Quick Note on Reaching the "African-American Audience"

One thing I need to say up front: We are NOT all the same.

I’m sure that many of you think I just stated the obvious, but I had to say it because while many people accept that to be true, it seems to go right out the window when people begin planning communication campaigns.

The diversity of races is acknowledged, but somehow the idea of diversity within races does not make it into the conversation.

Most people who know me well are aware of the fact that my family is from the Caribbean. West Indian people and really anyone else who looks black in this country seem to get placed in the African-American category, but any 1st generation American with West Indian roots knows exactly how “African-American” our family members truly feel….

This is a bit of a rant, but it’s a rant with a purpose.

Yesterday I picked up the Sept/Oct issue of the Network Journal and decided to dig into their news brief section. I was pleasantly surprised by the fact that they dedicated a section just to data on Caribbean-Americans.

It’s so rare to see data on any segment of  the broad group referred to as African-American that I can somewhat understand how groups of people from the Caribbean get lost in the planning process. Though I have a bit more cultural perspective here, I’m still a communications guy and I’ll admit the fact that it’s hard to craft and tailor messages for an audience on which there is not much data.

Here are a few interesting points from the Networking Journal:

• Percentage of the African-American population of Caribbean origin: approx. 33
• European languages spoken in the Caribbean-American community:  4( Dutch, English, French, Spanish)
• Buying power of the Caribbean-American community: $16.3 billion
• Amount of money remitted annually to the Caribbean region by Carribbean-Americans: more than $8 billion
• Number of President Obama’s cabinet members with roots in the Caribbean: 3 – U.S. Attorney General, Eric Holder Jr. (Barbados); White House Political Director, Patrick Gaspard (Haiti); UN Ambassador, Susan Rice (Jamaica)
• Percent of Caribbean nationals who described themselves in a study as “a person of Caribbean Heritage” rather than “African-American” or “a person in the general market”: 72

As a professor I had in college often proclaimed, I say all this to say that in trying to reach the “African-American” audience or any defined racial group, it is worth taking the time to drill down a bit further and learn about existing cultural sub groups.

When we fail to do so, we miss a great opportunity to create campaigns that resonate with all areas of our target audiences, tap into their sizeable buying power, change perceptions and inspire people to take action.