Claudia “Havi” Goffan, principal at Target Latino

The Latino market is an ever evolving moving target that companies aim at with varying results. Finding a tool that would uncover the spending habits of your desired Hispanic audience is almost grabbing the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Target Latino has long developed a methodology to identify Hispanics online independently of their language or level of acculturation.

Because of its bilingual, bicultural and multi-layered nature, Hispanics have been the focus of numerous market research strategies. Following trend after trend, and many times (miss) guided by Hispanic advertising agencies, American companies have tried and erred on their quest to grab and hold this slippery fish.

“However, numbers don’t lie,” said Havi Goffan, multicultural marketing technologist and principal at Target Latino. “Our proprietary technology can identify Hispanics’ online habits –independently of the language they use– to be applied to ad monitoring and ad tracking. We also provide analytics of Hispanic targeted online advertising. Our exclusive intellectual property also allows for segmentation by country of origin, gender and age group,” she explained.

 Who is Claudia “Havi” Goffan?

An 18-year old curious woman about computers in Argentina few decades ago was not a common occurrence –I know because I am from the “pampas” – but rarer if she was interested in applying computer technology to marketing. Whaaaaat?

“Although I graduated with an MBA from the University of Buenos Aires (UBA), Argentina, and from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), I took my very first information technology class at the University of Buenos Aires back in 1978. I was interested in it not really as a career but as a field that allowed me to master certain tools. I took International Marketing classes concurrently with Artificial Intelligence (AI),” said Havi to LIBizus.

This fascination with business technology and marketing carried her over to the place she is today. An international keynote speaker and expert marketing technologist on culture, inbound marketing, content, SEO and Pinterest strategies, visionary Havi positioned her company around inbound marketing after the upheaval created by the 2000 Census. “It was crazy, every American company wanted to target Latinos,” she said.

She recognized the power of cultural knowledge as one of the pillars, together with technology and business savvy, in capturing the Hispanic market. “Instead of broadcasting a message to a market that might or might not be interested in what you have to offer, you get ready to be found when they are looking for you,” she explained.

“Inbound marketing seems simple but we know not everybody can make it to the first page of Google results, much less for the same keyword,” Havi said. And inbound marketing is much more than Search Engine Optimization (SEO), email marketing, and blogging, she shared.

According to Target Latino research, over 42M Hispanics – or more than 65 percent of the U.S. Latino population – are online and 87 percent of user-generated search engine queries click on organic search results.

“Whatever it is that they are looking for, the Internet has changed the way Latinos decide what to buy and who to buy from. There are only 10 places on Google’s first page. It’s not just about language anymore; it is about culture and relevance,” Havi explained.

Here are some stats Havi shared with LIBizus:

• B2B companies that create content have 67% more leads per month than those who do not. (Social Media B2B)
• 80% of the people ignore Google paid ads (Search Engine Land)
• 75% of the online population never go further than the first page of search engines results (Hubspot)
• People want to be in control of the content they receive: 86% skip commercials, 44% of direct mail goes unopened. (Content Marketing Institute)
• Articles with images have 94% more views (Content+)
• Around 60% of the population has a visual style of learning
• 58% of consumers trust editorial content.

“Companies need to develop everything and anything that will drive the prospect to them when THEY are searching for their products or services. Unfortunately, most companies still don’t get it and continue to practice outbound marketing. And here is one more reason to grasp: According to Search Engine Journal, inbound leads are 60 percent less expensive than outbound leads,” Havi concluded.

She has been recognized as an expert in Latino Marketing by CNN en Español, and featured in CNN, Adweek, AmEx Open Forum, Univision, Telemundo, HuffPo, AARP Viva, Abasto Media, and others.