US Hispanics, History and Growth of the Internet

There has been an incredibly fast evolution of the Internet from 1995 until the present time. As you can see in the graph below, Internet Users in the World has grown from 16 millions in Dec 2005 to 1,596 millions in Mar, 2009.

However, there’s an important distinction which is the language fabric composition of the Web content. What do we mean by this? Well, in the early ages of the Internet, almost everything was in English because most internet applications started in the United States. Therefore, in the early to mid 90s the search engines were in English as well. Anyone within the US or overseas conducting a Web search had to do it in English, there was no other option. As technology caught up around the world, the Web has become a multilingual platform and foreign Web growth has been astonishing. While in 1996, 75% of all Web searches were conducted in English, today English searches accounts for only 25%. Search engines and directories understood the importance of this non-English segment and today it is becoming easier and easier to find content in your mother tongue.

Reaching the entire spectrum of the US Hispanic community

As one article explains, U.S. Hispanic advertisers have historically lagged behind in moving their budgets online and therefore have provided less of an incentive for U.S. Hispanic publishers to post a wide variety of content online. However, this trend has shifted. Last year alone, the biggest Hispanic surge has been in internet media, up 36.3% in 2007 (according to the Hispanic Fact Pack 08). As a result, more Spanish-language sites/pages based in the U.S. are being optimized for search engines. US Hispanics will increasingly have more search options as Spanish Web content is being propagated over the Web. And since we know that people speaking the same language show an inclination to form their own online community no matter what country they happen to live in, it’s becoming almost imperative for many US businesses to make all or some of their Web content available in Spanish if they want to maximize their reach to the entire spectrum of the US Hispanic community.

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