It’s no secret that the Hispanic population is growing in the U.S. and even less of a secret that marketers everywhere are looking to take advantage of it. Spanish-language marketing campaigns and ethnic product assortments are just some of the methods currently being utilized by major corporations, but these just scratch the surface. One major grocer came to McCombs Marketing Fellows with an interesting challenge – how does a marketer reach the large percentage of Hispanics that are bi-cultural? Questions for investigation included:
- What language do they prefer to be addressed in?
- What messaging styles are most compelling?
- What unique channels do they utilize?
- In what ways do they resemble a traditional Hispanic consumer and in which ways do have they adopted general market practices?
- How does new media fit into a targeted communication strategy?
My Fellows group was tasked with looking at these problems and offering recommendations. In addition to the secondary research we compiled, we were also able to execute surveys and in-store intercepts as part of our primary research. Below are some of the interesting notes from secondary research:
- Brand loyalty decreases with acculturation. Acculturated Hispanics are more likely to choose price over brand than the bicultural and unacculturated Hispanics.
- Preference for in-person shopping decreases with acculturation.
- Coupon use as an incentive for product trial increases with acculturation, possibly due to language mastery and fine print issues.
- Hispanics are considered early technology adopters and over-index in mobile phone usage.
- Celebrity Endorsements and Event Sponsorships are the most influential communication channels for Hispanics.
While I can’t share the remainder of our recommendations due to NDA restrictions, you can already see from the facts above why this segment is interesting to marketers. While they often resemble traditional Hispanics, there are key opportunities to target them via tweaks to channels and messaging that would be used in the general market.
