Agency

In the wake of the economic downturn, 80 percent of senior finance executives said their scope of responsibilities has expanded, with finance also now overseeing programs in other departments across the enterprise, according to findings of a new Accenture survey.

The private label market has enjoyed sales growth in recent years that isn’t likely to decrease in the near future. Private label companies continue to introduce better-for-you products and more attractive packaging, all while being easier on consumers’ pockets. Their efforts seem to be working, since recent Mintel research found that 44% of grocery shoppers believe store brand products are of better quality today than they were five years ago.

Planned purchases, modified shopping trips and shorter shopping lists have become the mainstays of today’s value-conscious consumer, but these trends might not continue in 2011.

NAPA, the “Official Auto Parts Sponsor of the Federación Mexicana de Fútbol (FMF)” and the “Official Auto Parts Sponsor of the El Tri U.S. Tour 2011,” is launching the NAPA Pura Calidad Mobile Tour to connect with and engage Hispanics across the country . Leveraging some of the key Hispanic passion points – sports, music and family – the 2011 tour will travel to more than 10 major U.S. cities and be present at various events including Mexican National Soccer team matches, Alianza de Fútbol amateur soccer games, Hispanic festivals, and NAPA locations.

I have taken a stand many times when industry professionals continued to position Multicultural and Cross-Cultural Marketing as the only strategy that would finally help elevate the marketing to multi-ethnic consumers to its righteous place among advertisers and prognosticate the demise of Hispanic Agencies and the Spanish-language media that serve the US Hispanic Consumer.

Now that advertisers have the ability to put all multicultural consumers into one category from a total marketing standpoint and also use these models to impact mainstream advertising with cross-cultural strategies that obviously will turn our $6 Billion industry into what it should be.

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comScore, Inc. released findings from comScore ARS indicating the importance of a strong upfront strategy and creative execution in driving campaign effectiveness for TV and digital advertising campaigns in Canada. Extensive research conducted by comScore ARS also shows that creative quality drives more than half of the sales changes for brands analyzed, four times higher than the impact of the specific media plan involved, highlighting the importance of optimizing creative in ad campaigns.

Available at HispanicCMO.com and HispanicAccountPlanning.com

Google has created a “specialist team” to focus on the U.S. Hispanic market. John Farrell, general manager, Google Mexico, told MediaPost Thursday that the Mountain View, Calif. company developed a “methodical approach” to developing best practices that will help advertisers across all industries do a better job connecting with this market segment across search, display and mobile platforms. GOOGLE US HISPANIC BUSINESS VIDEOS AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD.

Latinos in Social Media [LATISM] announced the beta launch of their new online community website LATISM.org/beta.

US entertainment and media (E&M) merger and acquisition (M&A) activity outpaced the overall US deal market in 2010, according to PwC US. With the industry’s fast-paced shift to digital – and attractive levels of corporate cash reserves and private equity dry powder, PwC believes the catalysts are in place for more E&M deal activity during 2011.

Vocus has released its landmark study titled: State of the Media Report 2011. The report covers the four traditional media segments including newspapers, magazines, television and radio, and finds that the media industry has revived in the last 12 months and it continues to experiment with new digital and mobile distribution models. DOWNLOAD REPORT HERE.

Luis Miguel Messianu, President and Chief Creative Officer at Alma DDB announced the appointment of Diego Yurkievich as Sr. VP, Executive Creative Director for the agency.

Steeming from the success of its national general market advertising campaign “Mayhem,” Allstate has introduced “Mala Suerte” to Hispanic audiences to highlight the protection, value and peace of mind that Allstate provides when bad things happen.