Influencing the Digital Age

Social and Mobile Media Usage Among Hispanic Americans

blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire

After “Google”-ing relevant search terms related to this article, a lot of studies were found regarding the nature of Hispanic Digital Influencers.  Although there was a plethora of research surrounding the U.S. Hispanic digital market, there doesn’t seem to be much regard to what the studies say.  Companies are just starting to reach out specifically to the Hispanic Market, if at all.  

Proof Is In The Numbers

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According to an article by 360i Digital Connections, moving into digital media is an “effortless extension” of cultural habits centered on “living extremely social lives filled with family and friends."  In fact, the 2010 Census found that the economic influence of the U.S. Hispanic population doubled from $212 billion in 2000 to $978 billion in 2009, and is expected to reach $1.3 trillion in 2014.   

Clearly this market has a great online presence and online influence, but why aren’t they being targeted? It seems that companies do not know how or are fearful of spending a large amount of their budget on advertising with Spanish media and not getting a return.

Contrary to that fear, advertising through Spanish media is much cheaper than advertising through American media.  Spanish media also has a large base with many viewers, as can be seen with statistics from the usage of online social media from last week’s post. There are about 32 million U.S. Hispanics online in the U.S. which represents about 14% of the U.S. population. The following graph of U.S. Mobile Internet Users suggests that the Hispanic population is by far the prevalent user: 

 

Some of the main takeaways from 360i’s Hispanic POV Series on Hispanic Digital Influencers were:

1. U.S. Hispanics use the Internet as a virtual town square where the diversity of people and open environment allows them to join a conversation.  Given this view, Hispanics are 37 percent more likely than the general population to publish a blog and 12 percent more likely to visit other blogs, per Nielsen.  Brands that give this population the opportunity to become a part of their story in digital--to create and share--will have the most success when it comes to creating meaningful relationships with people.

2. Hispanic influencers who communicate exclusively in Spanish tend to share more promotional influencers who communicate in English, and even more still than general population influencers.  This presents an opportunity for marketers to utilize Spanish-language influencers to communicate brand messages in an authentic way.  

3. General population infleuncers demonstrate much more diversity in what motivates the types of content they share, while Hispanic influencers are primarily motivated by their shared cultural ties.  Understanding the various mindsets of Hispanic influencers will help marketers frame the right approach, especially when developing DWOM ® programs.

On the Move

The U.S. Hispanic community should also be a target audience to reach through mobile means. Companies are starting to catch on to the idea of group texting as 41% of Hispanics are accessible via smart phone, compared to 29% of the general population according to another article by 360i.    

Be on the move with your audience and grow with them as they catch on to the changing digital trends.

Conversational Robots

Defining social media marketing objectives

 

It was your co-workers birthday and his head was face-planted into the cake. Hilarious! People couldn’t stop laughing.  You want everyone at the company to see it and know about this incident.  You go to your automatically logged-in Twitter account and post a hilarious comment about your co-worker and his birthday face.

 

Soon after you post it, you realize you posted it on your company’s twitter. Oops! Surprisingly, you received positive response posts from your co-workers and even better, from your company’s followers and supporters.  Why were people so receptive to something so silly?    

Social Media Humanization

Using social media outlets helps turn your posts into a conversation. 

1. Twitter helps to bring attention to quick matter of facts or flash occurrences.  
2. Facebook helps humanize brands and builds communication with consumers.   
3. LinkedIn establishes thought leadership and initiates networking.   
4. Pinterest creates an appealing picture board to visually attract your customer base with fun pictures, quotes, and other miscellaneous things.

Now that you know which site is best for your efforts, the next step is to make your social media objectives.  An article about social media marketing found that the objective of social media marketing is to forge active relationships, converting the reader from passive observer into an active participant. This creates a network of advocates capable of rapidly spreading your message across their own networks. 

 

Setting it Straight

What are you trying to achieve by jumping into social media? Based on statistics provided by the American Pulse Survey on BIG Insight, Hispanics are the most prevalent users of Social Media across the board.

 

With these stats in mind, the U.S. Hispanic population can be easily reached through social media sites.  Advertise or promote your company or product easily through social media sites and engage with your customer! Be friendly, and create a conversation. 

What happens if direct contact is needed? What happens if someone tweets a question about a new product:  when does your product launch? But it turns out this inquirer speaks only Spanish: 

¿Cuándo se lanzará el producto?

The answer? Obvious. Reply to them in a language most comfortable to them. The Catch? Find a way to relay this information to the rest of your audience.  Creating an FAQ’s page in both English and Spanish can help reach multiple language sectors and ethnicities.  

When you find your face super glued to your monitor, step away from the social media realm for a bit, and find a way to directly engage with your diverse market. Call centers and local businesses can help promote your market in the outside world, and in the digital world.  Ask them to represent you on their page with an attractive image or logo that will draw consumers to click on it and hop to your Facebook page, Twitter account, Pinterest board or any other outlet you use. 

Be smart with your digital content by being extroverted and understanding your audience.  Some subjects can be touchy so remain neutral but be energetic and positive! These are the few keys to gaining a positive online presence.

Embrace the Wildfire!

How to Use Mobile and Social Media to Effectively Connect with the Hispanic Community and Increase Brand Awareness

blog.mobilemo.com

More and more, store employees are ringing up purchases while barely using the cash register. How? They are using their mobile phones to scan items, swipe credit cards through an appendage on the phone, and having customers sign on the phone itself. 

The “cha-ching” ring of cash registers is slowly becoming a nostalgic sound as mobile technology creeps up on tangible services and products. In fact, even people both young and old are walking around with their heads down in the light that sheds from their social media apps. It’s obvious that mobile media was taking over the world.  

The Biggest Users

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The U.S. Hispanic consumer is one of the greatest users of social media and mobile media in the world of marketing and consumer outreach. Not surprisingly, with their population size growing quicker than the speed of light, the U.S. Hispanic Market should be paid special attention to. Their buying power and obvious social media influence will help increase your brand awareness and effectively connect to others, through others.  

With that in mind, Forrester finds that Hispanics tend to over-index in their consumptions of social networking websites like MySpace, YouTube, and Twitter. What does this mean? U.S. Hispanics are fiends when it comes to social networking sites and use them much more than any other ethnic group. What’s more is that online Hispanics are generally “more active than non-Hispanics” and continue to “lead the market in online social behavior.” Hispanicmarketing.co adds to this data by finding that U.S. Hispanics are extremely active in online activities and more receptive to new technology than non-Hispanics. Additionally, Hispanics are prone to refer products or services to friends and family, making your marketing efforts much more efficient.  

http://www.vivemejor.com/

Unilever took full advantage of the Hispanic community’s large use of social media and connected with them through Facebook. Their page, vivemejor is driven towards Latina users as a way to connect Unilever with a huge online community. ClickZ asked Russel Lilly, Unilever’s multicultural marketing director, about three key best practices for connecting a brand with a community. He pointed out three great points:

1. Actively participate in the online conversation. Unilever does this by engaging in conversations Latinas are having online in social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube around topics that they know--beauty and food.  Once there, Unilever speaks to Latinas in Spanish and more importantly, provide compelling content and tips that can help them in their everyday lives. 

2. Create exclusive content.  Unilever works with industry leading experts to develop relevant and timely content for their consumers.  By offering exclusive tips and information they attract their consumers' attention, which then keeps them coming back for more.

3. Socialize information online and offline. Lastly, in connecting brands with the Hispanic community, they share their information with Latinas both online and offline via multiple touch points, including mass media, digital, social media, in store events across the U.S.--all of which provide content and brand engagement. 

Use, Don’t Abuse!

Of course, the U.S. Hispanic community is alive and thriving on social networks more than any other segment.  Through social media, members of the U.S. Hispanic population help spread their thoughts on brands and share their thoughts off the grid.  They seek family and friends to talk about things like the latest happenings from their favorite car brand’s Facebook page, or what their favorite actor is tweeting about.      

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Why are marketers not reaching out to U.S. Hispanics who are statistically known to be extremely active with social media? 

Company Fear: Latinos will not understand their outreach because of language and/or cultural barriers. 
 
Solutions? 

1. Pay attention to influencers in your community of interest and how they outreach to your target audience. 

2. Spend more time than money researching and understanding your target audience for yourself and for your company. 

An article on newstaco.com expands on how to successfully market to Latinos with social media. You need to do a few essential things: you have to understand the tools (social media platforms), you have to understand your audience (listen to what Latinos are already saying), you have to know who you’re selling to, and then you have to monitor how you’re doing.   

http://www.nmincite.com/

Corales and Martinez, the Hispanic Research Team of NM Incite in Hispanics in Social Media and the Emerging Opportunities for Brands in 2011 provide another great list of tips to reach the U.S. Hispanic Market. They state that, incorporating social media into multicultural marketing initiatives can offer serious gains for Hispanic engagement.  Here are some general best practices for Hispanic social media:

Understand Your Hispanic Audience. Hispanics vary in language and cultural practices. Culturally speaking, there are five main groups of Hispanics today, ranging from Spanish dominant to English-preferring Hispanics. Not all Hispanics fit in the same category and it is critical to understand the differences of each.

Choose Your Language Wisely. Because of the varying language and cultural practices of Hispanics, it is important to know what language to use within your audience. Affluent Hispanics may prefer English or even Spanglish, but if your audience prominently posts in Spanish, create content in Spanish to better engage your audience

Keep Content Culturally Relevant. Some of the biggest complaints from Latino bloggers reflect the lack of culturally relevant content from brands. Generally speaking, Hispanics want a meaningful and authentic connection with the products they use. Hispanics also expect brands to do their part in protecting, empowering and inspiring their community.

Pay Attention to Key Influencers within the Hispanic Segment. Consider following influential Hispanic online communities, such as the following listed below with their Twitter handle, and blurb about who they are taken from their Twitter page:

@ergeekgoddess (21,423 followers): Elianne Ramos, Hopelessly undomestic, globetrotter, author, CEO of Speak Hispanic, Vice-Chair of Marketing at LATISM, The Universe’s 1^st and only geek goddess! Speakhispanic.com.   

 
 

@JesseLuna (9,060 followers): Jesse P. Luna, Communications Specialist at @SEIU721 in Tri-Counties.  Social change through social media.  Tweets here are my own. #unions#ERIC#LATISM#faireconomy 

 

  

@LatinosatWork (3,184 followers): Murray A. Mann, Co-author Barron’s The Complete Job Search Guide for Latinos and Principal, Global Diversity Solutions Group, LLC.  A dialog on Latino career management issues. 

@Latism (26,403 followers): Latinos In Soc Media, Official account for Latinos in Social Media – hailed as the most influential online movement in the new multicultural web-founded by @AnaRC 

@Sarann (5,890 followers): Sara Patterson, Founder & Editor of MommaFindings.com, Brand Advocate and Consultant, Freelance Writer, Running Momma, Writing Momma, Latina Momma, Blogging Momma. 

 

@UrbanJibaro (16,313 followers): George Torres, Founder of Sofrito Media Group.  I connect people with the Latino culture utilizing social media and real world networking/entertainment events. #dailysofrito

The Bottom Line

To be successful with the U.S. Hispanic Market, be relevant, be timely, understanding, and most importantly be smart. Use opportunities such as outreaching through influencers, and targeting Spanish language media to broadcast about your products.  Don’t be afraid to cross cultural borders and take risks because when it comes to the U.S. Hispanic market.

All you need is one and it spreads like wildfire.

Important Notes

U.S. Hispanic Social Media Guide 2010-2011 Edition

The U.S. Hispanic community is very active on social media sites via computer and mobile apps. What’s MORE important is that they seek family and friends to talk about the latest happenings afterwards. 

U.S. Hispanics presence in online activities make them more receptive to new technology than non-Hispanics. 

Additionally, Hispanics are prone to refer products or services to friends and family, making your marketing efforts much more efficient.