A Tiny Humble Geo That Loves Crypto Way Too Much: El Salvador
Which country’s population is most disposed to cryptocurrency? El Salvador is hardly the first answer that comes to your mind. But it is. And in 2021 Salvador was the first geo to approve bitcoin as a legal currency. The policy of the entire state is aimed at introducing crypto into the economy, which in itself sparks interest.
Mix it with the poor education system and underdeveloped online advertising. Do not stir. Get perfect geo for crypto traffic in the end.
Sure, El Salvador is exotic and it would be right to take a deeper look at it before testing tools and directing traffic. And that’s precisely what we’re going to tackle in this article.
El Salvador: First look
The population is a bit over 6.5 million people, with a relatively large skew towards females (52.5%). This is because men usually leave to work in more developed neighboring countries. But still, the population is growing steadily due to the high birth rate.
Also, note that there is a real understanding of gender equality in this country, especially compared to other states in the region.
About 4 million people, 62% of the population, go online every day. This is a fairly low share of Internet users compared to more developed countries, but the figure is taken as an average for the country. In cities, more than 90% are connected to the Internet, and in villages, less than 50%.
So when you’re working on those targeting settings, better select major cities such as:
- San Salvador (capital). 239, 000;
- San Miguel. 267, 000;
- Santa Ana. 247, 000;
- Santa Tecla. 163, 000;
- Mejicanos. 147, 000;
- Ahuachapan. 132, 000.
Wired Internet connection is provided by the monopoly company Claro. 5 Mbps will cost $25, and 30 Mbps $60 per month. Considering the average income, this is very expensive, especially for this type of speed.
But things are better with the mobile Internet. The average speed is close to landline Internet and almost reaches 20 Mbps. The prices are more adequate, but there are restrictions on the amount of traffic.
Not everyone is going to watch videos, which, although quickly downloaded, can eat up a lot of paid traffic. So when you’re thinking about creatives, better come up with something static. As for websites, you’re free to use any add-ons you need to boost conversion.
This approach will give you both the ad views, and a nice landing page load speed; the right choice of elements will increase CR, and people won’t notice large consumption of traffic.
All in all, it’s better to focus on mobile devices and optimize sites for smartphone screens.
City residents, on average, earn $400-800 per month. Prices in this country can hardly be called ‘low’, so people are very interested in getting extra profits. Given that cryptocurrency is already a part of their lives (you can even pay back loans in bitcoins), the promise of making people rich through crypto won’t seem wild to them at all.
You can use the government’s strategy. Play around creating the national Chivo wallet, purchase millions of dollars worth of BTC, a trust fund that guarantees automatic conversion of bitcoin into dollars, or open access to cryptocurrency exchanges. El Salvador is also now developing a project to build a mining farm powered by electricity from geothermal sources.
On average, a city resident finishes only 7 grades, which indicates a poor educational level, including financial. This means you can use aggressive approaches and promises of gold mines opened with a minimum deposit.
The most popular social networks and messengers:
- Facebook;
- Instagram;
- TikTok;
- SnapChat;
- Twitter;
- YouTube;
- Twitch.
Best traffic sources:
- Facebook;
- Teasers;
- Native Ads;
- Google Ads.
The language is Spanish. The majority of the population is mixed race. There are very few whites, native Indians, and even fewer blacks.
Internet ads in El Salvador are poorly developed. Roughly 20% of advertising budgets go to offline media, such as billboards. The vast majority of the rest goes on television, media, and even radio advertising. That’s why you can go ahead and use approaches people got sick of in other countries.
So, according to all those factors, El Salvador is the ideal geo for crypto traffic.
El Salvador: The people
We cannot say people trust their politicians here, in El Salvador. But given the authorities’ attitude to crypto, it would be very appropriate to use them in your creatives. But some influencers occupy other areas, and you can safely make creatives with those people. Here’s a short list:
Nayib Armando Bukele Ortez. The president who made bitcoin legal.
Gabriela Rodríguez de Bukele. The First Lady.
Patricia de Arzú. Politician.
Carlos Calleja. Politician and businessman.
Alfredo Cristiani. Economist and politician, former President.
Rodolfo Zelaya. Football player.
Additional details
Just a bit of useful data that might come in handy for your creatives.
Popular banks:
- Banco Agricola;
- Banco Azul;
- Banco Cuscatlan;
- Banco HSBC;
- Banco Promerica.
Major Internet media:
- Elsalvador.com;
- Diario Co Latino;
- La Prensa Gráfica;
- ElFaro.net;
- Grupo Megavision.
Maximum support of bitcoin at the level of the state, poor education system, the wish for a better life, Internet ads people don’t see as being ‘used and abused’ — this is a specific set of factors that make El Salvador an ideal country for crypto traffic.