Telemundo allowing Sprint subcribers to help determine ending of popular soap

The headline is a takeoff of the popular soap on Telemundo "Sin Senos No Hay Paraiso" ("Without Breasts There Is No Paradise"). Telemundo is adding a twist to the original version from Colombia by creating videos representing three different paths for the protagonist and letting Sprint cellphone subscribers decide which to take.

Telemundo did something similar last year with "Victoria" by letting fans vote on three web-only alternative final episodes of "Victoria."

Don't fret if you don't have Sprint. They will get 4-days to view the videos on their phones, then they will be posted on telemundo.com for others to vote. Voting will then close in mid-December, and Telemundo will then shoot the TV episodes that follow the path selected by viewers.

It's the specialization, stupid

The 2008 Multicultural Marketing survey from the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) is out and only 45% of respondents indicated satisfaction with the results of multicultural initiatives, and 26% said that they are somewhat or very dissatisfied with the results.

Looking at the results we find that:
-- Only 22% feel that their firms have a high degree of knowledge and disciplined best practices.
-- Inability to integrate multicultural programs consistently into the overall marketing mix.
-- Only slightly more than half (57%) of respondents defined multicultural marketing as "narrowcasting or having a separate message for distinct market segments and communicating via media that reach multicultural consumers
--More than 20% are using seemingly less sophisticated approaches.
-- 11% report using a "mainstreaming" strategy (re-purposing general advertising approaches to appeal to multicultural segments)
-- 10% simply translate general marketing materials for media catering to multicultural audiences.

While this may sound controversial to many, a multicultural approach is a waste of time, resources and budgets. Most companies can't do 1 market segment (Hispanic, African-American, Asian, etc.) right. How can they then do all right?

With more of a focus on diversity than on driving business growth, many companies and organizations have sought to do "multicultural marketing" to appeal to one and all. Certainly this sounds great on paper, I mean who isn't searching for that Utopian world where we all hold hands singing Kumbaya?

However, the reality is that each market requires a distinct approach, distinct messaging, distinct strategies and distinct tactics. Cultural relevance is the name of the game, not getting general market campaigns out in as many languages as possible. The challenge, as nearly 6 of 10 said in this study, is that budgets do not allow for such specialized segmentation on so many fronts.

To answer this call, many multicultural agencies have popped up. At least from the ones I've seen and the one's I'm familiar with, multicultural agencies are also not equipped to do the job right even if they had the financial resources. Most, at least the ones I'm aware of, started as a specialized agency and someone, brilliant of course, at a meeting said, "why eat just one slice of bread when we can go after the whole loaf?" Give that guy or gal a raise!

Instead, companies should really look diligently at what ethnic market best provides for strong corporate growth. Where can they truly increase their market share? Who does their product or service really appeal to? Then, put the necessary resources into doing it right. Chances are, you're competitor isn't even doing that much. Marketing to a multicultural audience shouldn't and can't be thought of from a diversity perspective.

In summary, if you can't put the necessary resource to targeting everyone properly in a way relevant to each culture, put the right resource into the market that will increase business.

Latinos 50% of U.S. Population Growth Since 2000

The Pew Hispanic Center released a report showing that 1 out of every 2 (50.5%) people added to the population in the U.S. since 2000 are Hispanic.

The growth in the 1990s was 40%.

A point of interest to note is that the Latino population growth in the new century has been more a product of the natural increase (births minus deaths) of the existing population than it has been of new international migration.

As of mid-2007, Hispanics accounted for 15.1% of the total U.S. population. That number is expected to be 30% by 2050, according to the Census.

Hispanics still unprepared for digital TV switch

According to The Nielsen Company, more than 9 million households are not ready for the upcoming transition to all-digital broadcasting and would be unable to receive any television programming at all if the transition occurred today. Another 12.6 million households have at least one television set that will no longer work when the digital transition occurs.

The percentage of Hispanic households that are completely unready for the digital transition is 13%. About one-quarter of the households that speak only or mostly Spanish are completely unready, according to Nielsen.

AHAA denounces launch of PPM

From AHAA statement:

"The reckless, irresponsibility of Arbitron’s release of PPM without addressing the methodology and sampling issues is reprehensible,” says José Lόpez-Varela, chairman of AHAA. “It is an economic travesty to consider that an entire industry of cultural radio broadcasters may be wiped out because Arbitron executives wanted to collect their reward for an on-time launch rather than improve ratings accuracy. Minority stations are feeling the pressure of Arbitron’s monopoly on radio ratings and today, the company flexed its corporate muscle again creating even more problems and issues for cultural stations by insisting they begin using PPM today. The deceitful and manipulative move to strong arm stations and the advertising community again is shameful.”

The bottom line on this is that Arbitron decided to move forward despite severe concerns about PPM's accuracy. According to AHAA, some Spanish-language stations in PPM pre-test markets have experienced decreases in ratings and revenue of 50 to 70 percent.