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Too many companies do not effectively target growing ethnic and immigrant markets within the U.S.
Too many companies do not effectively target growing ethnic and immigrant markets within the United States, and are missing a major opportunity as a result.
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3 Comments On: Selling to Many Cultures — Within the U.S.
A well thought-out well-argued article. Being the owner of a multicultural consultancy, I agree with all the points made by the two authors. While the larger U.S. corporations are investing in marketing to Hispanic Americans, not enough are mining the business potential with Asian Americans who comprise a market segment of superlatives: the most affluent, the best educated, the most technology-oriented, etc.
Selling to Multicultural with in the US
This update is an interesting article for all companies to read considering the demographic changes occurring in the US. Too often a group like Hispanics and Asians are lumped into one segment. However that is a mistake most companies make when thinking of these groups. For example Puerto Ricans and Mexican both speak Spanish but are so different in terms of their status and opportunities in the US. These characteristics also impact their buying and purchasing power.
As someone who has worked in the MULTICULTURAL and DIVERSITY fields for over 20 years, I have seen where the power of Employee Network Groups can and do assist companies who know how to take advantage of their intellectual capital that these groups bring to their corporations. These groups often represent the ethnic markets that companies need to target in a more precise manner. I would also add that in order to do this right you need to have flexibility organizing the groups. Putting all Asians in one group proved to be a disaster in one company because of the vast differences that existed among these subgroups. Companies need to recognize these differences among their employees and allow them to bring what they know to the work place and use this to better understand their customers. Still given the numerous high Tech, PHARMACEUTICAL, and CONSUMER PACKAGING firms that I have worked with, I have also seen some “ENGS” that should have combined ethnic subgroups since their numbers in terms of staff were not that large to begin with and having a sufficient share of voice is important. Finally, one point that is missing from the article is my observation of some firms that start such Multicultural initiatives, only to drop it a few months later when there is a change in leadership.
If you need advice RE: such matter, feel free to contact me.
Edwin Martinez
610-630-1339
tatytoo@aol.com
This is an area that 2 countries in South East Asia has been doing particularly well. Their population since the birth of the nation has been multiracial and multi cultural. Hence marketers have had to disect and focus their marketing plans on several niche areas that pertain the uniquness of the population. Oh, btw, the two countries I mention above are Malaysia and Singapore.