NEW YORK — TV networks and operators want to boost their reach among younger Hispanic audiences by stepping up social-media marketing and delivering more content across multiple platforms.
Hispanic marketers are strongly focused on Millennials, given that Latinos will represent 80% of the growth among 18-29 year-olds over the next few years, said Karen Habib, Eclipse Marketing Services’ director of Hispanic marketing and development.
“You need to adapt with an evolving business,” said Habib, on a panel of marketing executives at the B&C/Multichannel News Hispanic Television Summit. “The challenge is allocating budgets across an increasingly fragmented marketplace.”
Telemundo Media executive vice president of marketing Susan Solano Vila said Telemundo produces its own original content, so it’s better positioned to reach younger audiences by offering content across TV, online and mobile platforms.
About 68% of Telemundo’s viewers watched the 2012 London Summer Olympic Games while using tablets or some other device; at the same time, 50% of those watching online ended up tuning in to television, she noted.
“It’s about that multiplatform experience — that’s what we’re managing and taking advantage of,” Solano Vila said.
Telemundo last week launched its first rebranding campaign in 12 years, with a new logo and the tagline “El Poder de T” — “The Power of T.” The letter “T” in Spanish is pronounced the same as the word “te” — the pronoun “you” — so the message can be read as either “The Power of Telemundo” or “The Power of You.”
Social media presents a rich opportunity for Hispanic marketers to enlist fans as brand ambassadors, Eclipse Marketing’s Habib said: “When Latinos get excited about something, they want to broadcast it to all their friends and family. Isn’t that what Facebook is all about?”
Facebook has worked for Verizon Communications. A year ago, it launched a “Somos FiOS” — “We Are FiOS” — Hispanic social marketing campaign on Facebook and Twitter. Oscar Madrid, director of multicultural marketing for Verizon FiOS, said his team carefully studied how Hispanic consumers wanted to be reached. The Facebook page now has 46,274 “likes” while the Twitter account has just 1,617 followers.
Music Choice, meanwhile, is “the new kid on the block when it comes to Hispanic marketing,” said Nolan Baynes, director of marketing for the music service, which is expanding social media outreach — and beefing up its selection of Latino artists — to reach a younger audience.
“[W]e are basically an urban and pop network, so it was a natural choice … to focus on the next-generation Latino audience,” Baynes said.
