1. Reality Check for Marketers: Latino and Black Working Class Voters Voted for Trump
It sounds counterintuitive, but support among Latino and Black voters was a key factor tipping the balance in favor of Trump at last Tuesday’s election. As the New York Times puts it: “Donald J. Trump picked up support among Latino and Black working-class voters, giving the party hope for a new way to win in a diversifying nation.” If only because of electoral and political goals, the Republican party seems to recognize that it needs to cater to the increasingly diverse America to stay in power.
Multicultural marketing expert Stephen Brooks, who, among other senior positions, was president of the Networks Division at GoDigital Media Group, notes that “it could be inferred from exit polls that Latinos are increasingly aligned politically and culturally with non-Latino whites and that assimilation could blur the lines between advertisers’ general market and multicultural messaging priorities.”
Brooks believes “that the biggest impact to multicultural budgets lies not in the political environment, notwithstanding the potential of deportations and immigration restrictions, but in budgeting trends. Even amid more favorable political climates, multicultural budgets have always lagged far behind both the size and purchasing power of multicultural communities.” He adds that his concern as a multicultural marketer “would be that brands could use election exit polling to justify a retreat back into a ‘total market’ budgeting and messaging approach, rationalizing if working-class African Americans and Latinos are voting in line with their white co-workers, maybe their purchase drivers are more similar than we thought. I think many of us saw the rapid diversification of the country ushering in an era of multi-party marketing strategies. Ironically, we may instead be heading for a consolidation, where everyone is ‘general market’ – with the caveat that ‘general market’ now has more multicultural representation in creative – and multicultural audiences will increasingly be targeted not through multicultural publishers but through the mega-platforms like Google Meta and Amazon.”
“My concern as a multicultural marketer, would be that brands could use election exit polling to justify a retreat back into a ‘total market’ budgeting and messaging approach, rationalizing if working-class African Americans and Latinos are voting in line with their white co-workers, maybe their purchase drivers are more similar than we thought.”
2. Electoral Outcome Highlights the Need to Understand Multicultural Audiences Truly
“Hispanic demographics and behaviors need to be re-examined by experts. Hispanics are now more concerned with the economy than with immigration. At the same time, the level of anti-immigration sentiment within the Hispanic community has not been properly measured and addressed,” says Hispanic business advisor Marcelo Rodriguez. “The Hispanic political spectrum is far more complex than simplistic left-right analyses suggest. Overall, Hispanic marketing strategies need a complete reevaluation—previous demographic or psychographics models are no longer effective,” Rodriguez adds.
“Overall, Hispanic marketing strategies need a complete reevaluation—previous demographic or psychographics models are no longer effective.”
“Reflecting on this election, one thing stands out to me – the influence of multicultural voters, especially Latinos, in shaping the outcome,” says Randy Gudiel, senior VP, media director, Orci. “As a Latino, I find myself wondering about the impact this new administration will have on our communities, and I feel the weight of these changes personally. But as a marketer, it’s also a powerful reminder of how critical it is to understand multicultural audiences truly. This election only underscores that need,” Gudiel notes. “Multicultural audiences are not all the same; they are diverse and complex, with distinct values and needs. For brands, it’s no longer just about checking the box on diversity—it’s about building true connection and trust,” Gudiel concludes.
3. Multicultural Marketing: Immigration Policy Will Impact Some Ad-Categories
“I am very concerned about deportations and how it will impact Hispanics, particularly those under DACA and Dreamers Act. Many industries could be affected by this, but top of mind are hospitality, farming, and manufacturing,” one insider tells Portada. Trump’s campaign promise to deport a substantial number of unauthorized immigrants early in his administration adds a risk factor to marketing to specific segments of multicultural audiences. To make matters worse, there is a lot of uncertainty about the number of individuals that will be impacted. The number of persons expected to be deported has been cited as broad as 2 to 17 million.
Stephen Brooks points out that the Latino community will remain a formidable economic force in the U.S. economy, even if Trump follows through with his promise to deport undocumented immigrants that he believes will be extremely costly and complicated to enact on the scale the President-elect has mentioned. “I do expect that legal immigration will be severely restricted, and the long-term impacts of that restriction on the growth of the Latino community will be felt,” Brooks adds.
“Many industries could be affected by this, but top of mind are hospitality, farming, and manufacturing.”
4. Obamacare’s Future and Its Multicultural Marketing Implications
5. DE&I: Anti-Quota Buying Position…
What is the impact of the new administration policies on DE&I-induced procurement going to be? Brooks notes, “The populist undercurrent of Trump’s movement is explicitly anti-quota, anti-DE&I. I could see some multicultural marketing budget quotas loosen, particularly in the government sector.”
“ I could see some loosening of the multicultural marketing budget quotas, particularly in the government sector.”
6. … and Minority-Owned Businesses to Become Less of a Driver
Let’s be honest, the boasting of minority-owned media certificates may have gone too far. It may have harmed the credibility of the multicultural marketing sector, where year in and year out a tremendous amount of amazing work has been rendered.
7. In the post-Truth Era, The Open Web Is More Important Than Ever for A Healthy Democracy
Misinformation, mainly spread by social media properties, plays an increasingly damaging role in the political discourse. Truth-based reporting methodologies are critical for a healthy democracy. Open web properties, e.g., direct publishers, which are not ruled by algorithms and employ professional journalists, should play a vital role in maintaining democratic standards and truth-based reporting. Brand safety objectives and corporate social responsibility also involve supporting content that has been professionally elaborated and fact-checked.
Brand support of direct publishers on the open web is critical in this context. “Compared to a general market strategy, there is more opportunity for direct publisher incorporation into social and digital recommendations because of the importance of the environment and content. That gives them additional value that is not necessarily true for general market properties,” Ana Crandell, VP of Media Services at Lopez Negrete, recently told Portada. According to Orci’s Randy Gudiel, “brands that paused spending pre-election might cautiously reinvest, focusing on digital and
contextual placements to control their message in a highly charged environment. To avoid misalignment, brands will be more selective about where their ads appear and lean on audience segmentation to reach consumers thoughtfully and effectively.”
Brand safety objectives and corporate social responsibility also involve supporting content that has been fact-checked and avoid supporting misinformation.
8. Is Multicultural Marketing Too Complacent under Democratic Presidents?
“These are the times when our expertise is most needed. Often during challenging times is when most of the progress is made.”
9. Conclusion: Data-driven Diverse Audience Budgeting will Continue to be Highly Effective
Portada expects African-American, Asian-American, and Hispanic-targeted advertising investment to reach a combined volume of US $16.51 billion in 2027, a 37% increase from US
;12.1 billion in 2022. How will Trump’s victory impact this forecast? Let’s not make a mistake about it; there continue to be more business opportunities for Corporate America to engage diverse consumers than ever before. Despite a 40% multicultural population, only 5% of media investment is reportedly allocated to multicultural media. Media planners at brands and agencies must learn how to budget for this opportunity. Earlier this year, David Queamante, SVP, Client Business Partner at UM, told Portada about his 7-step process to improve diversity/multicultural media budgeting based on the opportunity. This process establishes a final ratio between the multicultural-specific media budget and the overall media budget. Marketers and media planners who excel in meeting the objectives below will continue to prove that multicultural marketing and advertising are paramount to corporate growth in a multicultural America.
- Quantifying the opportunity
- Understanding media consumption
- Access and consistency in organizing the data points.
- Increase objectivity among stakeholders.
