It has been 10 years since the ANA Multicultural Conference was launched. James Speros, SVP, CMO of Fidelity Investments, highlighted how important the multicultural market has become during the panel “The Multicultural Marketing Journey: Milestone and Opportunities." The panel initiated Day 1 at the 2008 ANA Multicultural Marketing Conference in Boca Raton, Florida.
Speros highlighted that 95 million Black, Hispanic and Asian consumers living in the U.S equal the 12th most populous country in the world. As a reflection of how much the Hispanic market has grown, Speros noted that in 1998 the circulation of People en espanol was 200,000 while in 2008 the publication reaches more than 6 million people.
Speros later told Portada that the main issues facing the Multicultural Advertising and Marketing field include: Marketing Accountability, Analysis of Customer Experience, and Customer Experience Marketing.
After the initial session, an interesting case study on how Bank of America “Integrates Multicultural into the Broader Business” was presented by Anne Saunders, Brand and Consumer Marketing Executive of BofA. Several marketers on the client side present at the conference noted that terms like “General Market” and “Multicultural Market” should increasingly be replaced by concepts like “Total Marketing."