Online Hispanic Trends

Faster Growth in Asia Widening the Online Gap

Research by Forrester shows the faster growth in Asia is leading to a wider gap in the global online population.

Forrester research shows that by 2013, users in...

• Asia will swell from 38% in 2008 to 43%.
• North America will shrink from 17% to 13%.
• Europe will shrink from 26% to 22%. 
• Latin America will remain unchanged at about 11%.
• African and the Middle East will also stay at 10%.

Brazil and Mexico make up over half of Latin America's online audience.

See full article by Andrew LaVallee on the Wall Street Journal blog.

Profits Versus Global Growth Dilemma for Social Media Sites

Seems like a contradiction, but it's true....

Although many large social media sites such as Facebook and Veoh are experiencing dramatic global growth, this growth is actually having a negative impact on their profit margins.

These sites rely on advertising to make money, but in many developing countries the advertising doesn't translate into profit. The cost of making content available in these countries is also higher because companies have to purchase more servers to make content available to limited bandwidth users.

Some companies are taking steps to decrease these costs by lowering the resolution of videos and photographs in developing countries and others such as San Diego-based Veoh are restricting access in Africa, Latin America, Asia, and Easter Europe completely.

Source: New York Times

 



 

Web Access and Social Networking Growing Quickly in Latin America

A Google commissioned study by Pyramid Research shows that the number of Internet users in Latin American and Puerto Rico is growing quickly due to more affordable computers, greater access and use of broadband, and a growing interest in the use of social networking sites and applications.

Pyramid Research projects that the regional residential base would grow to 160 million in five years from the 2009 figure of 100 million.

Alexandre Hohagen, Google’s managing director for Latin America, says “A lot of people in Latin America use the Internet just to be part of a social network.”

Another study conducted by Comscore in the Fall of 2008 found that 8 out of 10 users in Latin America said that they used social networks, with the favorites being MySpace, Facebook, Hi5, Orkut and Sonico.

Source: eMarketer

Internet Statistics for Latin America - Key Countries Include Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, and Chile

Data from Internet World Stats indicates that the key countries for Internet use in Latin America are Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Colombia, and Chile. 

Chile is an interesting case. Although it doesn't represent a large number as a percentage of the overall Latin American population, it's Internet penetration is the highest of any Latin American country.

Although still relatively small, certain countries, including El Salvador and Guatemala have made significant gains in the 2000-2008 period.

What is most important to note, however, is the room for growth going foward... 

Central America and Mexico

Internet Usage and Population Statistics for Central America June2008
CENTRAL AMERICA	Population ( 2008 Est. )	% Pop. C. A.	Internet Usage, Latest Data	% (Penetration)	% Users C. A.	Use Growth ( 2000-2008 )
Belize	301270	0.20%	32000	10.60%	0.10%	113.30%
Costa Rica	4195914	2.80%	1500000	35.70%	5.40%	500.00%
El Salvador	7066403	4.70%	700000	9.90%	2.50%	1650.00%
Guatemala	13002206	8.60%	1320000	10.20%	4.70%	1930.80%
Honduras	7639327	5.10%	344100	4.50%	1.20%	760.30%
Mexico	109955400	72.70%	23700000	21.60%	84.60%	773.80%
Nicaragua	5785846	3.80%	155000	2.70%	0.60%	210.00%
Panama	3292693	2.20%	264316	8.00%	0.80%	487.40%
TOTAL	151239059	100.00%	28015416	18.50%	100.00%	770.70%

South America

Internet Usage and Population Statistics for South America June2008
CENTRAL AMERICA	Population ( 2008 Est. )	% Pop. C. A.	Internet Usage, Latest Data	% (Penetration)	% Users C. A.	Use Growth ( 2000-2008 )
Argentina	40677348	10.60%	16000000	39.30%	15.40%	540.00%
Bolivia	9247816	2.40%	580000	6.30%	0.60%	383.30%
Brazil	191908598	49.90%	50000000	26.10%	48.10%	900.00%
Chile	16454143	4.30%	7387000	44.90%	7.10%	320.30%
Colombia	45013674	11.70%	13745600	30.50%	13.20%	1465.60%
Ecuador	13927650	3.60%	1109967	8.00%	1.10%	516.60%
Falkland Islands	2483	0.00%	1900	76.50%	0.00%	n/a %
French Guiana	220898	0.10%	42000	19.00%	0.00%	2000.00%
Guyana	770794	0.20%	190000	24.60%	0.20%	6233.30%
Paraguay	6831306	1.80%	260000	3.80%	0.20%	1200.00%
Peru	29180899	7.60%	7636400	26.20%	7.30%	205.50%
Suriname	475996	0.10%	44000	9.20%	0.00%	276.10%
Uruguay	3477778	0.90%	1100000	31.60%	1.10%	197.30%
Venezuela	26414815	6.90%	5940426	22.50%	5.70%	525.30%
TOTAL	384604198	100.00%	104037293	27.10%	100.00%	627.90%

Source: www.internetworldstats.com/

 

Great Potential for Multimedia Growth as Broadband Penetration Increases

In a presentation by Alex Banks of comScore at the TV 2.0 Summit in Sao Paolo, Banks shared recent comScore findings on the use of multimedia sites in Brazil. The data shows that use of multimedia sites, particularly video sites such as YouTube, is limited by slow download speeds. Despite these slow download speeds, Brazilians are still visiting these sites in large numbers and it is expected that, as broadband penetration increases, their use will rise considerably.

Read full article in MarketWatch

MercadoLibre acquiring DeRamate to Strengthen its Position in Chile, Argentina and Mexico

MercadoLibre, Inc., the leading Internet trading platform in Latin America, announced that it is acquiring the operations of DeRamate, an online trading platform with operations in Chile, Argentina and Mexico.

"The acquisition is expected to significantly expand MercadoLibre's footprint in Chile while strengthening the company's leadership position in Argentina."  

Source: Marketwatch.com

Staggering growth for Facebook in Latin America

Data collected by Facebook shows a substantial increase in Latin American users. Over the past six months, they have added 2.3 million new users in Chile, 2 million in Colombia, 1 million in Venezuela, and 0.4 million in Argentina.....

Source: Insidefacebook.com

Online buyers doubling every two years in Brazil

An article by eMarketer describes the impressive growth of the ecommerce market in Brazil.

From 2003 to 2007, the number of individuals buying online in Brazil increased from 2.6 million buyers to 9.5 million, with the market expanding by 43% in 2007 alone. 

Third only to Japan (82%) and the UK (79%), Brazilians (79%) are heavily using the Internet for ecommerce in addition to many other online activities. 

They are heavy consumers of media, including books, magazines and newspapers, which were ranked with a 17% market share in research conducted by e-Bit.

Read full article

Visa, Inc. Study says eCommerce in Latin America to exceed $16 billion in 2008

In a new study entitled “B2C Electronic Commerce in Latin America and the Caribbean: Beating All Odds,” Visa, Inc says that retail commerce in Latin America will surpass $16 billion this year and reach close to $30 billion by 2010.

Using data from AmericaEconomia, the study indicates that Brazil had the largest retail e-commerce market at $4.9 billion in 2007, with Mexico (1.38 billion) and Venezuela ($821 million) coming in second and third respectively.

Retail E-Commerce Sales Figures for Latin American Markets

Country	2007 Sales	% Change from 2006
Brazil	4.9 billion	38%
Mexico	1.3 billion	59%
Venezuela	821 billion	68%
Caribbean (except Puerto Rico)	818 million	45%
Argentina	739 million	19%
Chile	687 million	46%
Central America	499 million	39%
Puerto Rico	445 million	16%
Peru	218 million	50%
Colombia	201 million	15%
Others	203 million	23%

What are they shopping for?

In response to questions regarding what they shopped for online, customers responses were broken down into the following categories:

• Books, music, movies - 21.4%
• Tourism and travel - 16.9%
• Electronics - 13.9%
• Software - 12.3%
• Appliances - 9.1%
• Services - 7.7%
• Flowers and other gifts - 6.7%
• Food - 4.3%
• Games - 3.1%
• Spare parts - 2.8%
• Furniture - 1.8%

Source: InternetRetailer

As Latin American Online Audience Grows, so does their use of Social Networking Sites

With overall monthly unique visits in Latin America increasing from from 53.6 million in June '07 to 61.6 in April '08, more and more people are using social networking sites in the Region.

 

In terms of the growth of social networking sites....

• Hi5 is the largest social networking site throughout Latin America (12.8 million unique visitors in April), except for Brazil where the leader is Google's Orkut.
• Hi5 has grown 20% in two months according to comScore.

• Hi5 invested in a Spanish-language version of its platform during the period that MySpace and Facebook were focusing their energies on U.S. growth and continues to develop localized versions for other Latin American countries.

• Facebook, which launched a Spanish-version of its platform using user-generated translation, is also growing quickly in Latin America with unique visits of 7.7 million in April according to comScore.

• Facebook has launched a Brazilian Portuguese version to compete with Orkut.

• Sonico, another social networking site, claims to have gained 17 million new users since it launched last July.

Source: VentureBeat