A study focused in the usage of social networks in Latin America conducted by comScore found that 85% of Brazilian internet users over 15 years old (that have connected from work or home) have visited social networking websites.

The year to year growth is a significant 9% when compared to September 2007, when  the figure was 76%.

With this study Brasil is positioned as the second country in terms of social networks popularity, Canada being first.

Within other Latin American countries, figures are rather impressive. With for example Chile and Colombia reaching 80%.

In terms of the players, Orkut (owned by Google) seems to be the leader in the region. With its visitor numbers  almost five times higher than the others, it’s interesting how the Latin American social networking landscape differs so greatly from the US and Europe. Livra conducted a study last year whith similar results.

Livra and Social Networks

In Livra we are still strong believers of the impact that social networks are having in the way that we recruit and engage online panelists.  Earlier this year we launched our own social surveys website and we are currently working on different ways to interact with some of the leading social networks in the region. The results so far are great, check out the activity in one of the user generated surveys in Livra Brasil:

Which is your favourite cell phone brand?

The one question survey had over 1,200 completes and over 160 user comments.

Fortunately nobody in the region is studying the impact social networks are having in people’s productivity, it can’t be good

For more info on the comScore study:

Eighty Five Percent of Brazilian Internet Users Visited a Social Networking Site in September 2008 [WSJ’s MarketWatch]

In Livra we believe that having a good time is very important and that through having a good time we can improve the way we work together. At Livra, we traditionally do two annual events. One around mid year and one near Christmas. These events have the following objectives:

• Get to know each other more
• Learn more about Livra and what other people in the team are doing
• Understand where we are as a company and what are the objectives for the future
• Have fun

As part of our culture we always try to find events that are a bit different. In the last year we have gone go-karting, done some karaoke, paintball and bowling among others.

In 2006, we started a tradition that is now integral part of the Livra culture: Every end of year we celebrate the Livra Games (2006, 2007), which basically consists in taking the whole team to a farm in the outskirts of Buenos Aires to spend a day competing in a variety of activities (from Wii Sports, to RC car races to human sized foosball) and closing with an award ceremony, dinner and a party. Livra Games is the conclusion of the year and it’s a perfect blend of competition, team work and fun. We love it.

This year, we inaugurated what we hope will become another great Livra tradition: The Livra Campfire.

Livra Campfire is also celebrated in the outskirts of Buenos Aires, and we also compete divided in teams. But this time the battle develops in the world of ideas. Yes, the main event is a Pecha Kucha Night, where all teams receive the same topic and a jury chooses the best presentation.

What is Pecha Kucha?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pecha_Kucha

To summarize, Pecha Kucha (deriving from a Japonese word meaning “chit chat”, is a presentation format in which ideas are organized within 20 slides that can only last 20 seconds. Each slide can only contain images and the speaker must develop his ideas within that frame.

The topic was simple: Had to be about anything related to Livra and the personal passions of each of the team members.

The results where outstanding. We witnessed an incredible display of imagination, originality, passion and dedication. All the presentations were excellent.

There was however only one winning team. Their presentation was a fun “Pecha Kucha” about  office etiquette in Livra. The winners were awarded with a free lunch in a restaurant of choice near the office. Also a latest generation iPod was given to one of the team members.

The event finished with a great Argentine barbacue and what gave name to the event… a great Campfire where we shared some good music and got to know each other a lot better, as someone said… “What happens in Livra Campfire stays in Livra Campfire”.

More photos here:
Livra Campfire 2008 Photos

According to this Knowledge@Wharton article workers and professionals in Latin America are finally overcoming the connectivity gap that had always kept them behind.

The article cites an IDC study showing that 64% of entrepreneurs and independent professionals who use computers in the region are either “hyper-connected” or “more and more connected to the Internet” when they do their jobs. This is higher than in Asia/Pacific (59%), Europe (50%) and the United States (44%).

The old “reasons” for this lag are starting to vanish, these are:

Price barrier

Until recently, Internet service providers were charging an unusually high price for Internet, mobile and other digital services.

Although not totally over (an Iphone 3G with an 18 month contract costs over U$ 600 in Argentina), services are now getting more affordable in the region.

Lack of training

A generalised lack of confidence on technology and poor availability of devices and services meant that the “over 40 year old” generation haven’t been able to grasp computer use.

Language

Over 90% of the information available on the Internet is in English, content in Spanish  and other languages however is growing rapidly.

You can find the whole article here:

LATIN AMERICA: Workers Overcome the Connectivity Gap [IBL]

eMarketer has released a new study that shows the growth US Hispanic Internet users had since last year. The study also projects that by 2012 there will be nearly 30 million.

Something interesting about the US Hispanic population is that, as the article reminds, it is not a homogeneous market. Latinos in the US are spread throughout different states and cities, some speak English and some don’t. And there are various degrees of acculturation, assimilation and income.

It is also important to understand that, as in Latin America, Latinos in the US come from a variety of countries and heritages that do not often share the same costumes, language and habits.

From an online research perspective, it may be the case that the way to approach hispanics in the US may be analog to the way we approach different Latin American respondents - Differently

The full article here:

The US Hispanic Online Populations [eMarketer]

As you now probably heard, Livra Panels has been acquired by Ipsos. Ipsos is the leading market research agency in Latin America and we are very flattered to have been chosen by them.

We have worked for 8 years to build (what we believe is) a fantastic company. We managed to recruit exceptional people, disrupt a whole industry and pioneer in online market research in the region. When we started selling online research in Latin America, there was no one. Just Livra.

Latin America in general is ruled by informal, substandard customer service and quality. But we wouldn’t settle for that. Instead of being “the best we could” we decided to be “just the best”. We didn’t benchmark from the locals. We benchmarked from the best companies in the world, through trial and error we managed to achieve world class quality and service.

But most importantly, we were able to get surrounded by an “above average” group of individuals that helped us achieved our vision… to become the leaders in our thing. But we didn’t settle for this.

So what now?

Well, we had been thinking about partnering with a larger company for a while. It was not our idea, people just started approaching us. Not one, not two, but several. That’s when we realised that we did really have something special. Something that was not easy to replicate. We had discussions with several other companies, some of which we highly respect and learnt a lot from.

And then came along Ipsos, a company that we didn’t know much. We were just aware of how big and successful they were in Latin America. And we slowly started to know them. It was a company founded by ambitious entrepreneurs. It was a company which started with very little but managed to get all the way up to being the best in what they do. Just like us.

But then we met some of them and we found them to be exceptional, incredibly professional people. People who were not boasting about their accomplishments, but mostly flattering about our little achievement. People who were open to share their insight and most importantly willing to listen to our ideas and vision about the future of this industry.

They “didn’t have us at hello” like in the movie. They worked their way into us. And did it very well.

They understood from the beginning that to make Livra truly great and global they needed to respect our culture, independence and “weird ways“. Livra will remain a specialized independent unit within Ipsos. We will keep doing what we do. Only better, faster and with more determination than ever.

We will continue to go out of our way in order to please our clients. That’s exactly what keeps us going, and it always will.

Thank you for holding our hand all the way through childhood. It’s time to become mature, but keeping that child inside. And that’s a good thing.

Thank you!

Diego Meller  & Martín Añazco

We just announced the launch of our new recruitment websites, the new Livra.com.

The new website is a major overhaul from the previous version of Livra in a variety of ways. The most important features are the following:

• Users can connect with friends and follow their activity (for example if they wrote reviews on products, or completed surveys)
• We let people create their own mini surveys, but in a very fun way. These surveys can be embedded in any website or blog.

• User can write and read product reviews as before, but now they can also add their own products to review them.

Why is this so important?

We believe that an online panel should be “a lot more” than a collection of e-mail addresses and building an interactive community of consumers that interact with each other and actually enjoy being part of it is the way to go. With this new platform people can get familiar with the idea of “opinions” and “reviews” and “online surveys” a lot easier, they can even create surveys themselves and send it to friends. They can be part of something that is a lot more entertaining.

The industry is also very aware of declining e-mail response rates and we have to find alternative ways to get in touch with our users. It’s no secret that social networking is the current trend on the Internet, and tapping into this seems to be the way to go.

Although still experimental, the new website is a major milestone for Livra:

• The website is available in 14 countries and three languages
• Including English and Spanish for the US
• It took an incredible amount of time and effort (we started working on the new platform over a year ago, code name was “Cereza”, which means “Cherry” in Spanish).
• The platform is built in a way that we can grow and scale it in size and features rather easily from now on. So this is just the beginning.

After almost two months of private beta we can say that so far the results have been fantastic. People are finding the site entertaining and easy to use  and the viral aspect of it is starting to work.

You can check out the site here:

http://www.livra.com

The launch press release here:

http://www.livrapanels.com/en/press11.htm

And some photos of our internal launch party here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/livra/sets/72157605461355307/

comScore has released their usual web rankings for the April 2008 period.

Brazil is still at the top with 19.3 Million users, Mexico and Argentina follow.

Here is the full chart:

The report gives a very complete picture of the Internet landscape in the region. Usage per country, top websites and other data.

Check the press release here:

comScore Releases Top Latin America Web Rankings for April 2008 [Comscore]

A Research Live article reveals the results of a study about online virtual worlds used for research. The study was conducted by Gartner. In an interview, the author of the study gives some interesting points, here are some excerpts:

“If there is a community in a virtual world that is targeted, then fine,” he says. “Otherwise you probably have a very unrepresentative sample of customers out there. You also have to understand that in a virtual world you’re dealing not so much with the customer as with the persona they’ve created.”

“The report paints a sad picture of the hundreds of corporate attempts to get into virtual worlds, claiming that such projects almost always fail within the first 18 months.”

“He also warns that the users of virtual worlds are not always the ripe targets that marketers expect – with a “black hole” between the pre-teens and the gamers in their mid to late 20s”

About time someone discredits this ridiculous trend. We have been talking about it for quite some time now. Since this post, we saw at least three or four more presentations on “Second Life” during Market Research conferences. It is sad that market researchers and clients have been so badly misguided about the “wonders” of online virtual worlds.

The article is here:

Virtual Worlds Not Ready for Resarch [Research Live]

A report from eMarketer indicates that Hispanics in the US are heaviest media users. Citing a variety of sources (Terra, ComScore, Burson-Marsteller, Experian Simmons) the following findings are disclosed :

•  In February 2008 the average Hispanic-American over the age of 11 spent more time online than watching television.

•  Every day, more than half (56%) of Hispanic-Americans surveyed said they spent at least an hour online, which was slightly more than the 50% who spent an hour or more watching TV.

•  More Hispanic-American Internet users spent 13 or more hours online (30%) than watched TV for the same amount of time (23%).

•  Hispanic-Americans ages 12 to 34 were on the Internet more than those 35 and older, who tended to spend more time watching TV than online.

• Three-quarters of respondents multitasked, saying they always or very frequently used the Internet and TV together.

• Of those, 44% e-mailed or instant messaged about the shows they were watching and 40% researched products being advertised on TV.

• Although Hispanic-American Internet usage is greater than that of the general US population, the group is still under-represented online, especially in broadband access.

 The article can be found here:

Hispanic-Americans Are Heaviest Media Users [eMarketer]

As part of the upcoming ESOMAR conference in Mexico, we placed an ad on April’s issue of research world which will be given out in the conference. This is a little preview of the ad:

Hope you like it!