It’s been four long years since the last world cup took place in Germany, when Italy beat France for the prestigious cup! This Friday the referee’s whistle will mark the beginning of the first world cup of this decade, hosted for the first time in the African continent. The 2010 FIFA World Cup will be in its 19th edition and it’s scheduled to take place between 11 June and 11 July 2010 in South Africa. Soccer mania is seen everywhere: outdoor advertising, print, radio, mobile and online, with media spends this year higher than any other year.

Some of the biggest soccer stars today like: Messi, Torres, Ronaldo, Kaka, Beckham and many others will take part on the world’s most-watched sporting event.

According to the 2006 FIFA World Cup^TM / Infront Sports & Media, billions of people watched the World cup, and a good chuck of it did so in 2006 via online, from which we can only speculate that those numbers will rise tremendously this year.

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As a follow-up to my last article titled: HISPANICS: The Majority Minority and Its Influence in Social Media, I would like to give a closer look at one of the Hispanic profiles I introduced as an example of influential Hispanic people in the digital space, and who has been able to recruit a solid fan base from the bottom up.  In an exclusive interview with Matt Reyes the founder of Twitteros, we will get a chance to learn more about his role as a successful Latino influencer in the online world.  Let’s begin!

Have you ever heard of Twitteros?

According to Matt Reyes, the term Twitteros is a Spanish adjective that means, “Twitter user”.

Matt is the founder of Twitteros, a social media community hub for Latinos that Twitter, based on the Ning platform that launched in late 2008.  The community hosts profiles, music, photos, blogs, forums, and other features.

As he explains: “The whole idea of Twitteros is to connect all Latinos that Twitter.  We have so much to say and so much to learn from each other, and this group will only connect us even more!”

In my 1:1 chat with Matt Reyes, he was very open to share with us more about Twitteros and his role as an influencer in the market, so influential that the 2010 US Census partnered with him and his social network to encourage Hispanics to be counted and share the importance of taking part in the act.

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As a friend pointed out to me recently, one of the subjects that is starting to get as much press as sports lately (Tiger Woods & Olympics aside) is the national Census, which will determine how rapidly has the U.S. Hispanic population grown in the last ten years, as according to the last census, Hispanics made up 15% of the total US population.

Currently there are over 46 million people of Hispanic origin or descent in the U.S., and is estimated that by the time 2010 census is completed this number will surpass the 50 million mark, making it the fastest growing and largest minority group in the United States.  This majority minority is quite evident in urban centers of various states like: Florida, New York, California, Texas and New Mexico; for instance, in Los Angeles County, Hispanics make up the largest ethnic group.

The growth on this minority is not only evident on its total numbers among the US population, but its online penetration and presence has also increased tremendously within the last decade.

According to eMarketer there are currently over 26 million Hispanics using the Internet everyday, and that number is growing just as fast as the total number of people within this minority, and by the end of 2012, it is estimated that there will be nearly 30 million Hispanics on the Web.

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