NEW YORK: Publishers in the US are increasing their focus on the historically under-served audience of female Latin American readers, rolling out a variety of bespoke media products.

The New York Times reports that firms including Hearst, Time Inc, Meredith, Fox and NBC Universal are all either launching or investing in vehicles that cater to Hispanic-American women.

Hearst is building in extra content to its Cosmopolitan brand, including a separate microsite within cosmopolitan.com for Latin content and an extra section in Cosmopolitan magazine.

The publisher is also launching an entirely new magazine, Cosmopolitan Latina, which will go on sale in states with large Hispanic populations in May 2012. The publication will compete with rival titles aimed at a similar audience, including Siempre Mujer, published by Meredith, and Time Inc's People en Español.

Healthy ad revenues for these magazines has encouraged investment, with Latina Magazine, published by Latina Media Ventures, enjoying a 13% year-on-year rise in ad revenues over the first nine months of 2011. People en Español was up 35% on the year, while Siempre Mujer enjoyed a boost of almost 50%.

According to latest Warc forecasts, adspend for the US magazine sector as a whole will decline by -1.9% in 2011.

More generally, advertisers have been shifting their focus towards multicultural marketing in the US over recent years.

This reflects demographic trends, with the 2010 US census revealing that Hispanic Americans represented 16.3% of the population, up 7.4% from 2000.

More broadly, data from the Association of National Advertisers, presented at its 2011 Multicultural Marketing & Diversity Conference, indicates that Hispanic buying power will increase 50%, from $1tr to $1.5tr, over the next five years.

But Bob Liodice, ANA President/CEO, told delegates that just 7% of the nation's $117bn annual marketing spend went on multicultural initiatives.

"That can't go on," he added. "We have to do better."

Data sourced from New York Times/Warc; additional content by Warc staff