INTERNATIONAL & MULTICULTURAL ISSUE - Odwyerpr.com

FEATUREThe why, how and what of multicultural marketingThe terms “multicultural marketing” and “marketplace diversity”strike fear in the hearts of many marketing managers. Their fear iswell founded: these professionals may have been wildly successfulat targeting mainstream customers but are now facing anincreasingly diverse body of consumers and have little experienceto serve them.By Anne M. BrumbaughThe fact is, professionals shouldn’tconsider multicultural segmentationand marketing because it’s the feelgood-flavor-of-the-dayor the “right thingto do.” There are many reasons why it’sgoing to be good for your bottom line.Why multicultural marketing?The 2010 census projects that whitenon-Hispanic Americans will become aminority majority (i.e., plurality) by 2042.I predict this will occur closer to 2035 asmore people intermarry, have children,travel and work here and abroad, andchoose to identify with more than one ethnoracialgroup on the census and otherpolls. Some white non-Hispanics seem tobe on the edge of panic that this day willbe some cultural Armageddon. My advice:embrace it, or at least get over it. If youdon’t, your customer base will shrink.Ethnoracial minority groups that have,for one reason or another, fallen into thelower tail of the socioeconomic distributionare making great strides. Not onlywill there be more consumers of diversebackgrounds, but they will have moremoney. They will not be buying theupscale homes and fancy sports cars withextra piles of money that wealthy whitenon-Hispanic Americans (allegedly) have,but they will be buying more and buyingbetter than they ever have in the past. Andthey will remember companies that targetedthem with respectful, value-addedofferings on the way up.Multicultural marketing is where yourcompetition is going. Both nature andbusiness abhor a vacuum, and underservedmarkets will not remain underserved forlong. If you don’t get with the programand learn how to target diverse consumers,your competition will. It may not be yourbiggest, closest competitor, but rather asmall shop that’s willing to end run youbut good with a little extra effort, creativity,and heart. The customers are there andthe money is there. Go for them beforesomeone else does.White non-Hispanic consumers willremain the largest ethnoracial group evenafter becoming a “minority.” The thing is,some of them will be gaining an appreciationfor the range of ideas, assortment ofgoods and services, and spice of life that amore diverse America brings to them, andthey will want to patronize firms thatembrace that. Multicultural marketing iswhere the mainstream mindset is going.Terms like the “New Mainstream,”“Cultural Creatives,” and “DiversitySeekers” reflect an evolving ethos amongcurrent majority white non-Hispanic consumerswho value diversity in their lives.Companies that don’t update their appealsto be more inclusive toward everyone maylose these folks as well.Here’s a piece of wisdom fromEconomics and Marketing 101: if all yourconsumers are the same, seeking the samesource of value for the same reasons, youcan’t differentiate and you end up playinga price game in a commodity market. Onthe other hand, the more diverse your consumersare, the more opportunity you haveto differentiate — do more, do different,and do better than your competition in theeyes of your consumers. Unfortunately,it’s going to take more money, moreknowledge, and more effort than it has inthe past, but if misery loves company, atleast everyone’s in the same boat. If youcan figure out how a particular consumersegment is different, cater to that point ofdifference, and then deliver on it, you’regoing to thrive in this new, multiculturalmarketplace.How to implement multicultural marketingOnce you’ve come to the realization thatyou need to consider multicultural marketing— targeting different consumer segmentson the basis of ethnic, racial, orother cultural group membership — youneed to figure out how to get ready to doit. If you want to do a mediocre job, simplyread an oversimplified demographicprofile of your target group on the Internet,reinforce marketing stereotypes that mayor may not hold true for the group, replacea few white characters in your ads withmembers of that group, and translatedirectly your existing communicationsinto their languageOn the other hand, if you want to knowhow to do a really good job — one thatresonates with your subcultural target andhas a positive ROI — you need to do a littlebackground work first.As members of the dominant culture,we white Anglos have a difficult timeknowing if, when, and how the beliefs,values, and behaviors of other culturalgroups differ from ours. We may erroneouslyassume that members of anotherculture behave just like we do, or that theybehave completely differently from howwe do. Successful multicultural marketingstarts by checking both types of assumptionsat the door. Research, particularlyqualitative, is absolutely essential forunderstanding the consumer beliefs about,motivations toward, uses of, and propensityfor different product categories andbrands among diverse cultural segments ofwhich we are not members. Assume nothing,research everything.Learn the culture of your target. Readthe literature of your target — be sure toinclude a biography or two, fiction, andnon-fiction of different historical periods.Take a history, sociology, or anthropologycourse to learn the culture’s ethos — whatmakes its people tick. Identify what popularmedia your target consumes (televisionshows, online content, magazines,radio, news, etc.) and consume them yourselfto learn what the current issues withinthe community are. You’re doing all thisnot to learn how to market to them per se,but rather to understand their values andbeliefs.Marketing to diverse consumersrequires a diversity of thought, and you getthis diversity of thought from havingdiverse employees. That doesn’t necessarilymean that if you would like to targetsubcultural segments X, Y, and Z, youhave to have employees from subculturalsegments X, Y, and Z (though it doesn’thurt). It does mean, however, that youhave to have different types of people inyour firm with a diversity of experiencesand backgrounds so that they can questionassumptions, tap into a broad network ofconnections and resources that a narrowemployee base might not have, and generatebetter ideas than a homogenous groupcould.There is substantial heterogeneity withinany segment, and failure to acknowledgeit could be disastrous. UnderstandContinued on next page28JUNE 2011 WWW.ODWYERPR.COM