Online Advertising in the Caribbean
Online advertising in the Caribbean in 2009 is more like online advertising in 1999.
Online advertising in the Caribbean in 2009 is more like online advertising in 1999.
During a recent trip to Puerto Rico, I had the pleasure of meeting with some industry compatriots, principals of local agency The Korber Group. In comparing notes, I discovered quickly that despite the fact that Puerto Rico is a U.S. territory, it and the rest of the Caribbean lags extremely far behind the U.S. when it comes to pretty much all things Internet. Below is some of the conversation I had with The Korber Group.
Hollis Thomases: Give me a little background. Where are you at here in the Caribbean?
The Korber Group: We came here in 2005, and back then there was really no online advertising going on whatsoever! Even now, although some progress has been made, it’s still very early stage and progressing slowly.
HT: Why is that?
TKG: There are many problems and forces at work:
HT: So what kinds of companies are doing online advertising here right now?
TKG: The tourism industry leads the charge, but their audience is really outside the area. Within the Caribbean, the top online advertisers right now are telecommunications, car dealerships, property developers, and financial institutions. This is not only a very naive market, but oddly, many of the advertisers do not want to be educated about reality. The recessionary times have stimulated interest in the Internet, but first-time advertisers have overly high expectations. They just want to hear that they can get results and get them immediately. Advertisers are getting so desperate for business that they’re vulnerable to scam artists who toss around buzzwords and tell them whatever the advertiser wants to hear, which then soils the overall market.
HT: Why the resistance to the truth?
TKG: A lot of it has to do with what the Internet has done for the U.S. and the rest of the world. Caribbean businesses just hear about and want the successes, but they don’t realize how far behind we are here both technically and contextually. Advertising opportunities are limited and only still sold on a flat-fee basis. There is no such thing as CPM, CPC, or CPA. Metrics are completely unreliable because sellers use “hits,” “page views,” and “visitors” interchangeably; media kit stats don’t add up. There’s no real way to target because neither publishers nor advertisers collect demographic information. We’re also hindered by cultural tendencies towards stubbornness and self-conviction.
HT: What about e-mail advertising, where does that stand?
TKG: It’s still completely the Wild West here! There are really no such things as legitimate double opt-in lists, and even if a subscriber tries to opt out, they usually continue to receive e-mails anyway. Here, both buyers and sellers focus on list quantity, not quality, so convincing them that a focused list is better is very difficult. The largest Puerto Rican newspaper‘s site is actually attempting to build a decent e-mail list along with demographic data, but they’ve made signing up for their bulletins very difficult to find and user unfriendly.
HT: Is it worth all this aggravation?
TKG: Yes, this market is huge, once it breaks through a few barriers.
HT: Well, good luck and gracias!
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