strategy Archives - EMERGENT ELEMENT

Who is your future customer?

We experience disruption with new technology and industry changes. However, demographic and customer expectations are fundamental driving forces in challenging how things are done.

Demographic change is a good indicator of who your future customer could be. You can look at age composition, income, education. However, the ethnic composition of the future population is one factor that sometimes becomes an afterthought.

What makes demographic shifts so rewarding is that it brings innovation and growth opportunities that will impact society and the economy.

For instance, the US Census has projected that Latinos will reach 111 million by 2060, becoming 28% of the population. That means that soon it will be one in three people who could be a future customer. However, 70% of Latinos say brands don’t understand their culture, a 59% increase from a year ago, according to H Code.

Why does understanding their culture matter?

Because culture matters to tell authentic stories and to create remarkable experiences. People don’t care about you unless you care about them. They look at content through their personal lens of values, knowledge, experiences, attitudes, and beliefs. And if you cannot meet them where they are, cannot see their worldview, and provide a solution that fits them, you run the chance to become irrelevant.

The implication is that addressing a new population segment rarely fits the way you currently do things. It will require you to see things differently, look at your current capabilities, identify your key and future customers’ challenges, and deciding what you need to do to serve them.

Innovate, Don’t Force

Trying to force people to consume when they don’t want to is not a good growth strategy. Instead, innovate to remove the barriers to action.

Be wary of the mantra: If we build it, they will come.

Have you ever felt pushed or trying to be influenced to do something, and the more they insist, the more you resist or entirely ignore it? Your reaction could be for many reasons. Maybe you are not interested because you had more pressing problems, you are solving the issue in another way, or because it is not that important to you. Are you being seen?

As marketers, strategies, and designers, we have to learn to see. Learning to see involves empathy and respect for the people we seek to serve. Learn to see their dreams, desires, and the culture they belong to or want to be part of.

Our job is to help them get where they want to go next.

In our eagerness to solve a problem and go to market, we tend to ignore two crucial assumptions and four barriers that can derail us from helping the people we seek to serve.

The first mistake is to assume that someone that does not consume wants to consume. Maybe the people you are serving are not interested, or your offer does apply to them in their current circumstances. It is a nice have but not a priority for them.
The second mistake is assuming that people that don’t consume our product are not consuming any products. Maybe they have found a way to work around what they want to get done. Have you ever used a knife as a screwdriver?

Innovate and Remove Four barriers to Action:

A third mistake is not understanding the barriers to consumption. If they are interested in the offer and are using a way to a surrogate to help them, then the question is, why are they not consuming?

Skills:

Do they have the ability to do so?

Recently I was working with a non-profit organization that serves first-generation Latino parents. LEAF helps them understand how to navigate the US school system. Coaching and workshops were in-person meetings. And then, Covid changed everything. And we had to pivot to an online session. The interest was still there, but no one was signing up and showing up. Although parents knew how to use their smartphones, they didn’t know how to subscribe and access the online meeting platform. So, LEAF focused on educating parents on registering for workshops, seminars, and using the online meeting platform.

Access:

They have the desire, but is the product or service accessible?

In 1993, I was working in a startup marketing agency. Little Caesars Pizza was losing market share to its competitors. The franchisee group approached us to help them with the Hispanic consumer. Hispanics love to eat pizza, and first-generation Latinos ate pizza as a celebration and a get-together party. But the celebratory occasion needed to happen at a seating down restaurant. And Little Caesars has no chairs or tables. It is a food pick up parlor. We needed to help Latinos change their perspective that a celebration could take place anywhere, and Littel Ceasar could be with them.

Wealth:

Do people have the financial assets to be able to afford the services?

Part of Latino students learning to navigate the US school system is taking the SAT and ACT, but how can they do that when parents have limited resources and are concern about more pressing things? LEAF partnered with the SAT Board to provide vouchers to low-income Latino parents enabling young students to take the test.

Time:

Is it too cumbersome or time-consuming?

During the H1N1 crisis, we worked to increase vaccination among Latinos and African Americans. The population at risk was ambivalent about getting vaccinated and didn’t have the time to go to a determined place when they work two jobs and needed to take care of the family. Thus, we brought the vaccine to them. We set at a tent in a convenient community location and partnered with a pharmacy to provide the vaccines.

If the people you serve have a desire for your offering and are non-consuming, don’t try to persuade them. Work on removing the consumption barriers. Don’t force, innovate.

You Can’t Change Minds Without Winning Hearts

Will pushing harder do the trick?

As a kid, I hated eating meat. The harder my mother pushed me to eat, the harder I resisted. As a result, I stayed seating at the table for two to three hours after everyone was gone. I couldn’t stand up until I finished my plate. Luckily, I had a German Sheppard that will save me from the pain of chewing one more bite.

The assumption is that pushing harder will do the trick. However, the approach often backfires. When someone pushes, the other person pushes back. They push back to keep doing what they are doing, in my case, avoiding chewing meat.

My mom’s objective to influence, convince, and reason with me had a good intention – eat your food to stay healthy. However, it mostly focused on her desired outcome, finish your food. She was so focused on her own goals that she pushes and pushed, forgetting to understand why I was not eating.

Seek to understand to create a meaningful connection

Inciting action and changing minds starts with empathy. Understand the fears, uncertainties, and desires are (FUD) of the people you want to serve. In other words, learn what drives them and what is blocking them. The insight will help lower the barriers to action and build trust.

79% of consumers said that brands have to demonstrate that ‘they understand and care about me’ before they are going to consider purchasing.’ – Wunderman study

I didn’t eat meat because it was difficult to cut and chew. It was a fight between me and the stake. Besides, I was a slow eater, and that made me feel worst. All my family had to wait for me to end eating before they could get up. That usually took about fifteen minutes, except the days we had a stake in the menu. Those days, they will get up ten minutes after they finished. I stayed until my plate was empty.

It wasn’t until she understood this that she changed how the steak was cooked and served. Maybe that’s why I love “Lomo Saltado” so much. After the change, I enjoyed dinner and finished with the rest of the family, which made me feel great.

Help them advance where they want to go.

People like to be in control of their choice and actions. Telling people what to do does not help. On the contrary, it falls with resistance and deaf ears. That’s what happened when we worked on the Zika campaign in Puerto Rico.

The Zika virus was an emergency campaign and an immediate threat to unborn babies. We hit the ground running, telling pregnant mothers and their partners what to do. However, we had not considered that Puerto Rico is an island, that living with mosquitos is part of everyday life, and mosquito-borne disease was nothing new to them. Our audience knew what to do. They have heard the same preventing behavior campaign since they were kids. They received the message with hesitation and anger. Thus, they were tuning out.

Moms and pregnant women wanted a healthy baby. However, they were overwhelmed with all that was going in Puerto Rico and how that affected their lives. What moms need to hear was a reminder to do these activities and not feel like a “bad” person for not doing them. We learned that two out of the four preventing behaviors were not doable.

With these insights, we designed social and traditional media stories that reminded them about two preventing behaviors they can do each day, like brushing your teeth each morning. We placed ads on venues that will trigger reminders such as on top of mosquito repellent shelves, cinema, and restaurant bathrooms. Results were outstanding, intent to “Use Insect Repellant” increased 39%, and repellent sales increased 15% from the previous year.

You can’t change minds without winning hearts. Winning hearts requires listening, building trust, and creating a meaningful connection. Understand the people you want to serve, gain insight that helps lower the barriers to action and, helps them get where they want to go.

Cultural Marketing is understanding the tribe

All Marketing is Cultural

All marketing is cultural. People you want to serve belongs to a community and a tribe or tribes. A tribe that reflect who they are or aspire to be. The story they tell themselves.

Culture is what people do, what they believe, what they value, and how they conform to a peer’s group, which informs their worldview. And in turn influences the behavior they choose, the status they seek, and how their actions fit the tribe. What they do is influenced more by who they are than what you say. People like us do things like this.

People don’t know what you know, don’t care what you care for, and don’t seek what you seek. Their experiences are not your experiences. And that is ok because it is not about you, it is about them.

All marketing is cultural. Cultural marketing is understanding the human connection; it is finding out how the people you want to serve to see their world; it is creating a story that resonates, fits into it, and helps them move forward.

Is There a Blind Spot in Your Marketing Strategy?

If you have not considered marketing to Latinos, you might be missing a growth opportunity. The Latino consumer market is the fastest-growing segment in America with spending power to the tune of $1.7 trillion—the equivalent of capturing a share of the Canadian or Mexican economy.

Currently, Latinos account for 1 in 5 Americans and soon will constitute 1 in 3 of the U.S. population. Moreover, more than half of the U.S. Hispanic population is under the age of 29. Additionally, 25% of Generation Z, (3 to-23 years old) the largest generation group in the U.S., is Hispanic.

Latinos are well-connected and a powerful social force. They communicate more frequently with family, friends, and colleagues than non-Hispanics. According to the Keller Fay Group, compared to other ethnic groups, Latinos talk 20 times more about brands and are 5 times more likely to share shopping recommendations according to CivicScience. This means outreach to Hispanics can boost your marketing investment. Specifically, an earned media multiplier effect—brand awareness and peer influence—can result in an increased ROI.

If you are developing a Latino marketing campaign, let’s take a look at three potential blind spots:

Engaging Latino

Strategy goes nowhere unless it starts with the customer. John Sculley in his book Moonshot, advises the reader to put the customer at the center of abusiness concept. This is especially relevant with a diverse audience. You wouldn’t market to customers in a different country the same way you would market to the typical U.S. consumer, would you? The Latino community is no different.

Culture matters to tell authentic stories and to create remarkable experiences. We have to recognize that not everyone is the same. Customers look at content through their personal lens of values, knowledge, experiences, attitudes, and beliefs.

Designing relevant marketing, communications and experiences mean creating messages and moments that your audience can identify with and say, “They are speaking to me,” “This is for me,” or “I can see myself.” In other words, strive for cultural affinity. Why? Because Latino consumers will pay more attention, trust the brand more, and will be more likely to take action.

This means looking at each segment of the Latino population and considering their living context, values, aspirations, needs, motivations, and challenges, to design programs that achieve cultural affinity and relevancy. According to the Nielsen TV Brand EffectSurvey, advertising and programs that have cultural affinity are more impactful, as general population advertising doesn’t always resonate with Hispanic audiences.

English vs.Spanish-Language.

Think differently. It is not about English or Spanish. It is about language plus culture, context, and content. Language depends on the Latino audience segment and their language of comfort.

The Nielsen study found that Spanish-language ads perform better than English-language ads among Hispanic adults in terms of ad type, brand, and message memorability. These ads perform more than twice as well in likability. However, this does not mean doing a literal translation from English to Spanish.

It is frequently believed that English is the default language for bilingual Hispanics. However, Univision found this is one of the largest misperceptions. Bilingual Latinos speak in the language that is most appropriate to what they’re doing. For example, when looking at online videos, 74% of third-generation bilingual Latinos consume videos in Spanish.

On the other hand, younger Latinos are more comfortable speaking and consuming content in English. However, younger Latinos are watching more Spanish-language videos on streaming platforms like Netflix and YouTube, and actively seeking out and enjoying content tailored to them as Latinos. According to eMarketer,73% of third-generation Hispanics said they consume online videos “that speak to their Hispanic/Latino heritage.” Why? Because retaining their culture is very important to them.

Language matters but is just one part of the equation. This underscores the need for brands to connect with Hispanics in a culturally relevant way. Just because Hispanics are consuming content in English, it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t incorporate Spanish into marketing campaigns, or because Latinos prefer speaking in Spanish you should do a direct translation into Spanish.

Building Online with Offline Experiences.

Customer trust is based on consumers sharing their experiences with other consumers online and offline. Word-of-mouth is the leading influencer of consumer purchase decisions in the U.S. Notably, TV, radio, print, digital media, and offline events have a strong role to play in influencing word-of-mouth purchasing decisions.

Latinos are very active on social media, sharing posts and comments on issues specific to their communities and culture. Online and offline experiences give them an opportunity to build a relationship with the brand and ammunition to talk about it. Over 68% of Hispanic brand mentions referenced some form of online or offline marketing, compared to 60% of non-Hispanics.

The Keller Fay Group study found that Hispanics are not only more likely to engage in word-of-mouth than the general public, but also more likely to pass along the information they hear to others. What’s better than learning about a product or service from people you know and trust?

Remember, emotions drive people to action and people tend to conform to what others are doing. So igniting an emotion and making content more observable makes it easier to talk, share, and take action when the content and experience are culturally relevant.

Should Hispanic be marketed as General Market?

One of the key issues marketers are struggling with is the cultural tension between general and Hispanic marketing strategies to reach and engage Hispanic customers so they can grow, make profit and/or make a social impact. And with limited resources cultural marketing strategies might become an afterthought or the team would default to just translate the general market strategy for the Hispanic customer.

But, not all consumers are created equal. So, if two customer segments are different, why shortchange your growth potential by marketing Hispanic customers as general market?

Here are a few ideas on how you can diffuse cultural marketing tension:

Cultural Insight Drives Strategy and Strategy Drives Impact

Consumers are not isolated entities. Past experiences and social interaction dictates the outcomes of their behavior. Cultural insight will help you develop solutions and create an original narrative storyline that evokes emotions. Emotions that are relatable and familiar with your audience’s real-world experiences, which might be different from each customer segment you want to reach.

Developing relevant products and creating an emotional connection starts on the front end with understanding your customer’s pain points, the progress a customer is trying to make in a given situation, and knowing their emotional drivers to prove that you get them.

When Natural Valley wanted to reach the Hispanic market, they asked, “How do we tell the Natural Valley story to Latinos?” The answer in the general market was: hiking to the top of the mountain or kayaking on rapid waters. Adventure stories of how nature was conquered. However, when Casanova Pendrill, asked the question, they uncovered that to Latinos the parks served as their natural adventure and that all natural ingredients get you into the nature lifestyle.

Emotionally Connected Customers are More Valuable

Emotional drivers vary by customer segment and product category. Customers who form an emotional attachment to a brand are 52% more valuable than those who are just highly satisfied, according to a Harvard Business Review article by Scott Magids.

But, gathering demographic facts about a customer and implementing general market strategies or translations won’t capture what really motivates Hispanic customers to take action. Think of it this way: You can know a person’s age, height, and family size, but that won’t tell you why she bought a camera today. Maybe she needs to feel that she belong —a reason no amount of demographic data will reveal.

When Little Cesar’s Pizza wanted to reach Latinos in California’s Central Valley, we found out that eating pizza for first generation Latinos meant going to a seat down restaurant to celebrate with family and friends. The experience gave them a sense of accomplishment. It was not a utilitarian transaction to ease the day and cook a meal. Thus, Little Cesar’s Pizza needed to change the customer behavior and idea that eating at restaurant is the only way to celebrate special occasions.

Being Relevant Is About Helping Your Customers Tell Their Story With Your Brand

Helping your customers tell their story is about understanding how your brand enables your customer tell who they are. It requires exploring your consumers cultural and social context to learn how they feel and how to capture the unseen cultural subtleties. By understanding how they feel, think, say, and do about life, you will get a better understanding how your product or idea might fit into your customers lives, helping you become relevant.

When we worked on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Zika campaign in Puerto Rico, we learned that living with mosquitos is part of their daily life and that mosquito-born desease campaigns were nothing new to them. Thus, the new campaign was rapidly falling into depth ears. Like a new song played too many times, goes into a background noise. So we asked how does mosquito preventing measures fit into their daily life? And we uncovered that what we needed to do was not telling what to do instead reminding them that preventing measures are part of their daily routing to enjoy the things they like to do, such drinking coffee with friends, going to the beach, and watching movies.

Given the enormous opportunity to capture the Hispanic market and create value, companies should diffuse the cultural tension between marketing to Hispanic consumers as general market. It will be harder to make an emotional connection that inspire action if you don’t develop a Hispanic strategy based on cultural insight.

You can begin to lessen general versus Hispanic marketing strategy tension by developing a strategy with cultual insights, uncovering emotional drivers, and helping your customers tell their story with your brand.

Strategy: Uncover Inspiration

Thanksgiving reminds to be grateful for all the good things we have and the abundance in our lives. It also reminds us about 3 reflecting questions for 2019.

After the dinner is over and guests are leaving, we start planning what to do with the leftovers – preparing guests’ take home plates, what to keep, what to throwaway, and different dishes for the coming days.

In a similar manner, we can ask 3 strategic questions to prepare for 2019:

What to keep or what to continue doing
What to get rid off or what to stop doing
What to do different

As important as feeling grateful, it is also important to lay out the groundwork to fuel opportunities in 2019. Take December to reflect on this past year and think how you will make 2019 a remarkable and impactful one.

3 Horrible Mistakes You’re Making with Latino Marketing

If your growth plans includes tapping into the Latino market, you’re probably taking into some consideration how to implement your plans for a positive ROI. These can range from using internal staff, translating English campaigns to Spanish or hiring a subject matter expert or an agency. All these are viable options to look at. Regardless of what option you choose to go with, three tactics that you should consider carefully are:

Audience:

The Latino market is growing and changing. Now you have different segments with different cultural values going from traditional to non-traditional with shades of grey in between. Treating everyone equally will not resonate and capture their attention.

What can you do? Segment your audience by cultural orientation and focus on aspirational values to engage and develop messages. Remember that one message does not fit all.

Mobile:

“Hispanic consumers see mobile technology as critical to support their mobile lifestyle”- Price Water Coopers

Latinos are mobile mavens and are using smartphones to engage with brands on a deeper level. They are more socially connected with friends and family according to the latest report from univison.com. They are actively seeking out deals and making purchases – all day long on their smartphones. Look at some of the numbers from Google, Univision and eMarketer research:

81% of Hispanic mobile subscribers own a smartphone.
80% more likely than their non-Hispanic counterparts to actually purchase the products they see advertised on their mobile devices.
20% more likely to download and 18% more likely to video stream than non-Latinos.
68% of the respondents who search at least monthly do so on their mobile devices to find the information they need.
11+ hours each month watching digital video.
39% more time watching video on their smartphones each month vs. total population.

What can you do? Think mobile first, then create content that is engaging, easy to consume, and helps your audience move towards their aspiration and intentions. Remember that Latino generations differ on the digital channel purpose and how they are used.

Influence:

Latinos want to hear from people like them.

Culturally, Latinos are well connected in their personal lives on and offline with influential networks of friends and family. The power of word of mouth is an influence driver to their purchase decision.

According to Keller Fay Group, Hispanics are talking about 20 more brands per week than non-Hispanics. Further, Univision reports that 79% of online Latinos have a presence on social media sites and they share 5 times more often than non-Hispanics via social media. What is more interesting is that 35% of the content they share is more likely to be clicked on by others.

What can you do? Develop a communication program that sparks conversations on and offline with content that is sharable. This can involve working with influencers to share your content or create user generated content that supports your brand, implementing a twitter chat, Google hangout or on the ground event.

Whatever option you choose to implent to grow with the Latino market, start with understanding your audience, thinking mobile first, and answering the following questions- What do you want others to say about your brand? What are you doing to promote conversation around your brand?

Hispanic conversations are essential to brand preference.

Word of mouth marketing drives 13% of consumer sales and amplifies the effect of paid media by 15% according to the Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA). What is not a surprise is the fact that Hispanic consumers are leading in brand word of mouth (WOM) conversations. Hispanics are social by nature and by culture. For Hispanics, it’s about the “we” and not the “I”. Connecting with friends and family is a way to keep up with brands and current events, according to a recent study by Latina Media Ventures.

Hispanics place a really high value on the community. Connecting to stay in touch, to be in the know, and to share stories is an extension of that value. The conversation sometimes referred to as “el chisme” takes place over the phone, via text, online, or in-person among family, friends and the rest of the social network.

Why is this important?

Hispanics turn to family and friends for information and make decisions as a group. According to SMG Multicultural, 57% said family and friends are the primary sources of information, while 60% are influenced by their partners and 50% from their children when making decisions. This correlates with a WOMMA study of English- and Spanish-speaking Hispanics that found that Spanish-speaking Hispanics word of mouth is highly actionable. It is likely to contain a buy or try recommendation, be passed along, or lead to purchase.

Every day in the U.S. Hispanics generate 483 million brand impression via WOM and 241.5 million come are from Hispanic millennials ages 18 to 34 according to Keller Fay Group. Looking at in another way, 21% of the 2.3 billion WOM impression each day are from Hispanic conversations. According to WOMMA study, Hispanics engage in 110 brand conversations per week vs. 72 for the total public – 53% more word of mouth than the total public. In addition, Spanish-speaking Hispanic consumers amplify advertising more in brand conversations than the total public (40% vs 25%). That is a significant opportunity if you consider the following:

Conversations increases marketing effectiveness up to 54%, and a 10% increase in conversations resulted in a sales lift of up to 1.5% according to marketing-analytics expert MarketShare.
Hispanics will constitute 119 million people or 28.6% of the U.S. population by 2060 and will have $1.7 trillion buying power by 2017 according to Statista.
Spanish-dominant are talking about 30-40 more brands per week than non-Hispanics
Hispanic millennials are engaging in nearly 20% more WOM than their non-Hispanic millennial counterparts.

How do you ignite the conversation?

Give them something to talk about: Find your brand purpose and tell your story. Latinos support brands that support community causes, help them drive their aspirations, provide a great experience, and become part of their community. Marketers should ask:

How does my product/brand fit into my audience’s life?
How is it helping them accomplish their goals?

Think mobile: Hispanic consumers are not only the fastest-growing demographic in the U.S., but they’re also trendsetters in digital, leading the growth in device ownership and online usage. According to Nielsen, nearly three out of four Hispanics (72%) already owned smartphones, 95% of Hispanic smartphone owners used social sites and apps, and make up a growing share of mobile shoppers accounting for one in eight U.S. consumers who use their smartphones and tablets to shop.

Engage offline: Offline events give you a great opportunity to create an experience, get Latinos together, and ignite a conversation that can be amplified online. Think passion points – music, sports, food, movies, and community. According to WOMMA, the offline worth of mouth had a more significant impact on buying outcomes than social media.

Next time you are thinking about capture the hearts and minds of the Latino consumer, ask what would I like them to say about me.

Social Context: Key to Latino Marketing

Marketing communication plans are crucial to reaching potential Latino consumers and a well-planned advertising/promotions campaign could result in positive ROI. However, marketing to Latinos should go beyond marketing communications. The marketing plan should look at all moments of truths, from products to services, to be designed, created or adapted for cultural relevancy and social context experience.

From a marketing perspective, it makes a big difference whether Latinos are new immigrants or more acculturated and whether they in live in more established areas such as Los Angeles or high-growing Latino markets such as Baltimore. Their marketing maturity, media consumption, and purchasing patterns differ considerably

Although Latinos in general share the same cultural values—community orientation, authority, religion, respect, and family— these values vary from country to country and within a county between rural and urban centers. These values are passed from generation to generation but are weakening as the younger Latino generations are integrated into mainstream America.

Furthermore, the social context and ethnic networks where Latino live influence the adaptation of new values, beliefs, attitudes, feelings, and needs regarding different products and services. External factors, such as geographic region, immigrant acceptance, and labor markets increase the reliance on personal networks and brand loyalty.

Latinos are a collective culture – a culture that likes to share and engage with immediate family, extended family, friends and business and brands. Each product or service experience builds credibility, trust and loyalty towards the company or brand. If the experience is positive, the brand or product becomes an integral part of their lives. On the other hand, if it is negative, it becomes a topic to share among family and friends.

Therefore, a company that takes into consideration all these different factors understanding the differences in values and beliefs between new immigrants and more acculturated Latinos, their social context, and engagement preferences provides a window of how to better develop communications, products and service experiences to reach this diverse community.