Agency

The recent Advertising Age story about search consultants raises a very important issue, although not the one that was most prominently featured. The debate about the ethics of some search consultants “double-dipping” is an old concern and one that is hopefully becoming less prevalent.

Overhead rates are used by many advertisers in the calculation of agency fees. In many cases, the overhead rates of a client’s agencies are compared to “benchmarked overhead rates” as provided by benchmarking consultants. Benchmarking consultants will tell you that there are standard proportions of these costs in the marketplace, and that these proportions (“rates”) should be used to evaluate an agency’s overhead costs. The benchmarkers have the industry data and proof, they say, but their database cannot be revealed for confidentiality reasons. DOWNLOAD Report Here.

Latinos are currently the fastest growing consumer group in the United States, challenging marketers and demographers to take a fresh look at what it means to be—or become—an “American.” The demographic buckets commonly employed in market research do not really reflect the Latino experience, nor are they capable of sorting Hispanics into meaningful, actionable segments. Yet, reaching and engaging Latinos is a critical objective for brands today, and will continue to be so for decades to come. It is a real dilemma for marketers, and one that we have experienced firsthand at Communispace. DOWNLOAD Report Here.

Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) consumers are more likely to consider buying a product from a company that targets gay people in its ad imagery, according to a survey done by Harris Interactive for consulting firm Witeck-Combs Communications.

San Antonio based MarketVision has teamed up with the National Council of La Raza to produce two English-language public service announcements encouraging young Latinos to take control of their future by choosing college. Called “What if?” the :30 PSAs feature two real-life examples of Latinos who turned their childhood passions into careers by pursuing a college education.

Hispanicize has acquired a significant stake in Being Latino, a Hispanic community and social media platforms and publisher of the online magazine Being Latino.

According to Radio Business Report, Attiva Capital is a significant shareholder of Spanish Broadcasting System, holding, along with its principal investors, about 9.3% of the publicly traded Class A shares of SBS. It is the latest shareholder to try to pressure the company to make major changes.

This paper shows how the rapid growth of Hispanic and Asian origin groups and new internal shifts of African Americans are transforming the racial and ethnic demographic profiles of America’s largest metropolitan areas ahead of other parts of the country. DOWNLOAD Report Here.

Brands of all stripes are working toward delivering personalized messages to their target audiences. Despite their best efforts, however, consumers say certain industries are not meeting their needs. Service providers, such as cable and utility companies, and regulated companies, such as insurance and finance brands, appear to be behind the curve in terms of delivering personalized digital experiences.

PRISA Digital and Maya Publishing Group announced their partnership to market the advertising space of online properties of Notmusa in the Hispanic and Portuguese markets of the region.

Small and medium-sized businesses will continue the recent trend of shifting their marketing budgets to digital advertising, performance-based platforms and customer retention business solutions over the next five years, according to a new U.S. SMB Spending Forecast by BIA/Kelsey. This trend creates an increasingly large market opportunity for businesses serving SMBs and developing SMB tools.