The United States Hispanic Internet Audience Grows Faster than the Total U.S. Online Population

04/20/2009

comScore, Inc. a research firm measuring the Internet marketing world, recently produced a report on the United States Hispanic Internet market. The results of this study revealed that the Hispanic online audience in February of 2009 reached a record of 20.3 million individuals, a figure that represents 11 percent of the complete United States online market. In 2008, the United States Hispanic market showed significant growth. In fact it outpaced the full United States online population when it comes to the quantity of visitors, amount of time spent viewing, and the number of pages viewed as well

Jack Flanagan, executive vice president of comScore Media Metrix, stated that it is well known that the Hispanic audience is growing quickly and is now a major segment of interest by Internet marketing advertisers.However, he also adds the caveat that any company that is seeking to reach this market segment needs to better understand the United States Hispanic online consumer and his or her behavior This is critical for companies wanting to leverage Internet marketing as an access point. This, he states, will be a major component of their media and marketing campaign strategies.

The United States Hispanic online audience’s increase to 20.3 million individuals in February of this year has actually increased by 6 percent from 2008’s records. The actual time spent on the Internet increased by 6.9 percent in 2009 – this is actually 3.9 time faster than the United States online population. It’s no wonder Internet marketers are eyeing this segment and beginning to craft ideas and strategies to reach these consumers.

United States Hispanics make up 11 percent of the United States population, and yet Hispanics only account for 9 percent of all the time spent online. One of the goals of comScore’s survey was to better understand the web pages that Hispanics are commonly expected to visit while on the Internet. In order to determine this, the study carefully inspected the online categories where Hispanics spent the largest portion of their time online.

The study concluded that the online category where Hispanics spent most of their time was Community - Teens, where they accounted for an 18 percent share of time spent within the site category. Other online categories that ranked high on this list were:

Gaming Information – 13 percent
Entertainment - Radio – 13 percent
Entertainment - Multimedia – 12 percent
Services - Discussion/chat – 11 percent
Services - Instant messengers – 11 percent
Community - Lifestyles – 11 percent
Entertainment - Music – 11 percent

It is made apparent by this study that the categories where the Hispanic population spent most of their time online were entertainment and leisure related. Flanagan adds that although Hispanics are not on the Internet as much as the rest of the population is on average, they do however, become highly engaged in communication and entertainment online. This provides an attractive target for companies seeking to tap this segment via Internet marketing.

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