Agency

Dear all,

How are you? As you know, I love you all dearly, even if I don’t show it every day. I have spent my entire career in your presence in some way, shape or form, and I care. I really do.

The Hispanic Community Health Study/Study of Latinos (HCHS/SOL), the research study of Hispanic/Latino health funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), has released initial findings that show significant variations in disease prevalence and health behaviors among groups with different backgrounds.

The local commercial broadcast television and radio industry contributes $1.24 trillion of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and 2.65 million jobs to the American economy annually, found a new study by Woods & Poole Economics with support from BIA/Kelsey. The analysis, which breaks down broadcasters’ influence on the economy of all 50 states and the District of Columbia, concluded that both television and local radio broadcasting’s economic impact will continue to grow in the coming years.

The National Retail Federation released its 2014 economic forecast today, projecting retail industry sales (which exclude automobiles, gas stations, and restaurants) will increase 4.1 percent*, up from the preliminary 3.7 percent growth seen in 2013. NRF also announced today it expects online sales in 2014 to grow between 9 and 12 percent.

Analysis of recent ACA numbers in California revealed a surprising statistic:  Hispanics and Millennials are signing up for the ACA Exchange at half the rate of Non-Hispanics. While initial assumptions pointed to the highly publicized challenges shared by most consumers during the initial enrollment period, deeper delving by Santiago Solutions Group (SSG) indicates that Hispanics and Millennials share a common problem which affected their low ACA enrollment levels: a Healthcare literacy gap. Growth leaders and insurers are turning their attention toward immediate action plans that can correct this common – and very fixable – problem.  By Santiago Solutions Group

The majority of consumer packaged goods (CPG) companies are failing to place analytics at the heart of their decision-making process, limiting their ability to improve the customer  experience and gain business advantage, a study by Accenture has found. Accenture’s analysis also suggests that in many cases the problem is compounded by fragmented investment in narrow programs that are not well coordinated and fully optimized.

Shiv Singh’s role at Visa is twofold: to manage global brand strategy and positioning, but also to evolve the way Visa does marketing. Singh spoke with eMarketer’s Debra Aho Williamson about Visa’s attitude toward real-time marketing and how the company plans to measure the performance of real-time initiatives.

The use of celebrities is a popular creative approach for brands looking for success in online video. With more than 600 campaigns employing famous faces last year — and with those campaigns garnering more than 2.2 billion views — this was among the most used tactics in 2013.

Patterns of global migration have shifted in recent decades and those changes, along with the ups-and-downs of the economy, have also resulted in changes in the flow of remittances —the money that many migrants send back to families in their countries of origin.

As the first wave of the Digital Generation, Gen Y is truly disrupting the traditional notions of marketing. Brands can partner with Gen Y by understanding what’s important to this culturally diverse and life stage-straddling group, and how digital and mobile permeate their lives.

MiTú announced that it will partner with Latin America-based TOUCHE’ FILMS and Enchufe.TV to create Latino-friendly, English language comedy formats for a U.S. based millennial audience.

Hispanics & Multicultural non-Hispanic generated six in ten of all new grocery buyers between 2011 to 2013. Health-Natural stores buyers growth rate was led by Most Acculturated Hispanic segment. Hispanics led in Mass/Discount growth rate. On the other hand, Least Acculturated buyers declined sharply for Hispanic Grocery stores and C- stores. Millennials led in the growth rate of Low-Tier and in the decline of Mid-Tier.

Celebrities. They appear to be the focal point of every PR campaign these days, don’t they? Whether it’s to open a restaurant, get donations for a charity, sell a t-shirt or just to lend heat to a cool brand, we publicists tend to look to celebrities as a quick solution to every problem. (I’m distinguishing between an advertising campaign, in which a celebrity is paid big bucks to essentially “act” in a TV or print ad, and a PR campaign, in which a celebrity lends his or her personal credibility to support a cause or an event or a product.)

With the advent of the ACA, insurers have two drivers: share AND profitability.  Most sales and marketing focus is on gaining share by securing the highest enrollment numbers possible.  Effective Growth Leaders are measuring business success beyond market share: The utilization cost and ROI of the new pool is an equally important goal of effective marketing. Companies can measure their success by drawing in a pool that may have both a higher likelihood to health coverage and a lower propensity to acquire preventable conditions, both of which impact the bottom line.   By Santiago Solutions Group

Consumers have already voiced interest in receiving personalized emails, and recent polling suggested that personalization would be a key trend across all communications this year. In a November 2013 study by Conversant, around three-quarters of US senior-level marketers and agency decision-makers agreed that “individualized messages and offers will be more effective than mass messages/offers” this year, and about the same percentage said “personalized one-to-one marketing is the future.”

“Fast is fine, but accuracy is important.” That quote is attributed to Wyatt Earp, but I think it applies to marketing as well.  In a world of marketing that is quickly being pushed towards data-driven methodologies, I would think accuracy is one of the most important criteria, wouldn’t you?

The Creative Capital – the digital agency assigned to the task launched a unique message campaign titled “Ponte Pa Lo Tuyo” or contextualized into English would be “Get with it and start making money”. The spanish-language campaign covered the areas of television, radio and print ads.

The high demand from Hollywood executives for fresh faces and a cohesive Latino entertainment entity has prompted the recent partnership of Isabel Echeverry/Kontakto Reps and Erika Olmos/Olmos Management to form Olmos Kontakto Entertainment.

With anticipation growing across the globe for the upcoming 2014 FIFA World Cup Brazil™, Budweiser revealed Rise As One, the brand’s global creative campaign on behalf of its sponsorship of the upcoming tournament.

When it comes to their financial lives, some Hispanic Millennials like to have all their ducks in a row. Using Simmons data, Tr3s recently identified and analyzed this segment, called “Life Planners.” Representing a little more than 1 in 3 Hispanics 18-34, this group is optimistic, believes in seizing opportunities when they arise, strives to be well-informed, and doesn’t like the idea of debt.