Commentary
Big Media Captures The English-preferring Online Market
- by Lee Vann , Columnist, July 11, 2013
In January 2012, I wrote a piece on how digital publishers were addressing the English-preferring Hispanic market. At that time, traditional media players were being challenged by nimble upstarts who saw a clear demand for Latino-themed content in English. Today, that dynamic has shifted, with large publishers vaulting ahead of the upstarts and simultaneously demonstrating the viability of the English Hispanic online market.
I must say that I am not at all surprised by this shift. True, upstarts can be more nimble and be first movers, but big media enjoy advantages that are hard for startups to overcome. First, large publishers have well-established relationships with advertisers and the media buying agencies that represent them. In addition, big companies have significant resources that can be deployed to build digital platforms, hire writers and drive traffic. That said, in today’s world of efficient publishing and social media, upstarts will continue to play an important role in a market that they played a key role in creating.
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The following analysis shows how publishers targeting Latinos in English have fared since I did the analysis in January 2012. At the top of the list are big media companies who are driving strong growth among English-preferring online Hispanics. (Website data comes from Compete.com and represents highest number of monthly unique visitors in 2013 if available. Growth is from January 2012 if available.)
Fox News Latino
- Website: 732,000, n/a
- Facebook: 80,000, +111%
- Twitter: 31,000, +245%
Mun2
- Website: 186,000, +24%
- Facebook: 342,000, +165%
- Twitter: 69,000, +245%
NBC Latino
- Website: 158,000, n/a
- Facebook: 48,000, n/a
- Twitter: 15,500, +7,650%
Univision News
- Website: n/a
- Facebook: 15,000, +650%
- Twitter: 88,500, +205%
MTV Tr3s
- Website: 84,000, -16%
- Facebook: 88,000, +35%
- Twitter: 67,000, +235%
Being Latino - Upstart
- Website: > 10,000, -9%
- Facebook: 108,000, +66%
- Twitter: 12,000, +118%
Guanabe - Upstart
- Website: 36,000, -77%
- Facebook: 3,000, +20%
- Twitter: 2,400, +4%
In addition to these publishers, new players have emerged including a couple of upstarts and one large publisher. Below is a rundown on this group that includes Voxxi, Latino Rebels and MSN “Latizine”.
Voxxi - Upstart
- Website: 72,000
- Facebook: 16,000
- Twitter: 6,500
Latino Rebels - Upstart
- Website: 22,000
- Facebook: 37,600
- Twitter: 15,000
MSN Latizine
- Website: 29,000
- Facebook: 300
- Twitter: n/a
When I take a look at this market a year from now, I am sure that growth rates will continue as more advertising dollars flow to target English-preferring Hispanics. I also anticipate many new publishers jumping into this space and anticipate the emergence of many English sites aimed at Latinos within topical niches such as sports, business, technology, food, beauty and fashion, among others.
If you know of a publisher targeting Hispanics in English, let me know!
One news site you've overlooked, and the only one founded by a Latina, is Latina Lista — www.latinalista.com
Website: 30,000
Facebook: 3,511
Twitter: 9,890
Thanks,
Marisa Treviño
Publisher of Latina Lista
I think we should have another category like Pioneers or Senior Citizens. What do you think Marisa?. I just passed 8 years doing online English-language news this month and you about 9, right?
Lee, I still have to wonder about the economics however for all these ventures. You need lots and lots of traffic or extremely high CPMs to be viable unless subsidized by big media. The ad dollars weren't and to my knowledge to still aren't flowing our way.
Take a look at NBCLatino. They now have a year under the belt. How much do they need to me make in ad rev to pay for 8 to 10 professionals living in NYC. My low guesstimate is $75k/year time 10 = $750k. 150k uniques isn't going to pay the bills even at 2 pageviews per unique and a generous $10 cpm that would be revenue of only $3k/month per ad section that isn't enough to pay half a person.
Don't get me wrong, I believe we need sites like NBCLatino and other big media venture to get more exposure for our stories and concerns. Before big media jumped into this niche there was less of chance for our stories to get mainstream media attention, now there is almost a ladder. Now there is a little more chance especially combined with social media.
I am sure there is a lot more to come and it will be exciting to see how Fusion plays out but when it comes to expecting the ad dollars to flow and support this niche, I am not holding my breath.