This post was originally written for AdAge
One way we might judge this year’s Super Bowl ads is by how much they reflect a total-market view of the world.
I am not talking about ethnic casting, or ethnic spokespeople, but rather the presence of cultural cues. These are subtle suggestions that ethnic values or habits — primarily Hispanic, since that is the most powerful multicultural influence in the country right now — are being assimilated into mainstream media. Read more…
Post originally written for The Huffington Post’s Latino Voices
Fifty years ago Maria’s “problem” was a would-be nun who wanted to marry a widower and become the mother of his five children. Today in the United States the problem is that the Von Trapp kids would more than likely be fatherless, and more and more Maria’s are having children without getting married.
The out-of-wedlock birth rate for Hispanic women in the U.S. reached over 53 percent of new births in 2010, according to the National Vital Statistics Report on Births: Preliminary Data for 2010. With Hispanic birth rates wildly outpacing the national average, this issue merits serious consideration given that out-of-wedlock births all too often go hand in hand with poverty, low educational attainment and propensity toward incarceration. Read more…
Added Value Cheskin’s Intercultural lead, Stephen Palacios, writes for ANA Magazine, exploring the challenges – and benefits – of a “Total Market” strategy.
“Is [NFL running back] Reggie Bush my African American strategy, or just my strategy?” asked the CMO of a Fortune 100 company in response to a question on ethnic marketing. Having a dynamic sports hero as a spokesperson was intended to appeal to broadly to all consumers. The fact that he appeals more deeply to African Americans was a plus, making Bush both “efficient” and engaging. Read more…
Post-election analysis is in full force and the prominent role of the overwhelmingly pro-Obama Hispanic vote is front and center. From hues and cries (Bill O’Reilly) to demographic tut-tutting (Juan Williams’ “Obama’s Daunting Demographic Message for the GOP”), pundits and columnists alike are opining on how Republicans have “lost the country,” or at least marginalized their chances for national governance by alienating Hispanics. The core issue? Immigration reform.
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Marketers Split Over the Value of Ethnic-Inclusive — But It’s Just the Beginning.
The most important development in multicultural marketing is the notion of the “total market” – shifting from targeting particular ethnic consumers to strategies that will appeal to a multicultural nation. This past week, we saw how the concept is still in its gestation stage, causing both confusion and potentially earth-shattering shifts. Read more…
We have a new oxymoron that has entered our popular culture vocabulary. Recent front page news announcements in many leading newspapers reported the first ever demographic shift of non-white births outpacing white births, which has created a “minority-majority” youth population. This oxymoron has come into common parlance, as accepted as George Carlin’s famous “jumbo shrimp.”
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Developments in social science, global trends and demographics all reinforce the significant benefits of bilingual education. Despite that, American schools show a steady decline in language programs. How can this be?
First, let’s look at the conditions for bilingualism. There have always been benefits to being able to speak more than one language; recent studies show the depth of those benefits: “Being bilingual, it turns out, makes you smarter. It can have a profound effect on your brain, improving cognitive skills not related to language and even shielding against dementia in old age.” Read more…
Stephen Palacios writes for AdAge: We’re at a Tipping Point in the Battle of Effectiveness vs. Efficiency:– In just one week, in very different work settings, Walmart Stores, Kellogg’s, AT&T, Wells Fargo, General Mills and Target were in focus.
The topic? How each is wrestling with new marketing models that try to balance the “total market” vs. ethnic-specific initiatives. “Total market” is defined as an appreciation that the general market has dramatically shifted, and is now defined in large part by ethnic consumers. Read more…
Cheskin Added Value’s Stephen Palacios blogs for AdAge:
At the fictional Sterling Cooper ad agency in “Mad Men,” Pete Campbell urges a client to “take a look at the Negro market.” In the TV show the year is 1961. It’s a reminder that the push to understand and target consumers on the basis of their ethnic identity goes back decades.
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Cheskin Added Value’s Stephen Palacios writes for The Huffington Post’s Latino Voices: - Let’s consider unintended consequences and the growing Hispanic market: Laws and regulations that start out with the very best intentions for Hispanics may now actually be impeding their progress. Take for example, a recent meeting I was in with a major financial services company. I was with a group of execs going through a presentation of market data, competitor reviews and overall Hispanic consumer category attitudes and usage behavior. At the end of the meeting, one exec came up to me and said “we have the same problem as I had in my last company, it’s hard to make the business case with CRA regulations limiting our ability to measure the market”. What did he mean?
Read more…
This post was originally written for AdAge
