Juan Tornoe

Is Dora the Explorer Turning into a Bratz Kid?

You be the judge:

  

Who's "maturing" next? Barney!?!?

Mamboing with the Walmart Moms

Saturday Evening I was invited by my friends at Mercury Mambo to a mixer they threw for Walmart's 11Moms. The guys from Bentonville, AR recruited these female bloggers, now actually up to 22 and growing, to share their valuable tips and idea on how to stretch their dollars. All but two of them were in Austin for this year's SXSW Interactive conference, courtesy of Walmart, and Mercury Mambo decided to show them some good ol' Texan hospitality. The two missing, by the way, one is about to give birth to her new baby at any moment, the other just had had hers :-)

I tell you, the Mambos showed the Moms a mighty fine Latino Texas time! Besides the Margaritas and great Mexican beer, there was Mambo-made, finger-licking good, Tex-Mex cuisine, and extremely cool screen printed t-shirts with in-house developed designs (I'm wearing mine right now!).

The Moms were awesome! Down to earth, high-tech, business-savvy, very – and I mean – very knowledgeable ladies. Had a blast chatting with them about blogging, Walmart, kids, and each of their areas of expertise. Walmart did an exceptional job at recruiting them. One thing I really apprecited about the whole program is that the Moms are not pushing Walmart products, they are sharing honest, straightforward advice on dollar-stretching issues; if that means putting down a product being sold in Walmart, so be it. Now THAT, is strong, reliable advice.

Their “11 Moms” stickers were awesome as well... great move!

I've been "Lonely-boyed"!

Some of you might have heard me talk about during one my seminars (If you haven't, what are you waiting for to book me???) about a term I coined myself, "Lonely Boying", which I've defined as reaching the Latino market through short, yet powerful, tidbits within your general market outreach efforts.

I've noticed some very wise marketers are jumping on the bandwagon... You are very welcome :-)

Having seen/heard/read multiple examples in varied media outlets, I was pleasantly surprised to see it on a website I use quite frequently and for which I have often questioned the effectiveness of the advertising placed on its pages: facebook.

In the midstof an all-English home page, there it sat, all by itself the poor thing, sticking out like a sore thumb, an ad in Spanish:

Yep, I immediately noticed it and saw it was in the language in which my mamá sang me all those children's lullabies not so long ago (Right... Who am I kidding!), and it just happens to be the same language I still speak at home every single day :-)

I saw it and reacted to it; well, sort of... I am sharing it with you, aren't I?

The point is IT WORKED! It grabbed my attention like no other ad on facebook has been able to do so since the day I joined the social network, which had been a while now. I was Lonely-boyed and I loved it!

See the power of the technique? Use is with caution... it is part of advertising's dinamyte; masterfully used it will work wonders, missuse it and it will blow up in your face.

Remember?

Tu que estás en alto cielo
hechame to bendición...

There's something NOT Hispanic about this...

 
Says the Latino guy with the DANISH last name... (me, for those slow to figure it out). Then again, what is Latino?

“If I were an aging white person”

Note from Juan: Usually I am not this insistent, but today I am compelled to urge you to read my friend Dave's article. It is a must read for anyone living in the United States today, especially for those with "issues" regarding the nation's increasing diversity.

March 3, 2009
By Dave Schechter
CNN Senior National Editor

“If I were an aging white person,” Ron Crouch begins provocatively, “I’d want to find some young black and Hispanic families and ask them how they’re doing because those young Hispanics and blacks will be taking my butt down the road” as they become the taxpayers and leaders of an increasingly multi-cultural America.

Continue reading Dave's post on CNN's AC360 Blog.

Knowing what you are good at and getting help from the experts on what you are not

A couple weeks ago I was all hyped up by the launching of my new project, the Hispanics in Austin Blog. I went ahead, maybe a bit prematurely now that I think of it, and shared it with the world. Here is a screen shot of it the day it went live:

Some of my good friends, those who don't think twice about being very - and I mean very - honest with me, congratulated me on the initiative, but flat out told me it's look and feel sucked. Ouch! They were talking about my baby... Still, they were right.

So I pleaded for help from my creative secret weapon, a person who shall remain unnamed for now, let's call him "Cabazorro". Just a couple hours after that El Cabazorro came back with the blog's new look:

I'm doing cartwheels (mentally at least) after admiring the 1000% improvement, when I hear from Cabazorro again telling me he's not fully satisfied with the banner's resolutions and that he'll be sending me a new one a bit later.

So, the lesson for us all, as mentioned on this post's title, get help from the professionals when you really want to get things right. I did... Do you?

Who's developing your Latino strategy? Let's talk about it.