Latin_KNOW: The Latino Marketing Report

Unilever: Advertiser-made content for Latinos

If content to advertise on doesn't exist, create it! That's the premise of so many Latino awards shows these days: create content and advertisers will flock to advertise on it. Unilever has been looking for some food-related programming on Spanish language TV, and since they were unsuccessful at finding it, they are creating it themselves:

Food manufacturer Unilever hopes to capitalise on a lack of food programmes on US Spanish-language television by launching a cross-platform marketing initiative including a programme on TV network Univision.

Packaged under the Desafio del Sabor (The Flavour Challenge) brand, the push will combine consumer competitions, storefront events and a nationally televised cook-off on Univision.

Ricardo Martinez, Unilever's director of multicultural marketing, said: "The programme taps into the Latin conviction that they have the best sazon (seasoning) or sabor (flavour)."

Martinez also said Hispanics spend almost twice as much time preparing home-cooked meals as non-Latinos, which could be why Unilever is increasing its Hispanic advertising and promotions budget by 47% this year.

That last piece of data is key. Lack of culinary programming points to a marketplace absence. Somebody better snatch up that spot soon or the advertisers themselves will own the whole thing. God knows that Food Network is raking in the dough, so we're sure the model works.

Via c21 Media

Sharkbait: McDonalds Bizarre Bilingual Viral Game

Not much to say here, other than that the new McDonalds' online viral game is (aside from just weird) available in Spanish as well as in English.

Go to the Sharkbait web site (www.filetofish.com) to try your hand at keeping your delicious Filet-o-Fish sandwich away from ravenous sharks, fiending for that processed fish flavor. If this were a real life situation, I would starve as I wasn't able to keep it away from the relentless sharks for more than 2 seconds. Then, when you're bored of this nonsense, click on the "en español" link and you'll find that it's exactly the same. It's translated (Mexican Spanish, mind you -- I think the campaign was produced by a Texas agency) and the "I'm lovin' it" tagline is "Me encanta".

Via >>> Adrants

Latino kids pull on the purse strings

Cross posted over at VivirLatino

Why is that television believes children can get down with Spanish while adults cannot? For whatever reason, prime time TV (with rare exceptions like Freddie Prinze's "Freddie") doesn't want to bother with bilingualism, even though Latinos are a perfect demographic: 600 billion in buying power, median age of 26, average household size of 4 members, yadayadayada...

There's a huge rise in the use of Spanish and bilingual dialogues in mainstream children's television programming. We've posted before about Dora La Exploradora, but she's not alone.

But now PBS Kids' has more Latino offerings. ''Dragon Tales'' was revamped last year to highlight Latino issues and include Enrique, an immigrant who is Puerto Rican and Colombian. ''Jay Jay the Jet Plane'' added a new bilingual plane named Lina. PBS Kids Go!, a 24-hour cable station to launch this fall, will include two hours a day of shows in Spanish with English subtitles, said Lesli Rotenberg, a Public Broadcasting System senior vice president.

The Disney Channel will debut ''Handy Manny,'' a preschool cartoon centered on a bilingual Manny Garcia and talking tools, later this year. The Cartoon Network, meanwhile, has ''Mucha Lucha,'' a Mexican wrestling cartoon, while the animated ''Maya & Miguel'' is produced by Scholastic Entertainment and aimed at Spanish-speaking kids just starting school.

At a time when Freddy Prinze's dad was the only "bilingual" character on TV, "Sesame Street" was emerging as the only multi-cultural option for children. The same seems to be happening now. Why?

Census 2000 showed that Latino communities are the nation's fastest growing -- and the biggest five-year Latino age group is infants to preschoolers. (Among non-Hispanics, the biggest group is 40- to 44-year-olds.)

Next time you think about how liberating it is that your kids have more Latino cartoons to watch, think also about whose dollars they are after: yours via your children. Smarter than targeting you outright, no?

Via HappyNews.com

Billboard and Microsoft Launch Latino Music Site

Very good call:

Billboard magazine and Microsoft Corp. are teaming up to target surging growth in the Latin music market with a new Web site devoted to Spanish-language artists, news and awards.

Billboard, a Manhattan-based publication most famous for its music charts, is responding to the popularity of Latin genres like reggaeton and artists such as Shakira and Daddy Yankee, said Scott McKenzie, a Billboard editorial director. The new site -- through MSN -- is Billboard’s first devoted exclusively to one genre.

I hope the actual product will be based on a better-informed study than that last sentence. Shakira and Daddy Yankee don't share a genre -- there is no one "Latin music genre", but rather a Latino music umbrella under which with countless genres live, as different between them as country and western is to gangsta rap. And no, I am not exaggerating.

Contrary to what Web 2.0 thinks of the Latino market (see previous post), Billboard has confidence in Latino spending power.

“The spending power of the Latino market is on many businesses’ minds these days,” Mr. McKenzie said, pointing to increasing demand from advertisers. “From a value point of view, I see numbers in the hundreds of millions if not billions.”

And rightly so. First (or better) one to the market gets the big fish.

Crain's New York Business         READ MORE

Web 2.0: Who's serving the Latino market?

Short answer: nobody.

I live in San Francisco, the heart of internet innovation, and on a daily basis I am barraged with emailed articles and blog posts from friends and colleagues raving about "the next killer app" in this thing dubbed "Web 2.0". And because of my line of work, I am also bombarded with data and news on the "illusive" and lucrative Latino market. It seems everyone is after a piece of the pie, except internet companies.

In researching for a post on another blog, I took a look at the Web 2.0 "innovation map" that Fourio came up with. This Google Maps-based app tracks companies around the world dedicated to some new Web 2.0 concept. While I was happy to see that there were "innovators" in Spanish-speaking countries, I was surprised that all of them (they are only located in, according to this very non-scientific map, Chile and Spain) have chosen to pursue a mainstream English-speaking m arket.

True: go where the money is. False: the Latino market worldwide has no money to spend.

No one has yet been willing to step up to the plate. Spanish-speaking users around the world have cheaply translated knockoffs of portals and search engines at their disposal, but nothing truly theirs. I wonder when the internet world will start to see value in a market that traditional marketers are fighting for tooth and nail.

Since when is technology slower to the game than corporate America?

Tortillas around the world

I was struck today by a piece of news that in itself was not very striking: a Mexican corporation acquires a tortilla company. It's the details that surprise:

GRUMA has acquired Rositas Investments PTY LTD, a company that manufactures tortillas in Australia; the closing of this acquisition was Friday, January 27, 2006. The purchase price was $17.6 million Australian dollars, or approximately $13.3 million U.S. dollars.

Rositas, with annual sales of approximately $22 million, manufactures tortillas primarily in the institutional segment, but also sells through retail chains. Its products are sold under the "Rositas" brand name, which has great acceptance with the Australian consumers.

An Australian tortilla company, no less. I had no idea that tortilla production was now an international industry. Especially when in places like Spain you are hard-pressed to find an edible tortilla. The tortillas made available to the Spanish consumers are either Old El Paso brand (previously only at certain supermarkets) or the new line of tortillas by Bimbo. Apparently the Spanish market is so unfamiliar with this food item (which, incidentally, shares the name of what is arguably the quintessential Spanish dish) that Bimbo has had to name them "Roll's" (why in English? no idea) and call them "bases de crepes" (like "crepe cakes").

Given this general lack of popularity of tortillas in a Spanish-speaking European market with a large Latin American immigrant population, it is surprising that large-scale tortilla production is happening Down Under.

"With this acquisition, GRUMA reinforces its presence in the international markets and, together with its next tortilla plant in China, it will be better suited to supply the Asia and Oceania markets."

I always thought that Mu Shu Pork wrappers were suspiciously similar to tortillas de harina.

Hispanic Business.com

Tags: latino market,tortillas, business,international marketing,food,mexican food

News: Clear Channel Launches Spanish language radio network

According to the Hollywood Reporter:

Clear Channel launches Hispanic radio network

Expanding its commitment to Hispanic radio, Clear Channel has formed its first Hispanic radio network. Called La Preciosa Network, the service targets Spanish-dominant Latinos aged 18 to 54 featuring Spanish hits from the 1970s through the 1990s. In addition to the launch of the network, Clear Channel also announced it has added TV personality Victor Manuel Lujan to its lineup, which includes morning show host Alex Lucas, Rosemar Vega, Pepe Reyes, Jose Valenzuela and Guille Perez.

The Hollywood Reporter            READ MORE

Technorati tags: latino marketing, hispanic marketing,radio

Companies clamor for Latino MBAs

The Latino market boom is changing the face of campus recruiting and talent search in general. Read my post about it on VivirLatino, which links to the entire Business Week article.

News: Pew Report Finds Latino Immigration Has Declined

The Pew Hispanic Center released a report today on the state of Latino immigration. Its findings may surprise some:

By 2004, the annual inflow of foreign-born persons was down 24% from its all-time high in 2000, according to the Pew Hispanic Center analysis of multiple datasets collected by the Census Bureau and other government agencies

According to this brief, by 2004 immigration was climbing again:

Whether or not this move portends further increases is impossible to predict. But even with this recent increase in migration, the most recent data show that immigration flows are at levels comparable with those of the mid-1990s and still significantly below the peak levels of 1999–2000.

I am unclear as to if the data in this report considers all immigrant groups or just Latinos.

You can read the whole report at the Pew Website. Also, for a reflection on the interpretation of this data by various mainstream news sources, see this post at HispanicTips.

Technorati tags: immigration,Mexico,Hispanics

News: Discovery Launches First U.S. Spanish-Language Networks to Focus on Women, Children, and Families

In response to the Latino market boom, it seems television networks are trending towards more Spanish-language programming, or at least the option to watch in Spanish if desired. From HispanicBusiness.com via HispanicTips, this release from the Discovery Channel:

Discovery Launches First U.S. Spanish-Language Networks to Focus on Women, Children, and Families

MIAMI, Sept. 26 /PRNewswire/ -- Discovery U.S. Hispanic Networks, the leading provider of high-quality, real-world Spanish-language programming, is expanding its product offerings for the U.S. Hispanic audience beyond its existing network, Discovery en Espanol, by launching two new networks, creating the first Spanish-language channels to focus on the interests of women, children and families. Discovery Kids en Espanol and Discovery Travel & Living (Viajar y Vivir) will provide stimulating programming in the Discovery tradition of excellence, giving viewers more choices in the family-friendly and lifestyle entertainment categories.

Building upon Discovery's expertise in providing culturally relevant programming in 23 Spanish-speaking countries worldwide, coupled with the popularity of Discovery en Espanol in the U.S., the content is closely tailored to meet the viewing preferences of the Hispanic audience. Discovery Kids en Espanol and Discovery Travel & Living (Viajar y Vivir) will each feature a mix of original productions and some of the best Latin American shows making their U.S. debuts. The networks are not SAP feeds of their English-language counterparts; rather they are unique channels that directly speak to the U.S. Hispanic audience with "transcreated" programming, corresponding to their interests through language, music, graphics and popular Latin American personalities.

HispanicBusiness.com      READ MORE

Technorati tags: latino marketing, hispanic marketing,television