Acurrate data is a tricky concept. The U.S. Census is widely used to determine the number of Hispanics in the U.S, as well as other demographic information. But according Dave Gusse, Vice President of Strategic Print Marketing for Newspaper Services of America (NSA), the Census counts as Hispanic anyone who is even 1/16th Hispanic. “If I'm 1/16th Hispanic do I need a specific marketing campaign targeting me based on my ethnicity?” Gusse says that the fear is that the number of Hispanics who actually need to be reached with a separate marketing campaign will be much smaller than the current 15%. “The universe would probably shrink to maybe 7% or something like that, but at least advertisers would really know who they needed to target,” says Gusse. On the other side are those who say that the 2000 U.S. Census actually undercounted Hispanics, possibly by as much as 3 million, Roderick Harrison of the Center for Political and Economic Studies said in a CNN interview.
Carrie Barnes
For more information read:
November 07, 2005: Do we get the Numbers Right? Evaluating Hispanic Market Research
July 25, 2005: New Research Emphasizes the Importance of Spanish-language Media and Advertising