AN INTERVIEW WITH:
Roberto Ramos
President and CEO, The Vox Collective
By: eMarketer’s Tobi Elkin
eMarketer: When targeting Hispanics, are you focused more on traditional segmentation models or on psychographic/behavioral segmentations?
Roberto Ramos: It’s more about looking at lifestyle and culture, which transcends language. It’s really about the values and drivers that come from the culture, whether it is the sense of family, traditions or the fun style and flair that comes with Latino culture.
In terms of the most recent census, a lot of the growth is coming from the second and third generation, meaning the US-born Latinos. With that comes a different attitude and energy. They’re basking in this mainstream appeal.
They’re reading about themselves and the impact they’re having on the census and on corporate America.
The attitude around it is really best summarized by the premise of living in two worlds. This bicultural Latino is fully conversant and often more comfortable in English, but still tapping into Latin culture and their Latin roots through music, food and style.
“This bicultural Latino is fully conversant and often more comfortable in English, but still tapping into Latin culture and their Latin roots through music, food and style.”
eMarketer: What do you advise about targeting Hispanic millennials?
Ramos: They’re living in both cultures and expressing themselves through music, food and style. The millennial market is Latino ages 13 to 24. That’s where a lot of the growth is. The Latino demographic itself is 10 years younger than the general market. It’s also a multigenerational dynamic. Culturally,
Latinos live at home longer. Often, recent Latino immigrants live together for economic reasons.
The youthful component in Latin culture is incredibly strong. When it comes to fashion, they overindex in the juniors apparel category, for example.
eMarketer: Does this generation want to be trendsetters and influencers among their peer groups and in their family?
Ramos: That’s consistent with everything we’ve seen. There are a couple of drivers that lead to that. First and foremost, it is a younger group to begin with.
They live in trendsetting markets such as New York, Miami, Houston, Chicago and LA. While there’s been triple-digit growth in non-traditional Hispanic DMAs, meaning smaller cities, and some states that you would not expect, it’s still pretty much an urban phenomenon.
It’s a very creative culture with a big focus on music. Music is one of those elements where we see that cross retro-acculturation, in which they’re going back to their roots. They’re still confident and assertive in their roles as
Americans, and more so as trendsetting/influencer Latino-Americans, they’re sharing their culture with their peers, hence the crossover appeal that’s taking place.
eMarketer: Can you explain what you mean by retro-acculturation?
Ramos: Retro-acculturation is the point at which you go back to your roots. It used to happen later in life, in your 30s and 40s, when you were starting a family; the feeling of wanting to focus on your cultural upbringing.
Ten, 20 years ago, the Latino market was not perceived of as hip. But now, and especially with the census and in the past couple of years, there’s greater visibility around it. We see a greater source of pride in the culture, and a lot of the new media enables it. Online, Latinos are finding self-expression and connecting with others like themselves and creating platforms where cultural expression can be amplified.
“We see a greater source of pride in the culture, and a lot of the new media enables it.”
The growth in the market is coming from those Latinos who were born here.
Let’s not forget that their parents came to the US to provide a better future for their kids. So anything that speaks to empowerment—whether it is focused on education, self-expression, scholarships or the cultural energy—is important to them.
eMarketer: Do you see any language-dominance issues?
Ramos: Traditionally, Hispanic media has been thought of as being Spanish language media. But now we’re seeing a rise in bilingual and English-language media targeting Latinos. So you have channels like MTV’s Tr3s and a new channel that launched recently called nuvoTV. You have a lot of radio stations that speak to this consumer, too.
eMarketer: How do you explain Hispanics’ higher engagement with mobile and social media?
Ramos: It’s a culture that’s very expressive. From that insight, we see that a high degree of communication is ingrained in the culture. They are looking for the best tools to stay connected. The youthful skew amplifies that. When we look at that first generation, it’s still the bulk of the market. You want to be associated with the next big trend and that’s part of the immigrant mindset. You want to show off in a good way, to some degree, but also provide your kids with the best things.
eMarketer: Is acculturation an important issue when targeting Hispanics?
Ramos: It’s definitely a variable. We always want to look at the highest number of people, or the top clusters, from a population perspective before we start segmenting and slicing it into smaller buckets. Acculturation measures the receptivity of a specific group to something in the culture, meaning they have some connection to that culture.
So acculturation is good in the sense that if you’re doing a Hispanic-themed effort, you want to make sure you’re speaking to the people who will respond to the music, the colors, flavors, the story and the energy—whether it’s in English or Spanish.
And there are certain lessons that can be gleaned: A new arrival will be more dependent on Spanish, so that will impact media vs. a more assimilated or bicultural audience where you’ll have to speak to them in both languages. But across the board in these clusters we find a strong common denominator, which is the pride in Latino culture. So it’s about adding that cultural component against whatever lifestyle segmentation comes in.
eMarketer: The latest census shows that growing numbers of Hispanics are living in smaller metropolitan areas. How does a marketer approach geotargeting?
Ramos: The ideal is to have a well-balanced marketing mix, where you have the big national media—broadcast TV—driving that big message, introducing the brand. But you also want to be closing the sale at a local level. This is where local nuances are critical, where countries of origin and language preferences start kicking in. It’s where you have to identify markets that are Spanish dominant vs. more established, bilingual or assimilated markets.
“The ideal is to have a well-balanced marketing mix, where you have the big national media— broadcast TV—driving that big message, introducing the brand. But you also want to be closing the sale at a local level.”
From a geo-targeting perspective, you have very unique opportunities. For instance, direct mail performs incredibly well with the Hispanic market, often because the postal service in Latin America didn’t deliver, so they get here and they’re not as jaded. And we’ve seen that across the board with our clients like Vonage, where the response rates are higher.
eMarketer: So if you’re a marketer looking at the latest census figures and seeing how Hispanics are fanning out to secondary and tertiary markets, what should you be trying to do?
Ramos: If the budgets allow for it, I would try to leverage first-mover advantage types of opportunities. As we look at the market projections for Latinos in these communities, we see considerable growth in those markets going forward. So the upside is very strong.
eMarketer: How important is the country of origin in targeting Hispanic consumers?
Ramos: It’s more important in certain product categories than in others. For instance, when you’re looking at food, Mexican vs. Caribbean preferences are different. The impact of country of origin will always be stronger with the less assimilated. But as we see the growth coming from those Latinos who are born here, the focus will be more on the US/Latino identity.
With the younger Latinos, there’s still a strong sense of their nationality. When they go away to college, they might realize they were living in high-density
Hispanic neighborhoods and now they’re a minority or an emerging minority, so they come together more.
eMarketer: Are there some generalizations that can be made about this population?
Ramos: First and foremost, it is a younger market and that shapes the thinking in terms of the energy that you apply to a campaign. That also impacts certain product categories. Latinos overindex in technology, lifestyle, fashion and entertainment. It’s why on any given weekend, you can have as much as 30% of a film’s box office gross coming from Latinos. In states like Texas and California, nine out of every 10 kids born are Latino. That’s a huge opportunity from a fashion, retailer and an entertainment perspective. I think it’s just making bilingualism more natural—the way Dora the Explorer has done.
“Latinos overindex in technology, lifestyle, fashion and entertainment. It’s why on any given weekend, you can have as much as 30% of a film’s box office gross coming from Latinos.”
While Latinos continue to be strong in urban areas, the impact is also being felt in Middle America. When you see the Hispanic population increases in states like Iowa, Indiana and Washington, there is an opportunity to cater to them and online vehicles are tools for doing that.
eMarketer: What are common mistakes marketers make when targeting Hispanics?
Ramos: It’s happening less today, because there’s a greater degree of sophistication and rigor based on the size of the opportunity. But the segmentation task can confuse marketers and nearly paralyze them. When they hear about all the different nationalities, they fear how much versioning needs to be done on their campaigns.
Before, there was a little bit of the fear of culture. Now marketers realize that culture has to be the platform. You’re selling through the heart. That layer will provide the point of entry to talk about product differentiators, pricing, unique product positioning and all these different things.
