Brands Reach Out To Generation Ñ

Without a doubt, the Hispanic and Latino populations are the fastest-growing minority groups in the U.S. today. Brands looking to connect with and effectively market to young people who form a significant part of these cultures must step up to the challenge of understanding their youth.

An “In-Culture” marketing expert, reports that, “marketers who fail to attract Generation Ñ (10-19) today may have lost them [for] their adult spending years.” Some facts from the Urban Marketing Corporation of America:

- The current annual buying power of the U.S. Hispanic market is approximately $510 billion.

- Hispanics are the youngest population in the U.S. with a median age of 24.8 years (versus the overall U.S. median age of 34).

- Latino youth overwhelmingly favor English-language media over Spanish-language media. They spend nearly twice as many hours consuming television and radio programming in English than they do in Spanish and five times the hours reading English-language print media compared with Spanish-language print.

Two organizations that are making substantial efforts to reach this market are the Boy Scouts of America and Girl Scouts of the USA. The Boy Scouts will be focusing on the newly-formed Hispanic Initiatives program this year, and plan to hire more Latino staff, recruit more Spanish-speaking members, and allow easier access to Spanish-language materials, like the Manual del Wolf (Cub Scouts' Wolf Handbook). Grupo Gallegos was selected as the advertising agency to help increase awareness and recruit Latinas for the Girl Scouts.

In sports, ESPN Deportes was added to the lineup of channels available through a cable subscription service in Tampa, FL and FSN has pledged a yearlong diversity awareness campaign and will air a series of vignettes featuring inspirational Hispanic Americans.

Media giant MTV has MTV Latin America for Spanish speakers and MTV Tr3s for the "Spanglish" speakers. Coming soon on Tr3s, the Latina counterpart to "My Sweet Sixteen:" "Quiero Mis Quinces." Part of NBC Universal’s Telemundo Cable Networks, mun2 was created specifically for Latin-American youth and is available to more than 24 million households.

Some companies have simply gone straight to the source to find out what they need. Ford Motor Co. enlisted DeVry University undergraduate students to help come up with a marketing plan for its new Fiesta model geared towards young Hispanics. About 60% of the students enrolled in the class, Integrated Marketing Communications: Multicultural Markets, were Hispanic. If a whole class wasn’t enough, just ask blogger Lauren Fernandez. She gives her non-professional opinion and advice on how to market to this unique demographic.
Last, but not least, are the social networking sites focused on the Hispanic and Latino communities. Quepasa, MiGente, and vostu each allow users to customize a profile and connect with others.

About Gynae Davalos

Gynae is Ypulse's new Urban editor. She currently works with The Cipher Project in Austin. She's also been involved in Better Hip Hop Bureau Austin and is currently in training to be a Lonestar Rollergirl, which has a program for young girls called Austin Derby Brats.

Categorized under: Urban

You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. If you are a Facebook user, comment using your Facebook account.