With an increasing number of Hispanics using the Internet in their car-buying process, marketers climb into the front seat.
According to a recent AOL/Roper ASW U.S. Hispanic Cyberstudy, online Hispanic consumers are purchasing new cars at four times the rate of the general population, 46 percent of online Hispanics are using the Internet to design and customize their car of choice and locate a dealer for that car, and 48 percent of online Hispanics have bought a new car within the last three years.
“With more than 14 million U.S. Hispanics online today and more flooding to this medium daily, advertisers can’t afford avoiding this enormous opportunity,” says Peter Blacker, vice president-multi-cultural and international AOL network sales and solutions and also the chairman of the Internet Advertising Bureau’s (IAB's) Hispanic Committee. Blacker says larger advertisers are just starting to notice this fast-growing demographic. “We have been able to secure major Hispanic campaigns with marketers like Ford and are seeing an increased interest from the automotive industry.”
Channeling to Hispanics
2004 has been a pivotal year for Spanish language automobile marketing on the Internet. Just last month, AOL Latino, an Internet service provider for U.S. Hispanics developed a partnership with Autobytel Inc., an automotive marketing services company. Their goal is to launch a new channel called Automoviles (Automobiles). The two companies are developing this new Spanish-language autos channel to provide AOL Latino members with comprehensive Spanish language car search and comparison tools. It will include expert automotive content, dynamic data and tools, and the ability to submit an online request to buy from a local Autobytel dealer.
Additionally, Autobytel's data and software division, AIC (Automotive Information Center), developed a search engine to let its members custom-configure packages. That way they can compare a specific vehicle to similarly equipped competitive models in terms of safety, price and specifications; and later submit an online request to purchase the car.
According to Lavonne Luquis, director of programming at AOL Latino, "It is imperative that U.S. Hispanics be marketed to in their own language. By aggressively expanding the Spanish language content available on the Web, AOL and Autobytel are helping to bring consumer-friendly content to a generally under-served segment.”
Autobytel is certainly not a newcomer when it comes to marketing to U.S. Hispanics online. Prior to its partnership with AOL Latino, Autobytel launched Autobytel En Espanol because of the importance of Spanish-language automotive marketing. The portal offers users upgraded research tools, content and, most significantly, a Purchase Request engine in Spanish for both new and used vehicles. Autobytel designed its En Espanol channel to empower Hispanic car-buyers with the same convenient research, buying processes and cost-savings that hundreds of millions of English speaking car buyers have enjoyed since 1995 on Autobytel's car buying Web sites.
Direct from the automaker
When it comes to automobile manufacturers, Toyota was one of the first auto manufacturers to use the Internet to reach Hispanic customers. And it works -- Toyota has achieved the No. 1 ranking for new vehicle sales registered by Latinos, according to R.L. Polk & Co. (CYTD May ’04).
Toyota uses both the Spanish-language endemic sites such as Univision and Terra, as well as the Spanish-language versions of the "Big 3" (Yahoo en Español, AOL Latino, and MSNLatino.
According to Mark Simmons, national manager, advertising strategy and media for Toyota, “They are all fairly comparable in their delivery results. However, the endemic sites reflect a slightly better return on qualified traffic. Additionally, we use the Spanish-language pages of several auto sites, as well as a few bilingual lifestyle-type sites like Batanga and ESPN. While the best traffic and qualified traffic rates are delivered by the auto sites, the portals and lifestyle sites deliver large audiences cost efficiently.”
Back in May, Ford Motor Company and America Online launched the first-ever Spanish language community hub for entrepreneurs. This hub, called Mi Negocio -- which means "my business" -- is designed to be a one-stop shop for Hispanic small business owners, featuring live chats, in-person forums and informative articles from Fortune Small Business and Business 2.0.
This partnership gives Ford the opportunity to market to online U.S. Hispanics who want to purchase a car. According to Nick Scheele, president of Ford Motor Company, "Clearly, an online connection between Ford and the Hispanic community is important to our future. Of great interest to Ford was data from the America Online and Roper ASW study that showed a definite link between the Hispanic community, the Internet and automotive sales. An amazing 12 percent of Hispanics who participated in the survey bought a car online.”
As the U.S. Hispanic population continues to represent an ever-larger piece of the overall automotive market, it is evident that an online marketing investment and leadership in this area will continue to pay off. Aggressively expanding Spanish language outreach to the U.S. Hispanic market not only helps bring consumer-friendly car-buying to an under-served segment; but it also makes solid business sense.
Elizabeth M. Lloyd is the director of corporate marketing for Netblue, Inc., an online direct marketing company based in Silicon Valley. Previously, Lloyd was the director of marketing for opt-in email provider, NetCreations, in New York City. Prior to NetCreations, Lloyd was responsible for the PR department of ValueClick, Inc.
Additional resources:
Reaching Hispanic Entrepreneurs
Ford and AOL spark trend of teaming to reach Spanish-speaking small business owners in U.S.
How Toyota Topped the Hispanic Market
The auto company shares its strategies for becoming No. 1 in sales to Latinos.