Search Marketing In Latin America?

Every year, I go visit at least one of the major international search markets. Since my specialty is in global SEO/SEM it would not be very credible for me to claim to be an expert on marketing to a country I've never even been to, would it?

Actually, there are a depressing number of companies that do exactly this - sell one-page "international" pages for sites, typically poorly translated, and then "submit" them to the local Google (ie Google.co.uk, etc). This is a scam.

First, you don't need to submit to Google - any version. Second, one page of content is highly unlikely to bring in any traffic to speak of, unless it's desperation or long tail traffic. Finally, the whole concept is wrong. If you are not willing to invest more than one page for an entire market, then you have more problems with your marketing plan than SEO.

Anyway, although I have offices in Mexico, Brasil and Argentina, they are through a contract firm and I've honestly never been there or met the staff. So I'm going. As someone formally trained in anthropology, I'm a huge believer in the value of "field work" and "being there". Now we get to the reason I'm bothering to tell you all this:

If YOU were going on an SEM-related trip to South/Latin America - what would you be interested in learning? Where would you go? What would you do? I'll be happy to share what I learn with you, if you want to give me some guidance as to what you want to know.

I'm thinking of going in the fall, on advice from some friends in Argentina regarding the weather. Since I only have about a week or so, I need to be very focused. Here is a (very) rough idea of what I'm interested in seeing/doing:

Countries to visit: Mexico and Brasil. Argentina if I can, but it's iffy this trip, given the time constraints. Just so you know, the top 3 are (in order): Brasil, Mexico, then Argentina.

Search Companies to Meet with (if possible): Yahoo. Anyone else?

Questions to be Answered: What is the real search market share in these countries? What are the scams that need to be avoided? What tactics seem to work the best?

If you can think of anything else, let me know, and I'll find out for you :)

Ian

PS: No, I'm not spelling "Brazil" wrong - the locals call it "Brasil".