Hispanic Marketing: Adopt, Adapt or Create?

If you can't afford to do Hispanic specific programs from the ground up, embrace Hispanic marketing through creative and strategic adaptations of your general market campaigns. 

Leverage your General Market research. After all, we are all humans, with very similar needs and wants; plus most of us use products much the same way.  And consider this; Hispanics don't wake up in the morning thinking, "Today, I want to be a better Hispanic".  Chances are, they wake up thinking "I want to be a better father, a better athlete, programmer, carpenter, doctor, dentist or banker, etc." They only happen to be Hispanic but they use and need your product much the same way others do. Remember, Being Hispanic is not a passion point.

Adapt your communications strategy. The brand is the brand is the brand. Your communications objectives in English should align with those in Spanish.  So, rather than reinventing the wheel adapt your existing communication strategy by infusing it with Hispanic Cultural insights and, yes, idyosyncracies, which make things funny, memorable or relatable.

Align your Creative assets:  Shoot light, olive-skin talent. If you have a demo in your spot, create a Spanish version with a VO and use it online. Shoot the English and Spanish version of your creative at the same time. Give and experienced Creative Director YOUR brief, and he'll come up with a spot that works for Hispanics.  (If he is honest, he'll let you know if your spot works as is with only slight modifications). If you know which banners perform best in English? Adapt only those to Spanish first.  Develop your GM and Hispanic Social Media content calendar and posting strategy with the help of an experienced Hispanic Social Media writer, and he or she can make the content culturally relevant.

Finally, if you have a Spanish and Enlish website and run a robust Inbound Marketing program, make sure your blogs are transcreated into Spanish along with your best performing keywords (additional keyword research directly in Spanish is highly recommended), and email campaigns and Calls To Action and landing pages, etc. 

If you want to have a Spanish website (which you should), is totally advisable to translate it after you've done your initial keyword research (the closest interpretations of your top search queries in Spanish) and apply it to the Spanish site for better SEO results right out of the gate.

Let’s talk about leveraging your Creative and Strategy to develop Hispanic marketing programs. I’ve been doing it professionally and successfully for the past 20+ years, collaborating with some of the largest General Market Agencies in the country.