Elusive Sweet Spot of Hispanic Marketing.

With billions of advertising dollars at stake, Azafrán Advertising, the Hispanic marketing division of Lopito, Ileana & Howie, Puerto Rico’s largest ad agency, announced the identification of what they believe is the elusive sweet spot™ of Hispanic advertising—the Hispanic Fusion™ segment. The discovery of the true driving force of the powerful Hispanic consumer demographic has the potential to not only transform the $4-billion Hispanic advertising industry but also to end once and for all some of the most persistent stereotypes and misperceptions about the make-up of the nation’s largest ethnic minority

Pointing to a wealth of market research, Jaime Fortuño, Managing Partner of Azafrán Advertising, and Alicia de Armas, Account Management Director, show that the majority of the country’s 41.3 million Hispanics are neither recent immigrants nor wholly assimilated individuals—as traditional advertising campaigns would indicate. Rather, they are a highly acculturated—not assimilated—group that, despite commanding $600 billion in buying power, have attracted little attention from Madison Avenue.

“Most advertising directed toward Hispanics assumes there are only two ways to address the population and speaks to them either as recently arrived Mexican immigrants or as individuals so assimilated that they are indistinguishable from the mainstream,” said Fortuño. “While these groups are certainly part of the population, they are not its defining force as they comprise only about 40 percent of the population and follow many of the trends set by the vast majority, which we call the Hispanic Fusion™ segment.”

As defined by Fortuño and de Armas, the Hispanic Fusion™ segment is a highly diverse group encompassing recently arrived immigrants from a variety of countries as well as second, third generation, and native Hispanic-Americans. Despite their diversity, they share many points of cohesion. This includes a high enough level of comfort with the mainstream to succeed at all levels of contemporary U.S. society while maintaining a clear identification with their cultural heritage; a great level of comfort with their bilingualism; a shared sense of optimism and belief in the American Dream; a focus on the here and now; and a commitment to building a bridge to the mainstream instead of an alien nation within the nation.

“We call the Hispanic Fusion™ segment the “silent majority” because they make up the majority of the population at this point but, judging by the prevalence of ads targeting unacculturated immigrants, their voices have not been heard by the marketing community,” said De Armas. “The Fusion segment doesn’t respond to the traditional Hispanic marketing tactic of referencing the homeland or the journey to the United States. Their belief is that ‘If I am here building and living my American Dream, why would I respond to communications focusing on my immigration nightmare?’”

Instead, according to Fortuño and De Armas, marketers must adopt a new set of strategies that better reflect the differences and commonalities of this highly diverse and highly powerful consumer group. For example, Hispanic Fusion™ marketing, as opposed to traditional Hispanic marketing, would focus on roots rather than language because the individuals comprising the target audience may speak English, Spanish or Spanglish, but they all live Latin.

For marketers and advertisers aiming to strike the right chord with Hispanic consumers, the consequences of a misstep grow greater each and every day. Hispanic-focused advertising is already a $4-billion-a-year industry and growing fast. As greater numbers of companies become focused on courting this influential consumer segment the competition will grow fierce. Only those marketers with a deep and thorough understanding of the complexity and diversity of the demographic will succeed.