Anderson Marketing Blog

The Stats

The US Hispanic population continues to be the fastest-growing minority segment in the US. In 2014, there were 55.3 million Hispanics in the United States, accounting for just over 17% of the total US population. That’s about 15% of the total adult population and 22% of US millennials.

Hispanics tend to be younger than the general market and have larger families, a larger percentage was born in the digital age, and the share of adult Hispanics born outside of the US has been steadily declining (48.7% in 2014 vs. 55% in 2007). And lastly, Hispanics have a collective buying power of $1.2 trillion.

Their buying power alone makes them a lucrative marketing target, but before you rush to include this segment, you need to know more about it. How can you include them in your marketing efforts?

Here’s something you may not have thought about: Spanish is different in different Spanish-speaking countries. Don’t assume that because Hispanics speak Spanish, they all speak the same Spanish. Everyday words can have such different meanings within each Hispanic cultural sub-segment that, in the extreme, one group may respond positively while another may do so negatively to the same word.

As Robin Williams once said, “No matter what people tell you, words and ideas can change the world.” This sentiment is especially true in advertising. As any Creative Director will tell you: Every word matters when there is so little space and time to get a message across. And when advertising to Hispanics, one challenge is: Do you need original copywriting? Or is translating an effective option? What’s the difference? A copywriter writes copy. A translator translates words. Translating just the words may not be enough because it doesn’t always translate (pun intended) into good copy.

The thing that makes targeting Hispanic consumers a bit tricky is not that they are vastly different from other segments, it’s that sometimes the cultural nuances are hard to put into words. You often hear, “Hispanics consider family to be extremely important.” Well, that’s the case for all segments. But it’s how this sentiment is executed that defines whether advertising will work or not.