Redondo Beach, CA May 28, 2008 -- A new Hispanic Event Planning Online Directory was launched this week to serve meeting and event planners with a major focus on small businesses and the Hispanic market. LatinoSpeakersBureau.com unites unseen and overlooked vendors that are valuable to Meeting & Event Planners who need diversity resources and search online while preparing corporate workshops, conventions, sales meetings, trade shows or galas and fundraisers.

Latino Speakers Bureau founder, Leonor McCall-Rodriguez, built the website directory based on the needs of event and meeting professionals with listings of keynote speakers, meeting locations and a wider variety of resources in a one-stop-shop online tool geared to showcase not only Hispanic motivational and business speakers, but a broader offering of women and minority-owned small businesses.

"After 6 years of work with the Speakers Bureau, we met many business owners who were not connecting with event planners and meeting professionals, so we did the same thing we did with the Bureau: we created our own online solution", said McCall-Rodriguez, whose career spans the U.S. and Latin America with marketing and business development projects, including several Fortune 100 companies.

In this industry, she tackled the challenge of Hispanic speaking professionals to increase visibility, because they tend to operate as sole proprietorships or small businesses and compete against large scale general market bureaus. Visibility is critical in a market where speakers must highlight their programs, resumes and seminars in different languages before potential corporate, government, conference and non-profit event planners. Today, the Latino Speakers Bureau group boasts multiple sites and includes successful Latinos who travel the world with their best sellers and keynotes. Among them are Joachim de Posada, Dr. Jo Ann Pina, Jimmy Cabrera, Victor Antonio Gonzalez, Simon Silva, Maria Marin and Manny Medrano.

With the new LatinoSpeakersBureau.com, other small businesses and professionals such as photographers, lawyers, chefs, producers, emcees, comedians amd musicians will be part of the online directory. The new portal includes an event calendar, articles, and a Classifieds section, sure to grow as minority businesses build their ads for the event and meeting industry. It is also expected to attract corporate advertisers who offer travel, production services and event locations.

The category that stands out as a cultural twist on this site is Weddings & Quinceañeras, that will showcase professionals, locations and services related to these life events, including culturally relevant seminars from Hispanic professionals for them. "We see wedding planners as well as event planners across the U.S. finding a home online at LatinoSpeakersBureau.com", the founder explained.

The site will also showcase many non-profits that reach out to the Latino Speakers Bureau, including those that provide Spanish assisted services for the community across the U.S..

"This is just one more tool for integrating Hispanic businesses with the mainstream market. And when you see a market need, you can wait for the market to solve it, or jump in and blaze your own solution. We've found that the latter is much faster and more fun," concluded McCall-Rodriguez.

Latino Speakers Bureau is a division of Mira Promo Inc., California Corporation serving the Hispanic market since 2002, with Hispanic market and multicultural business development solutions. Latino Speakers Bureau is a trademark of Mira Promo Inc.