Target Latino gives the gift of WOM this holiday season

We, at Target Latino, have decided to spread a little cheer this Holiday Season. And we want to give the gift of recognition and help promote our colleagues that have worked so brilliantly and hard this year to write their great articles on Hispanics / Latinos and, even better, Hispanic marketing.

So, if you would like us to give you this gift, send us your favorite article on Hispanic Marketing, Social Media, Latino life, demographics, anything related to the Latino community along with a short bio (photo, if you want) and we will do the rest!!! We’ll post it, promote it and credit you for being WHO YOU ARE!!!

Thank you for participating and allowing us to give, at least a little, on this Holiday Season!!

May the year that comes be even better than the one we are now!!!

With all the Target Latino love,

Claudia “Havi” Goffan

PS: Please, send us an email via the Target Latino page or via the contact form on the blog and we will reply so you can send us the rest of the materials!!!

never lose your sense of wonder

never lose your sense of wonder

Ford Goes All Social For New Focus

Ford is following up the social-media launch of the 2011 Explorer and a current blog-centric test-drive program for the F-150 pickup with a world-wide program supporting the next-generation Focus car.

Ford has used social media based programs to good effect since launching the Fiesta in the U.S. by giving social mavens European spec vehicles well before the American versions hit showrooms.

Ford has used social media based programs to good effect since launching the Fiesta in the U.S. by giving social mavens European spec vehicles well before the American versions hit showrooms.

The test-drive program invites bloggers, people with popular social media pages and lots of Facebook friends to apply to participate in a global consumer test drive program for its Focus and then to talk about the car online.

The company will bring 100 people to Europe in early ’11 — when the car launches — to spend two days driving the car and learning about it. Ford will select them through a Facebook application. The company announced the program on Thursday at the Paris Motor Show. The car launches in the U.S. The program, “Focus Global Test Drive — Start More Than a Car” starts after the Paris Motor Show with the company accepting applications at the “Global Drive” tab at Ford’s Facebook page for Focus.

Applicants have to submit a video clip to the Facebook page explaining why they should be selected to be part of the event and how they would benefit a charitable cause cause in their community with a donation from Ford. Each driver will be awarded the local-market equivalent of $10,000 (USD) for a charitable cause, with up to $500,000 (USD) in total contributions around the world. The company says it will choose participants based on a combination of their reach in social networks, content creation skills and volume of “likes” generated, among other factors. Ford also will invite established bloggers and online influencers.

Ford has used social media based programs to good effect since launching the Fiesta in the U.S. by giving social mavens European spec vehicles well before the American versions hit showrooms. The Fiesta Movement program had several iterations involving different cohorts of people — Fiesta “Agents” — who got the cars for six-month stints and had to blog about the cars while getting assignments from Ford that involved road trips and Apprentice-style local-market projects to promote the car.

Scott Monty, who heads social-media programs at Ford, says the 100-person limit was dictated by the campaign’s parameters. “When you think about the charitable element — putting dollars against each individual — we had to cut it off somewhere. So we are both giving people access to the vehicle before it is available to the public, but also making good on a promise to contribute to a better world.”

Monty tells Marketing Daily that Ford is also making sure the final 100 participants represent an geographical distribution. “We have a quota from each market or region in which we are holding the promotion because we want it to be reflective of the markets in which we want to do business.”

He says the application process goes through January and the test-drive event itself will take place in February. “And we will do new activities in August.” Those will not include a literal reprise of Fiesta Movement, which made sense for that vehicle. “Fiesta Movement is one of the most bandied about programs at Ford. People want to know what the ‘Fiesta Movement’ is for next launch, but the idea is not just to replicate it. We have do to programs that are brand appropriate. The other thing that complicates it a bit is that the Focus customer in Europe is different than the Focus customer in the U.S. So we have to make sure it’s a program with broader scope.”

someone else is happy with less than you have

someone else is happy with less than you have

Source: Marketing Daily

Offline WOM More Prevalent, Positive and Credible than Online Buzz

Word-of-mouth (WOM) conversations that take place in person and over the phone are overwhelmingly more prevalent than those online, according to research.

Also, face-to-face communication is more positive in tone, more likely to be judged highly credible and more likely to lead to strong purchase intent than online talk, the study found

Below, some of the findings issued

On average, 3.5 billion WOM conversations occur daily in the US. Offline WOM accounts for 92% of these (75% face to face; 17% by phone), and email, IM/text messaging and chatrooms/blogs account for a combined 7%:

Most Word-Of-Mouth is Offline

Most Word-Of-Mouth is Offline

Also:

  • Offline is the predominant mode of WOM across all age groups, ranging from 80% among the youngest group to 97% among the oldest
  • However, teens participate in a higher percentage of online WOM (17%) than members of other age groups.
  • Consumers under age 18 are also more likely than others to drive advice-giving in online talk. Though only 13% of offline advice-givers are age 13-17, 35% of advice givers in online conversations fall within that age bracket.
  • WOM expressed face to face and by phone also is viewed as highly “credible” more often than online talk (59% vs. 49%):
Offline WOM has more credibility

Offline WOM has more credibility

One possible explanation for the credibility gap is that online communications often occur between people who don’t know each other very well. But the study suggests that the credibility gap exists even in communications between people who are related or otherwise know each other.

Specifically, content from a spouse, relative or best friend is rated more believable when it is shared offline, either by phone or face to face, than online – via email, text messaging or blogs.

“Apparently, the value of eye contact, voice and perhaps even nonverbal communication provides a boost to credibility and to the likelihood that we’ll do something about what we’ve learned,” said Brad Fay, a coauthor of the study.

Other findings:

  • Offline communication has more purely positive content than online discussion (65% vs. 59%) and is less likely to contain negative or “mixed” content (23% vs. 30%).
  • A comparison between face-to-face communication and content on online blogs and chatrooms reveals an ever wider gap, with 66% of face-to-face communication “mostly positive” compared with 57% for blogs/chatrooms.
  • Offline WOM is more likely than its online counterpart to lead to strong purchase intent (50% vs. 43%).

About the study: Results of the Keller Fay/OMD study are based primarily on surveys of 18,486 Americans age 13-69, from late July 2007 through early February 2008.

True Indeed

True Indeed

Facebook and Coca-Cola Bring “Like” To The Real World

RFID bracelets and "Like?" at Coca-Cola Village

RFID bracelets and “Like?” at Coca-Cola Village

Facebook’s “Like” functionality arrived in the real world this past month in Israel when Coke added RFID bracelets (Radio Frequency Identification) to the company’s Coca-Cola Village summer resort event, making it easy for high school attendees to share their experiences instantly on Facebook.  Throughout the Village’s 40+ experiences teens simply placed their RFID bracelets on “Like” placards to update their Facebook feed with a “Like” about a pool, spa, extreme sports, food and more all found at the Coca-Cola Village.  Also, if teens were photographed by one of the event’s official photographers the RFID technology automatically tagged everyone in the photo and uploaded it to each relevant Facebook profile.

Every day the Village was open up to 650 people attended.  Those 650 people each posted on average 54 pieces of Coke branded content on their Facebook profile, driving 35,000 Coca-Cola Facebook messages each day.  Talk about amplifying an event!

Check out the video to see how it all worked.  Huge “WOOHOO” to Coca-Cola Israel!

Facebook and Coca-Cola Bring “Like” To The Real World

you never know how strong you are

you never know how strong you are

Job Applicant, Beware: You’re Being Googled

In a posting at the Brazen Careerist Web site, Jason Warner, Google’s head of staffing for online sales and operations, contends that this trend “will become a non-issue as this phase of the Internet Age plays itself out.”

In a posting at the Brazen Careerist Web site, Jason Warner, Google’s head of staffing for online sales and operations, contends that this trend “will become a non-issue as this phase of the Internet Age plays itself out.”

It’s not just what you say that can be held against you when you’re looking for a job. It’s also what you post on MySpace, write in your blog and broadcast on YouTube.

That’s because if a potential employer uncovers salacious or otherwise unflattering material about you online, that job offer you were expecting could vaporize. With 77 percent of employers Googling and otherwise researching applicants, you never know what your future bosses may think about those times you ranted about your coworkers or got sloshed at a party. They may simply decide to avoid your questionable past and move on to the next candidate.

“Who wants to be the person in HR who brings in the kid who has bong hits all over his page?” says Michael Fertik, the CEO of ReputationDefender, a services company that helps job seekers clean up their online reputations.

A 2006 survey of 100 executive recruiters by job search and recruiting network ExecuNet found that 77 percent use search engines to learn about candidates. Of those researching candidates online, 35 percent eliminated a candidate from consideration based on information they uncovered online — up from 26 percent in 2005. ExecuNet predicts that the number of job seekers prejudged or eliminated due to this “digital dirt” will climb.

Is Ignorance Bliss?

Others say the trend may not be as widespread or as likely to accelerate. “I never run them through Google,” says recruiter Michael Kelemen of his candidates. “I call their references for background.”

“I think a lot of the stuff we read about recruiters doing background checks on their candidates online is more rumor than anything else,” adds Kelemen, who runs the Recruiting Animal blog.

Recruiters use Internet searches “to avoid major red flags, but it is just another assessment of a person,” says the anonymous blogger known as Your HR Guy. He adds, “My general view on Internet searches is that, for most positions, ignorance is bliss. Most of what is online for a majority of workers is personal, and most workers’ personal stuff [doesn’t play a role at work].”

But If Everyone Has an Online Past…

Others say the pervasiveness of social networking sites, such as Facebook and MySpace, and the way young people virtually live online mean employers won’t be able to judge candidates based on their digital dirt. If they do, the thinking goes, they will miss out on top-notch employees, given that just about everyone will have some incriminating information online.
In a posting at the Brazen Careerist Web site, Jason Warner, Google’s head of staffing for online sales and operations, contends that this trend “will become a non-issue as this phase of the Internet Age plays itself out.” He suggests five reasons employers won’t spend time worrying about “unfortunate online photos” and “other embarrassing antics”:

  • College students have always behaved in this manner.
  • More details about everyone will be online.
  • Searching for photos won’t be worth recruiters’ time.
  • The information is irrelevant.
  • It’s a slippery slope, especially if employers start to research existing employees’ outside behaviors.

Warner acknowledged the risks of having “those photos” online, and in a subsequent online discussion about his views at Brazen Careerist, others noted how interviewers and hiring managers may find it impossible to disregard what they learn online about candidates, even if the material falls into the category of forgivable indiscretions.

Clean Up Your Act or Stay True?

Certainly the possibility that a prospective employer can uncover things about your past can create anxiety about whether you should clean up your online image by revising Facebook pages, requesting that videos and blog posts about you be removed, or by hiring ReputationDefender or a similar service.

In a Brazen Careerist article titled “Twentysomething: Raunchy Old Photos Will Be Part of the Revolution,” Ryan Healy, cofounder of Employee Evolution, a Web site for Millennials entering the workforce, said he knows people who have removed materials “to save some face in the real world,” but has never considered doing so himself. “Why should I pretend to be one person for eight hours a day and someone else entirely the rest?” he writes.

And consider this: The generation moving into the workforce may not want to work for an employer that wouldn’t hire a talented 20-something for having a drunken photo on Facebook, suggests Scott Allen, coauthor of The Virtual Handshake: Opening Doors and Closing Deals Online. “The standards are going to radically change,” he says.

Source: Allan Hoffman, Monster Tech Jobs Expert

What are you made of?

What are you made of?

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