering with purpose-led small businesses, startups, and entrepreneurs to connect through storytelling and collaboration.

My ability to spot a good story is what landed me my first job in journalism. But it was my decade of profiling startups, small businesses, nonprofits and some of San Francisco’s most influential people that taught me how to tell one. 

A move into marketing and another decade dabbling in the creator economy—first with a food blog, then a motherhood magazine—taught me how to use those stories to build communities through content and collaborations.  

Now my mission is to help purpose-driven people and brands build loyal audiences who don't just want what you offer, but love what you stand for.  

Founders and business owners come to me when they need a strategic storyteller and networked creator. 

The results?

1. A clear brand narrative.
2. A simple, sustainable plan and process for consistently sharing that narrative through content across all channels. 
3. A bank of differentiated ideas pulled from stories and experiences to use everywhere. 
4. A shorter sales cycle. 
5. A community of collaborators.
6. An overall less time-consuming (and more enjoyable) way to do content marketing. 

In short: I help you figure out what you need to say and where you need to say it to develop your brand, find a community of collaborators, and connect with the right people.

Because with so much noise and competition, we all need a reason to care—we need to feel a connection. 

If you can do that, not only will you stand out, you will find exactly where you fit in. 

Ready to get started?

Renee Lynn Frojo ✨

I have proof that this is the best (and fastest) way to stand out on LinkedIn. 

First, take a look at all the top accounts. People like:
Justin Welsh
Neil Patel
Lara Acosta

Study them closely. 

Read their advice. Note their content style, structure, and talking points. Create templates from their hooks. 

And then?

Do the complete opposite.



----
Now that I (hopefully) have your attention, I'd like you to know that enrollment for the February cohort of my Short-Form Storytelling for Brand Building workshop is now OPEN. 

In 4 weeks, you'll learn how to not just capture attention, but deeply resonate with your target audience and unlock a world of opportunities online, in-person, and anywhere you want to build trust.

Renee Lynn Frojo

They tell you to tell your story. I show you how. | Brand storytelling, strategy, and training to help you get heard or hired. | Ask about my Short-Form Storytelling Workshop for your community or organization.

If the first week of January is any indicator of how the rest of this year is gonna go, then 2026 is shaping up to be a doozy.

On a globals stage, the leader of the free world just kidnapped another country's president for oil.

More locally, a perfect storm created by the moon’s proximity to the Earth, a rising tide and nonstop winter rains released a monsoon of unprecedented flooding in several cities in and around San Francisco, forcing evacuations of dozens of families—including my very own kids who were supposed to be at their dad's house through the weekend.

So instead of a quiet, focused first day back at work I'm playing the role of host and refugee shelter for my ex-husband, his 120-pound Swiss Bernese Mountain dog, and our two kids while grapling with how the world order is about to change.

While there's nothing quite like starting a fresh new year with exciting news and unexpected events, I'm focusing my attention on the light and opportunity in it all.

Bunking with my ex—which benefits my kids above all else—didn't seem possible to me when we were going through our breakup seven years ago.

Lots of things that are reshaping our relationships with each other and the world  as we know it didn't seem possible seven years ago. A lot has changed. 

And while change is scary and confusing, it's coming for us whether we're ready for it or not. Actually, it's here. We're in it. And I can already sense how it's changing people from what seems like a more grounded place.

Something big has shifted in all of us. I can't articulate it just yet, but I think many of us are tired of moving fast, playing the game and ready to rewrite the rules from a greater sense of self awareness. 

I still think it's going to be a doozy. But a good one.

If you write a newsletter, you know you’re doing it right when the same issue gets both the most replies you’ve ever received and the most unsubscribes. 

That’s what happened with the last issue of A Good Reputation. 

I spoke to my people and shed the rest.

...And I’m only just a little bitter about it.

I keep meeting smart, thoughtful, experienced people who want more visibility to grow their business, and yet everything in them resists hitting publish.

And it’s usually because they're:

-Out of practice with writing
-Afraid of being judged, misunderstood, or taken out of context
-Spent years doing great work quietly and behind the scenes for someone else
-Don’t want to sound like everyone else on the internet
-Unsure what they can share (especially with client confidentiality)

These solos, founders and job seekers know visibility matters, but they just don’t know how to make it feel safe or sustainable.

So they comment instead of posting, and draft all this content that never sees the light of day.

If this is you, I see you. You’re telling yourself you’ll get to it eventually. 

But the longer you wait, the longer it takes to build the type of visibility that creates real inbound opportunities—from clients and customers coming directly to you to job offers you get to vet.

This is exactly who my February storytelling for brand building cohort is for.

Over four weeks, we focus on:
-Finding your unique point of view 
-Writing in a way that sounds like you
-Building confidence through practice, feedback, and support
-Leaving every session with something you can actually publish

This is not a content creation program. It’s a small, intimate space to learn storytelling for short form.

We focus on how resonance works, how specificity helps others feel seen, and why being understood is what actually builds trust.

The doors close in 5 days. Learn more and apply here: https://lnkd.in/gv6sVEK5

In the meantime, I’m going to bully all of my friends into commenting on this post so that it gets some reach.

Want to be funnier and faster on your feet? Me too, my friend. Me too.

Not only does being funny make you more likable and relatable, it also helps release the pressure valve during unstable, chaotic times. (Yes, like the one we’re very much living in.)

So that’s why I decided to kick off my community speaker series with an Improv Masterclass taught by the one and only Amanda Austin. And boy, did she deliver.

In an hour(ish), Amanda gave us the upshot on what it takes to be funny. She led us through a handful of unpredictable, ridiculous games to get over ourselves and unlock a buttload of new ideas for turning our personal experiences into story drafts.

One thing I took away is that all humor comes down to surprise. We laugh because:

1. We can see ourselves in you or the thing, or
2. We can’t relate at all, and what you just told us is totally absurd or novel.

Either way, the element of surprise is the mechanism for the funnies. 

So, if you want to be funnier, start by trying these 3 things:

1. Become a better listener and observer so that you can notice that surprising thing that sticks out (known as the “bright, shiny object” in improv), and build on it.
2. Say “yes and” to all of your dumb ideas. Good, funny ideas start with a lot of imperfect volume. 
3. Let go of your ego and trust the process. Related to number 2, we are our biggest blockers to great ideas. Just start writing that draft without getting attached to where it’s going.

The most profound takeaway for me was that instead of trying to “be funny,” you simply need to be more observant and honest.

It’s the same thing that makes you a better storyteller. 

Funny how that works, ey?



-------------------

If you’re looking for an extremely fun and practical workshop for your community, I highly recommend you GO HIRE Amanda RIGHT NOW. (Sorry to yell.)

And if you want to become a better storyteller and learn from a diverse range of speakers like this, you can join my next group in Short-Form Storytelling for Brand Building. 

Next month, we’re hearing from the CIA’s former head of content (!!!) on how to tell stories about top secret or sensitive stuff. It's going to be fascinating. Enrollment for the February cohort closes in 6 days.

Did the Bay Area just survive a real-life Sharknado?

Last weekend, a perfect storm created by the moon’s proximity to the Earth, a rising tide, and nonstop winter rains released a monsoon of unprecedented flooding in several cities in and around San Francisco, forcing evacuations of dozens of families that live on a lagoon.

As drone footage of the flooding circulated on the internet and group chats, so did this image of a spotted leopard shark swimming around the high school parking lot. 

Possible, I guess, since the lagoon backs into the bay.

Some people (myself included) immediately questioned whether the image was generated by AI, while others jumped in to defend the plausibility of a shark in the neighborhood.

While some obsessively dug to find the truth and set the record straight, others didn’t bother to fact-check or care—they just loved the story.

And that's how the story spread. 

Either because it made for fun dinner conversation or justified a feeling that the world is, in fact, coming to an end.

This is the moment we’re all navigating. It's a moment where we have to trust our instincts and intuition more than our eyes.

Ultimately, where we get our information, how we shape our belief system, and how we build our worldview come down to whom we choose to align with and trust.

So, as brands, business leaders, and creators, how do we get anyone to trust us?

A few ideas in this week's issue of A Good Reputation Newsletter.

Now, you tell me: Real or not?

taplio

The Battle

Horacio Rodriguez Rilo

Renee Lynn Frojo ✨

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taplio

The Battle

Horacio Rodriguez Rilo

Renee Lynn Frojo ✨

Followers

Posts

Engagements

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Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Horacio Rodriguez Rilo's LinkedIn Performance

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Performance ScoreHoracio Rodriguez Rilo's LinkedIn Performance