SEM in Spain and Latin America. Google? Yahoo? Local Search Engines?

[jggretton]

Hello all, this is my first time on Search Engine Watch, and I've been enjoying reading through the debates on various seo/sem issues!

I'm about to start a Natural and PPC campaign for a Swiss company targeting users in Spain and across Latin America. In the past I've only targeted UK and US audiences so have focussed all my efforts on Google.

I'm now interested to know if there are better Search Engines to target for Spanish (and potentially Portuguese) speaking users in Spain and across Latin America.

Note: there are some old forum posts on this topic, but they seem quite out of date. Any up to date information would be greatly appreciated.

Many thanks,

James

[AussieWebmaster]

Obviously Google makes it easier... but you should break into campaigns by country so you can limit the traffic and see the differences with the language.

The countries within South America as much as SA and Spain itself have different expressions and use of language that can dramatically impact your CTR etc.

Yahoo International is a good source of Latin traffic as they used to be Terrespondo before Yahoo bought them so the traffic is tight and has a great Latin management team.

I know people you can contact on the Yahoo International side that would help set up accounts etc. They are very helpful. Email me if you need the contact info.

[AussieWebmaster]

Portuguese is the same... but here you would be mainly targeting Brazil which has the highest online shoppers of any country in SA.

[AussieWebmaster]

Depending on product or service - Miva which has ESpotting is good for European traffic in Spanish and Portuguese.

[jggretton]

Thanks AussieWebmaster that's really useful and I may well email you for the Yahoo International team if that's ok.

I'm very interested in the natural search as well. Does anyone know any rough user numbers for Google Vs Yahoo in these regions. Obviously my area was extremely general so any specific country information would help. ie Google.es compared to Yahoo.es?

[gugo]

Hi. I am Chilean but living in Germany doing SEM. I have done PPC in Chile, Argentina and Spain. Not only on the set up but meeting the local people.

I have to say that for Spain and Latin America the better parter to do PPC is.. Google.

Watch the numbers here(usually I give 3 sources but now i didnt found more)
http://domainsmagazine.com/Domains_18/Domain_3834.shtml
http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/004091.html
http://congreso.ojobuscador.com/2007...a/nielsenn.pdf


On the next issue. Language variations, be careful.

One example is very good. E.G "I will take my bag."
Take = coger in Spain.

In spanish for Spain: "cogere mi maleta"

But in Argentina, the word "coger" means "have sex"... so no more comments on how the same word can be dangerous when not well employed.

You have to use local synonyms, to have a good CTR as Aussie said and to mean the right thing.

If you have more questions, just PM.

GUGO

[danay]

I definitely agree with Gugo. Google has given us a ton of traffic versus Yahoo in Latam. I expected otherwise. However, with US Hispanic traffic. Yahoo seems to be stronger thanks to the Telemundo partnership.

[danay]

Any updates on this? Yahoo just moved their Latam ops to Miami, down the street from me (how convenient!). What is your experience with Yahoo Latam advertising?

[AussieWebmaster]

It is the old Terespondo... very solid leads