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Former Gillette Executive Joins LaVERDAD Marketing and Media

Eileen I. Ruiz Tabbed as new Hispanic Marketing Director

LaVERDAD Marketing and Media President and CEO Mike Robinson announced today the hiring of former Gillette Company Marketing Manager, Eileen I. Ruiz, to assist the company’s Fortune 500 clients with their Hispanic marketing efforts. Mrs. Ruiz, a native of Costa Rica, will provide expertise and direction as LaVERDAD’s director of Hispanic marketing.

“This was an opportunity for us to add a true professional who possess a great deal of global marketing expertise,” said Mr. Robinson. “Mrs. Ruiz will assist us in expanding our growing business, and will provide our clients an expert resource in areas of international marketing development and sales, brand management, global multi-media development, point of purchase strategy, and special event planning.”

In 1994, Mrs. Ruiz joined Colgate-Palmolive’s Central American operation, where she served as a brand manager for Baby Magic Mennen, senior brand manager for Baby Care and Family Talc, and a category manager, in which she oversaw the planning, organizing, and implementing of all marketing activities for the company’s personal care products.

In 1998, Mrs. Ruiz joined the Gillette Company in her native Costa Rica and was responsible for implementing all marketing strategies for the company’s many personal care and battery (Duracell) products in the Central American region. Her duties included launching Gillette’s Mach3 triple razor campaign by coordinating a highly technical, state-of-the-art, national advertising event. Her efforts in that campaign produced a 20% increase in sales for the Mach3 and Sensor shaving systems. Her overall efforts netted Gillette a 4% boost in market share for all product line categories.

After earning a promotion to regional marketing manager in 2000, Gillette tabbed Mrs. Ruiz to simplify and integrate the Panama, Nicaragua, and Honduras markets into the Costa Rican operation. Her responsibilities included completely reorganizing each country’s marketing department and creating specific strategies to develop new third party distribution opportunities.

Prior to relocating to the Cincinnati area, Mrs. Ruiz joined Philip Morris International in 2002 where she was responsible for establishing and implementing the company’s first trade marketing department in Costa Rica and Central America. As Trade Marketing Manager, she organized client programs, developed a customer information system capable of tracking sales and volume, and led an in-house point of purchase task force responsible for developing, installing, and maintaining all POP materials.

As marketing director for LaVERDAD, Mrs. Ruiz will assist the company in providing clients with solutions as it pertains to the growing national Hispanic consumer market. She will also play a major role in expanding LaVERDAD’s national and local business seminars, aimed at helping executives create better products and services for Hispanic consumers.

Mrs. Ruiz earned her bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from the University of Costa Rica in 1990 and her MBA from National University in San Diego, CA in 1998.

LaVERDAD Marketing and Media was founded in 2003 by Mr. Robinson, following a career at Procter & Gamble. LaVERDAD is an integrated marketing and media company specializing in providing winning solutions to Fortune 1,000 companies wishing to compete and win in the U.S. Hispanic market, strategic media purchasing and planning, and general market research, consultation, and development.

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Financial Survival Card Captures Share of Multi-Billion Dollar Hispanic Market

Financial Services International, Inc. Selects LaVERDAD Marketing and Media to Launch Financial Survival Card Targeting the Untapped U.S. Hispanic Market

Financial Services International, Inc. (FSI) today announced the selection of LaVERDAD Marketing & Media as its marketing agency, and partner, in the launch of an innovative financial services program specifically designed to assist Hispanics in managing their financial needs.

FSI offers consumers the Essential Card, a prepaid debit MasterCard, that can be used anywhere debit MasterCard’s are accepted and at over 900,000 ATMs within the US and around the world. And now, with this newly announced partnership, FSI and LaVERDAD will develop and offer a first of its kind financial services package, specifically designed to help Latino consumers who are un-banked, under-banked, and lacking basic, fundamental, day-to-day financial survival essentials.

According to LaVERDAD President and CEO Mike Robinson, “This program meets several critical needs of Hispanics such as access to direct payroll deposit options for the millions of Hispanics without a bank account; access to ATM’s worldwide; prepaid wireless phone minutes; basic insurance needs such as auto and life; and even repatriation insurance, which ensures that finances are available in the case of death and the participant desires to be buried in their country of origin.”

“FSI chose to partner with LaVERDAD for two major reasons,” said Randy Barker, founder, president and CEO of FSI. “One, because of their instinctive ability to market to the Hispanic population, and because of the business relationships they have already cultivated within the Hispanic community. We fully expect the partnership to produce an affordable financial package for Hispanic consumers who are lacking basic, everyday needs. We look forward to a long and successful relationship with LaVERDAD.”

“This is a tremendous opportunity for LaVERDAD and FSI to combine specific areas of expertise to provide a single product that will enhance the lives of the Hispanic and Latino consumer in the U.S.,” Mr. Robinson continued. “We are honored FSI recognizes us as a leading expert on the topic of Hispanic consumer marketing and strategic development, and are eager to bring this breakthrough initiative to fruition.”

Over 33 million un-banked consumers work in this country and are forced to pay high check cashing fees upon receipt of their paychecks. Along with check cashing fees, the un-banked consumer also faces additional charges to obtain cashier checks or money orders to pay normal, everyday bills.

The card will provide a package of prepaid membership options designed to help its cardholders take care of their day-to-day needs. These options include prepaid health benefits and general insurance, emergency cash, express payment solutions, repatriation burial insurance, and phone minutes.

Well known as a prominent financial provider specializing in membership services centered on the FSI Essential Membership, FSI has more than 20 years of combined experience in the service value card market. FSI has been extremely successful in delivering a wide range of financial services specifically designed to give its members a single point of contact to meet all their financial needs.

Mr. Robinson founded LaVERDAD Marketing and Media in 2003 following a career at Procter & Gamble. LaVERDAD is an integrated marketing and media company specializing in delivering winning solutions to Fortune 1,000 companies wishing to compete and win in the U.S. Hispanic market. Headquartered in Cincinnati, LaVERDAD provides consulting, marketing research, and marketing execution to companies operating in markets across the U.S.

 

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Understanding the Hispanic Market.

“Hola, como estás,” is not the usual greeting used at the Owens Corning World Headquarters, but it was commonplace in Panther Hall recently, when OC hosted the “Understanding the Hispanic Market: Business Opportunity or Matter of Survival” conference. Business leaders from around the Toledo metropolitan area gathered to learn the magnitude of the Hispanic market and how their businesses can tap into this exploding demographic.

Mike Robinson, President of La Verdad Hispanic Marketing Solutions, gave an in-depth report of Hispanic population and economic trends, demonstrating their growing status as a vital economic factor in the U.S. According to Robinson, Hispanic buying power is expected to exceed $926 billion by 2007. As Robinson presented these demographic figures, members of Owens Corning’s Marketing Communications department learned that the Hispanic middle class has grown by 80 percent since 1980, and the number of Hispanics in the U.S. now exceeds the number of Canadians in Canada. To make the data relevant to the Toledo-area audience, Margarita De Leon, founder of Bravo, a local Hispanic newspaper, took the stage to show how Hispanic trends in the Toledo metropolitan area line up with national figures.

After establishing that the Hispanic community is the fastest, most steadily growing population in the U.S., Robinson discussed key cultural characteristics that businesses should understand when marketing to the Hispanic community. Among the most crucial to consider is the nature of the Hispanic family, whose members rely heavily upon one another for advice to reach major decisions. These tight familial bonds translate into significant marketing opportunities. Often, if a firm wins the patronage of one Hispanic person, it has won the whole family.

And, according to Robinson, “Once that trust is built, the loyalty is strong; it’s very strong.”

He explained the key to winning in the Hispanic market is to capture a “share of the heart” by connecting with core cultural values. Awareness, analysis and action were the three practical steps he cited to become a culturally literate organization. These tactics work in unison to build a strong platform from which to reach Hispanics. Awareness refers to raising internal awareness about diversity and the Hispanic consumer. The second step is to analyze the market research. The final stage involves using that research to shape an organization’s marketing strategies, campaigns and promotions.

While discussing what it takes to reach the Hispanic market, Robinson commented that OC is far ahead of many other businesses with its efforts to accurately translate relevant materials into Spanish.

Because OC’s products are useful to people of every ethnicity and cultural background, the Marketing Communications department has adopted a “no population left out” marketing strategy.

Lynne Hartzell, Director of Marketing Communications, explained, “Most of our marketing activities aren’t designed to cater to a specific audience. Instead, our goal is to include all audiences. Our products serve a diverse population of people, and our marketing efforts are representative of that.”

To reach Hispanics in this all-inclusive marketing philosophy, packaging and installation instructions are available in Spanish so products are easily accessible to Spanish speaking consumers. OC is also working with Lowe’s through 2005 and 2006 to ensure that all product literature at the point of sale is bilingual in Spanish and English.

As OC works to reach out to diverse audiences in the U.S., Hartzell commented, “2005 will be a testing and learning process for our marketing concepts to find how we can gain a greater share of the heart for such an important demographic group.”

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Habla español?

Business Courier | By: Karen Bells

Businesses try, but not all succeed in marketing to local Latinos.

Marketing and media efforts aimed at the local Hispanic community are much like the group itself — relatively small but growing. “Only about 2 to 3 percent of this area is Hispanic,” said Roberto Peraza, president of the Hispanic Chamver of Commerce of Greater Cincinnati. But, he said, the number is growing rapidly. And the numbers are expected to keep growing, said Mike Robinson, owner of Montgomery-based LaVERDAD Hispanic Marketing Solutions.

“Even though the greatest concentration of Hispanics is in placed like California, Miami and Texas… you’ll find all the huge growth in Hispanic numbers in the midwest– Ohio, Kentucky, Michigan- and places like North and South Carolina,” said Robinson, who is Mexican-America.

In the Cincinnati area, the Hispanic population grew 120 percent from 1990 to 2000, Robinson said, while the white population grew 5 percent during the same period. Nationally, Hispanics accounted for 40 of the increase in total population during that time period, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

At 13 percent of the population, Hispanics are now the largest minority group in the country. All that growth means plenty of opportunity for business that want to get their message to the Hispanic community — and also plenty of opportunity to mess it up. José Cuesta, the Columbian-born business development director of Norwood-based Grupo Xela Integrated Hispanic Marketing, said marketing and advertising to Hispanics requires more than just translating your existing materials into Spanish.

“Some companies are placing ads in The Spanish Journal that are not culturally attuned,” said Cuesta. “Some are just translating the material and not developing a culturally relevant message.” The whole look of the messages has to be appropriate, too, from the choice of colors to the selection of images, he said. “I’ve seen some brochures for retail locations that are in Spanish, but they don’t look like it — they look American,” Cuesta said.

Other tips for businesses courting the Hispanic community, he said, include getting a qualified translator (“I’ve seen some horrendously translated ads,” Cuesta said) and making sure your back office is ready to handle the business when it comes. Cuesta recalled a local attorney group that made the effort to advertise to Hispanics. But when potential clients started calling, no one at the firm could answer the phone calls because no one spoke Spanish.

Both Cuesta and Robinson said marketing to this demographic requires creativity and a more grass-roots approach than typical marketing. Because there aren’t many Spanish-language media options in town, and many Hispanics either don’t speak English or strongly prefer Spanish, marketing efforts often involve going out into the community, Robinson said.

It’s labor-intensive, but the trade- off is that Hispanics are generally loyal customers and very brand-loyal, he said, something global firms like Procter & Gamble have long known. And there are lots of opportunities in a variety of industries.

“For instance, Hispanics account for almost 10 percent of all new car sales in the United States,” Robinson said. “There are great opportunities for the retail market, too, because Hispanics typically like to look nice.”

Other industries that have lots of potential business with the demographic include banking, restaurants and telecommunications, among others, he said.

One thing that might surprise businesses, he said, is that Hispanics tend to be more responsive to direct mail than other groups. While studies show other people throw away most of the direct mail they receive, La Verdad found out differently when compiling its 2004 Cincinnati Hispanic Marketing Snapshot, a consumer behavior analysis it sells to companies.

“Seventy-two percent of Hispanics say they open and read their direct mail, and 30 percent say they actually want to receive more direct mail,” Robinson said.

La Verdad also found that many local Hispanics are not getting coupons because they don’t read mainstream newspapers, where the coupons are often found. So his company created the Don Cupón booklet in conjunction with various clients and hit the streets — at churches, festivals, restaurants and Hispanic-heavy neighborhoods like Fairfield and Florence — to hand them out.

The Spanish and bilingual coupons include everything from Allstate to Jake Sweeney Chevrolet to the Newport Aquarium. Participation in the booklet is just one effort the aquarium is making to attract Hispanic business, said CEO Dr. Tim Mullican. “The Hispanic population is increasing tremendously, and this demographic is very family-oriented,” which is the aquarium’s target, he said. “Just the fact that they know they’re welcome is a big step.”

While grass-roots efforts are still the best way to reach Hispanics locally, there are a few media options, too, said Cuesta.

George Lopez’s Spanish Journal Network has published the biweekly The Spanish Journal (also called La Jornada Latina) for six years and is about to introduce several new products.

Starting this month, Lopez will launch a biweekly sports journal, Deporte Grafico, on opposite weeks. With the second publication, there will be a weekly presence in town, Lopez said. While The Spanish Journal is bilingual, with about one-quarter of content in English, Deporte Grafico will be entirely in Spanish. Ads for both are accepted in either language, and Lopez said about half are purchased by Hispanic companies and half by “corporate America.”

Spanish Journal Network also has a three-hour news radio show that runs every Sunday at 8 p.m. on 1050 AM, and in September it will launch an around-the-clock information service. Users call a free phone number to ask all kinds of questions, and advertisers can pay to become sponsors of the service.

And in March, Channel 12 (WKRC) launched a half-hour Spanish-language show, “Nuestro Rincon,” at 5:30 a.m. Saturdays and 6:30 a.m. Sundays. The Sunday show is all news, while the Saturday show includes news but also has more features stories and entertainment.

Response already has been better than expected, said producer Francisco Caceres.

Though the time slot is very early, he said, “as a Hispanic, I see the alternative as nothing.” Ad sales have been slowly building up, Caceres said, and the station just hired a sales representative to exclusively handle “Nuestro Rincon.”

“It is time. I don’t think it’s going to be long before all the stations will be doing something,” he said. “(The Hispanic community) is not going to stop growing. The smart business will see that there’s money to be made here.”

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Que Habla Consumer?

Cincy Business | by: Christine Williams

A Montgomery firm tracks buying decisions for the local and national Hispanic markets.

The country’s largest minority group is knocking at your business door. Care to let it in?

During the past decade, the number of Hispanics living in Greater Cincinnati has soared by 200 percent, an influential consumer base wielding an estimated $350 million in buying power.

If you want to tap into the market, you could listen to Mike Robinson, CEO and founder of LaVERDAD Hispanic Marketing Solutions in Montgomery. Proctor & Gamble, Fifth Third Bank, and Budweiser Brewing Co. are just a few of the Fortune 500 companies that already have done so.

Robinson, a Mexican-American, founded LaVERDAD a year ago to help companies in the Tristate and across the country link with Hispanics. “We know how to target and win the Hispanic market,” Robinson says. “We’ve seen what works, and can get into action quickly.”

To help companies learn how to entice the growing Latin American population, Robinson, who spent time in the 1980s and 1990s in Central and South America as a Green Beret, created a process he calls OneView. This marketing strategy focuses on each of LaVERDAD’s clients individually. The goal is to create the right message delivered through the right channels to reach each client’s Hispanic customer base. OneView thus seeks to create a single view of the truth, or, “la verdad.”

“Our goal is to create an environment of inclusion,” Robinson says. “It’s a smart use of marketing dollars.” In addition to its OneView approach, LaVERDAD offers an array of other services to help corporate leaders understand Hispanic consumers and market relevant products directly to them.

One way Robinson’s firm effectively educates companies about the Hispanic market is through seminars that teach decision makers about cultural variations, emphasizing that consumers from different Latin American countries don’t always behave the same. LaVERDAD also offers detailed market reports about Hispanics’ purchasing behavior, providing in-depth information about key spending patterns and demographics for any given ZIP code.

When Folgers Coffee needed to conducts Hispanic market research to a local segment. “LaVERDAD helped us tremendously. They live it, breathe it, are it,” Lora says.

The consultant conducted surveys, provided quantitative data, held interviews, and created focus groups for Folgers. These services allowed Lora to conducts his preliminary research locally without compromising the quality of his research. “That LaVERDAD offers that so many to not is that they have so many contacts within the Hispanic community,” Lora says. “They have a lot of value to add to a local business.”

“If you don’t start including diversity in your advertising messages, you’re going to stand out from the big platers who are,” warns Robinson., who adds that if companies don’t tap into the Hispanic market now, they could be hurting later.

“The only population increase in Ohio is the Hispanic segment. These people are our future workers, future managers, and future teachers.”