Batanga Launches Hispanic Ad Net

Targeting the booming U.S. Hispanic marketplace, Latin music and lifestyle publisher Batanga has launched an ad network with a combined reach of roughly 15 million unique visitors.

More than reach, however, Batanga brass are talking up the network's ability to segment and target this diverse demographic. "The growth of the U.S. Hispanic online audience is complex and cannot be addressed with a one-dimensional online strategy or buy," said Rafael Urbina, chairman and CEO of Batanga.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, there were about 43.7 million U.S. Hispanics ages 2+ as of 2008. In May 2009, comScore reported that about 21 million of them were online, representing about 10.7% of all U.S. persons online. And the U.S. online Hispanic population is growing about three times as fast as the overall online population.

According to a new eMarketer report, in 2009, the number of U.S. Hispanics online is estimated to grow by 7.9%, exceeding 22 million users. Time spent online is also growing rapidly, with data showing that U.S. Hispanics are spending over 26 hours online per month -- a 12.5% year-over-year rise.

The launch of the network comes on the heels of the company's recent implementation of new targeting technology, which allows marketers to target contextually and behaviorally in both Spanish and English, as well as automatically analyze Web pages across its network in both languages to locate relevant content.

Brand partners including Verizon, Sears and Sprint have already begun testing the new technology.

Batanga.com launched back in 1999 as a Web destination for Latin music and entertainment content. It has more recently updated its platform with social networking capabilities.

In 2008, the company acquired Hispanic ad network HispanoClick. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

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