Agency

Every day we are thinking about how to drive growth by conditioning demand in the market for our brand(s) over the other brands that we compete with.  By Bill Pink – Head of Global Analytic Leads / Kantar

On April 16, the National Association of Hispanic Journalist (NAHJ) board announced, in a press release posted on NAHJ.org, that it had voted to cancel national board elections and extend, for another year, the terms of board members, including those of the president and the rest of the executive board. This move encompassed both elected and appointed board members.

The 2020 Edelman Trust Barometer Spring Update: Trust and the Covid-19 Pandemic shows a significant rise in Americans’ trust in both government and business. Since January, trust in government has risen nine points, and trust in business has risen six points.

With Women’s History Month upon us, there’s no better time to recognize that efforts to increase gender diversity in the boardroom are finally beginning to yield results.

Healthcare Ready, a national nonprofit organization focused on health preparedness and response,  released findings from its fifth annual “National Domestic Preparedness Survey,” revealing that participants’ concern about some disasters has increased significantly. For example, concern about an emerging disease impacting communities quadrupled over 2019 numbers. These findings were illuminating when stratified by race, which revealed a heightened concern about the threat of emerging diseases among black communities, who have born a disproportionate impact from COVID-19.

To become more inclusive and LGBTQ+-friendly, brands need to lead with actions rather than just words. Making statements isn’t enough anymore. Instead, culture needs to change from within a brand, not just within its creative copy.  How can this happen?

Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, consumers have been highly attentive to companies’ concrete actions, especially regarding health protocols, reliability and pricing. When choosing vendors and products, people care about what companies do, not just what they say. Advertising and social media messaging thus should tightly align with the material steps a company takes in the marketplace.

Agencies and publishers will face a paradigm shift in the months to come as marketing priorities realign in light of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak. Advertisers will demand their media partners, moving forward, drive value at the bottom of the purchase funnel.

NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises announced that it has joined forces with Amazon to publish new Spanish-language content on Alexa, Amazon’s cloud-based voice service, available through the company’s family of Echo devices.

The Culture Marketing Council: The Voice of Hispanic Marketing (CMC) announced the 2020 Culture Account Planning Excellence (CAPE) award winners, originally created in partnership with HispanicAd.com. Alma took top honors with its Pepsi Campaign, which won Best in Show as well as a Gold award for Best Cultural Insight. LERMA/, MediaCom, Republica Havas, Urias Communications and Wieden + Kennedy also were among the agencies honored.

At ANA and AIMM, we strongly believe that every person — regardless of race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, ability, religion, age, or culture — should have equal rights, equal representation, opportunities, support, understanding, respect, consideration, voice, and the ability to achieve their full potential. For more than 20 years, we have used our collective voices, reach, and commitment to create an industry that is more inclusive, understanding, and reflective of diverse segments. Although we have done a lot, it is not enough.

A recent KPMG survey of 1,000 consumers in the U.S. revealed that consumer behavior and purchasing patterns are rapidly changing, and is impacting consumer and retail companies. As consumer-facing businesses adapt to the “new reality,” they face more challenges to innovate and reinvent their businesses to survive.

After 11 weeks of lockdown and quarantine in most of Europe and Asia, and as lockdown are starting to be relaxed in most markets, linear TV viewing levels are gradually returning to 2019 levels in many markets but we are still seeing the last two weeks up 4% to 10% vs 2019, despite the lack of sports and fresh content on TV.  In Canada, the US and the UK, viewing has fallen below 2019 by now. In the US in lockdown week 11, viewing was down -4% on Persons 2+ and -13% on adults 18-45.  The return of major sports competitions (European Soccer, NASCAR etc) may sustain consumption in June.

As communities across the country started opening up, and in anticipation of the Memorial Day holiday weekend, advertising agency, d expósito & Partners, launched a public service campaign, called “Lucha vs El Virus.” The campaign was designed to engage the Hispanic community and encourage compliance with public health practices during the COVID-19 pandemic. Inspired by Mexican professional wrestling (Lucha Libre) and their use of colorful masks to conceal their identity, the campaign seeks to help slow the spread of the virus by encouraging people to wear masks in a way that is eye-catching, fun and interactive but with a very serious message.

NGL Collective has announced the launch of Hispanicize #UnidosTogether Virtual Summit, the largest virtual gathering of Latinx influencers, content creators, entrepreneurs and media and entertainment innovators grounded by NGL’s #UnidosTogether initiative aimed at being a force for good in the Latinx community.  Led by NGL’s iconic Hispanicize platform, the FREE half-day virtual summit will take place on Wednesday, July 1st and represents a massive opportunity for brands to meaningfully connect with the Latinx audience during COVID recovery, and participate in the important conversation surrounding Black and Brown communities.

Agencies and our trade press have been busy opining on what it all means for this or that sector, whilst, one hopes, diligently planning for their own futures. Agencies are due to hit the reset button, but just before they agree to ‘restore factory settings’ it might be an idea to ask whether the old model is any longer fit for purpose.  By Brian Jacobs

BOTTOM LINE: While its likely not totally shocking at this point, we think that April increasingly feels like the bottom, and the linearity of the quarter appears to be much better in May, with expectations for continued rebound into June. Our and the Street’s 2Q20 estimates are largely in the range of where the companies indicated they were pacing for the quarter in April/early May, and our expectations are that there is likely upside to revenue numbers of at least 4-7%. We will be waiting to see how June shapes up, as well as color around 2H outlook before refining our estimates, but numbers are likely going higher.

As the coronavirus continues to spread across the U.S., brands are looking for ways to stay connected to consumers and to understand the impact of the virus on their lives in real-time, especially among multicultural groups who have been hit disproportionately.

Canela Media announced the launch of Canela.TV, a streaming service designed to connect with the 60 million Hispanics living in the U.S.

Personalization remains a tall order. Its possibility does not mean that every company is equipped or mature enough to realize its promise. All the data in the world isn’t terribly useful if marketers can’t put it to work — and putting it to work requires organizational capability at multiple levels of the marketing enterprise.