At a panel yesterday at Ad:Tech Miami, Social Media and UGC were discussed. The panel consisted of Emily Riley from Jupiter Research as the moderator, Antonio Otalvaro from Barrio305, Rick Marroquin from Batanga, and Demian Bellumio from Hoodiny Entertainment Group, LLC (ElHood.com).
Riley started with some very interesting facts found by Jupiter Research:
- 1of 5 of adults are on network sites (Myspace, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.)
- 1in 4 people read blogs
- 1 in 10 people produce content online (comments, product reviews, profiles, etc.)
The panel was made of executives from Social Media sites targeted and made for the Hispanic community. These sites are showing growth in users but more interesting for us online marketers, showing much interest by advertisers.
Companies such as Jeep, Dodge, Coca-Cola, and more big names are showing more and more interest in targeting the Hispanic market online which has still a tremendous amount of room to grow and for start-ups to make big names for themselves in the social space of Hispanic communities online.
A very interesting point brought up was Yahoo! Respuestas is showing more growth and interaction from users than Yahoo! Answers.
The Spanish demographic believes cultural ties are most important. Year after year, more and more Hispanics are looking for online communities to join who share their same interest, hobbies, etc…as we all look at those factors when joining an online community.
For example, ElHood.com is an online community specifically tailored for Hispanics to join a community for fans to communicate with one another but also to communicate with their favorite band. It has recently signed major advertising deals with Coca-Cola, major record labels, and Billboard.
You will start to see more and more social sites for Hispanic communities but for now, they are mainly entertainment based. I see a big gap in the social media aspect for Hispanics with news. Meneame.com is the Spanish Digg. Although the site does show growth and interaction from its users, the Spanish space is still in its Web 1.0 stages making that transition where big possibilities still exist for competition.
