Selling Spanish TV to ad buyers

Considering that Latinos make up the largest ethnic group in the United States and Latino buying power is on an upward march, you'd figure Spanish-language networks would be fighting advertisers off.

They aren't.

This week in New York, where the bulk of the commercial time for the upcoming television season will be sold at what's called the upfront market, Univision and Telemundo will need to make hard sells.

Advertising spending on Spanish-language media has been growing, rising more than 14% last year from 2005, according to Nielsen Co. But only 3.2% of total national television and print advertising is directed at Spanish markets in the Spanish language, TNS Media Intelligence has found.

What's more, recent research by the Assn. of Hispanic Advertising Agencies determined that of the country's top 250 advertisers, about 100 don't market in Spanish at all, and many of those that do aim less than 1% of their promotional budgets at Latinos.

A large group of advertisers -- mainly in the banking, investment and technology industries -- question whether they need to reach out to Latinos \o7en espanol \f7or whether their messages are getting across in English.

For Univision, this is irritating. Recently purchased by a group of private investors, the network's debt is about $10 billion, and it needs to ramp up advertising revenue. The investors are counting on Chief Executive Joe Uva, an advertising industry veteran who until this year led OMD Global Media, one of the world's largest advertising firms.

Although Univision is considered a player in the big leagues, able to compete for audiences with ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox, it doesn't command the same price for advertising time as the English-language networks do. Overall, on a national level, 30 seconds on Univision or Telemundo is 40% to 50% cheaper than 30 seconds on an English-language network.

Univision's plan is to convince advertisers in New York that Spanish-language viewers are more loyal than others, less likely to own Tivos and other digital video recorders -- making them less likely to zip past commercials -- and more willing to accept product integration in their favorite programs.

Dennis McCauley, an Irish American who is co-president of Univision's network sales and marketing division, knows about the loyalty. When he's in public wearing a jacket or shirt bearing the Univision logo, inevitably he is buttonholed by \o7telenovela \f7aficionados or viewers who want the latest gossip about the network's hunky national news anchor, Jorge Ramos.