Total Market should be called ……….

As many of you know, we have given considerable coverage to the issue of Total Market through our platform HispanicAd.com and our new platform Hispanic CMO.

We have let the voices of our industry, including those of decent; enjoy a platform for their views.

We have attended or worked closely with organizations and conference that have made an attempt at defining and understanding the need for a term like Total Market.

The more I read, listen and think, the more I am against the term Total Market.

I believe that the concept of Total Market, as much as I believe the term Multicultural is not good for our Industry.

When marketers were using the term Multicultural they put us all in one cozy bucket that they could manage and check their “I Do That” boxes.  Hispanic Marketing was 90% of the deliverables and ROI in the bucket.  We did not fight the categorization.

Here comes Total Market, another attempt at putting us in another bucket.  

Let’s define Total:

Adjective:
    1.    Comprising the whole number or amount.
    2.    Synonyms: entire, complete, whole, full, comprehensive, combined, aggregate, gross, overall, final “the total cost”, utter, absolute, thorough, out-and-out, outright, all-out, sheer, perfect, consummate, arrant, positive, rank, unmitigated, unqualified, unreserved, categorical “a total success”

Noun:
    1.    The whole number or amount of something.
    2.    Synonyms:  sum, sum total, grand total, agg

So it’s the TOTALITY of all consumers.  Right?

Who leads?  Who holds the flashlight in the dark tunnel of lack of knowledge?  Who has the real insight that produces ROI?

I do not think that Caucasian consumers are the same as Hispanic, Blacks, Asian consumers and/or any other cultural / linguistic group in this country.  

We have commonalities, but we have more that differentiates us.

Is there really a US mainstream?

This brings to mind two statements by Luis Miguel Messianu – CEO of Miami based ALMA, which he delivered this past Friday at the Versailles Breakfast Club in Miami.

“Reaching is not Selling”.

Regardless of the reach of a media platform, if the message is not relevant . . . nothing happens.  How simple and true.

I believe we all in the US Hispanic Market and mainstream advertising, marketing and media business can agree on this premise, then ……….

“The broader the insight the more generic.  The more generic, the more forgettable and less effective”.  

Once again, how simple and true.

Having to dilute an insight or to look for the most generic of insights to accommodate ALL consumers as the crux of your marketing plan to ensure that one agency handles all of the work, seems not a sound business opportunity that would generate enough ROI for consideration.

From a procurement standpoint cost reduction is very important, but top end sales trumps cost cutting any day.

What a legacy for a CMO: There were so many differences that offer opportunities to produce impactful ROI, but to make it work, we went with the most generic to ensure that we could launch the program and save money.

At the ANA Multicultural Conference last week in Miami Beach, Javier Delgado-Granados – Director of Marketing / Walmart Stores, Inc. and a CMO that was featured in Hispanic CMO stated “to be able to eliminate a “Multicultural Effort” (I hate the word but it works for me now) from any plan at Walmart, it was required to seek approval  or permission from upper managements of the company about the possibility of eliminating the effort from the plan”. 

This is a unique philosophy that demonstrates how to ingrained Multicultural marketing into the marketing culture of a very successful mainstream retailer.

Mis respetos.

Agreeing is not good business.  Why do we need to agree about Total Market?

We have done that in the US Hispanic advertising Industry on several occasion in the last two decades from a media and research standpoint that has changed the course of our industry, many say in the wrong direction.  

Having a unique selling attribute or a feature and benefit, that requires unique insights and platforms that deliver a consumer not available anywhere else seems to me to be an opportunity.  Generic marketing does not sell at the same levels of targeted marketing, especially when there are 56 Million consumers at stake and growing.

Some pundits state that we are making the art & science of targeting US Hispanic Consumers too complicated. 

Really?  It is complicated to produce ROI.  The targeting of US Hispanic is complicated if you want to produce ROI.

So to accommodate the Total Market push by mainstream agencies and those clients that have procurement issues or lack of knowledge, the wrong strategy is better than no strategy.  Really?

A couple more thoughts …….

The insight and creative agencies needs to fight to demonstrate that the correct insight sells product/services, the wrong insight kills your client’s plan and our Industry.  

“El Insight de la Tribu” is the unique selling proposition.

So I submit to the industry a new term that would replace Total Market with a more direct term that better defines the concept …… Generic Marketing.

Saludos,

Gene Bryan
CEO
HispanicAd.com
Hispanic CMO
Hispanic PR Pro