Hispanics feel underrepresented, almost invisible, on TV — and that should be a concern for marketers missing out on what could be effective campaigns to Latinos, experts on the subject said Wednesday at the Hispanic TV Summit during NYC TV Week.
Carlos Santiago is a co-founder of the Association of National Advertisers (ANA’s) Alliance for Inclusive and Multicultural Marketing. At the 20th anniversary Hispanic TV Summit Wednesday, he said Latinos have the strongest interest of any multicultural consumer group in seeing programming they feel authentically represents them. They also respond well to ads that feel culturally relevant to them, Santiago and a co-panelist, Veronica Hernandez, product manager of inclusion analytics, at Nielsen, said.
Also: More Coverage from the 10th Anniversary NYC TV Week
“From all of the segments, the segments where culture has the most weight to the sales success of a campaign is among Hispanics,” Santiago said. “It explains 78% of the success of a campaign. For other segments, it’s a little bit below 60%. Hispanics, when they see culture, they make a connection that takes them to the purchase.”
Using the Spanish language in ads, he said, can add 22% to the success of a campaign, all of which means authentic and relevant content is key to return on investment. “The impact is not marginal. The impact is astronomical.”
Severely Under-Represented
Nielsen estimated Hispanics make up only 13% of on-screen casting on TV, and the figure drops to 7% when Spanish-language programmers are removed from the mix, Hernandez said. By contrast, Hispanics were about 19% of the population as measured by the 2020 U.S. Census.
Hispanics also are the multicultural consumer category (77%) most likely to feel stereotyped in portrayals on TV, Santiago said. And 59% of Hispanics, according to AIMM research, believe they are under-represented or not represented at all in shows on TV. “They feel invisible because they are invisible,” Santiago said of Hispanic TV viewers.
On English-language networks, there’s a scarcity of shows that feel culturally relevant to Latinos and not enough such shows being developed, Santiago said, citing the cancellation of shows such as Jane the Virgin (The CW), Vida (Starz) and Netflix’s La Casa de las Flores and Mr. Iglesias. Not enough similar fare is being developed, he said. “There really is nothing out there,” Santiago said.
Hernandez said Hispanics love to watch programming on streaming platforms: 44% of the content Hispanics watch is on streaming, 9 points higher than the general population. An increase in free ad-supported streaming channels in Spanish would give marketers more opportunities to reach those consumers with culturally relevant advertising, she said. For more about Latinos' preferences for streaming, read this Nielsen report released the day of the summit.
She also said the U.S. Hispanic population is increasingly diverse. There are 3.8 million Afro Latinos, she said, and the Asian Latino segment has grown 23% since the 2010 Census. “We’re young, we’re queer, we’re differently abled, so there is just not enough content to capture all of the nuance that exists in the community,” Hernandez said.
U.S. Hispanics are mostly (67%) born in the U.S., she said. “This generation has also been really exposed to social justice and equity issues. That empowers us to demand more as consumers of the content that is being offered to us.”
“I think that the expectations from Gen Z is not just to see your identity but to see it in a positive light,” Santiago added. “It’s beyond having someone in the cast that is Hispanic. It’s to make sure that that representation is accurate. That you feel proud of that representation. When all of that is encapsulated in a great storyline, great series, then consumers, respondents, viewers are rating that at a high level. When combined with advertising that is in that context, that increases ROI.”
Not Enough Content
The summit began with comments from Gonzalo Del Fa, chairman of the Hispanic Marketing Council and president of GroupM Multicultural, urging TV executives in the room to insist that English-language programmers have Latinos represented more fairly before and behind the cameras. "Besides the Hispanic networks, is there enough relevant and authentic content? Not at all," he said.
Among the growth statistics Del Fa cited about the Hispanic population was its spending power: $1.9 trillion, he said, compared with $495 billion in 2000 when the first Hispanic TV Summit was held. In 2025, he said, U.S. Latinos' estimated spending power will be $2.5 trillion.
NYC Television Week also included the Advanced Advertising and Next TV summits. It ends tonight (September 15) with the 40 Under 40 Awards. ￭
