The media landscape is more varied now than at any point in history, which shouldn’t really come as a shock to anyone.  Look around: Digital is king, social media has provided an unmatched venuefor the consumption and consideration of news (which isn’t necessarily a good thing) and the mass ease of targeting millions has opened the floodgates for marketers and content creators of every type.

But something that flies under the proverbial radar all too often in discussions of modern media is the scale and scope of multicultural news consumption—something that no marketer or content creator should ignore. And at 4media, we don’t.

Our VP Executive Producer in Spanish Media, Javier Robles, is an expert in the Latino media landscape, having produced over 600 satellite media tours and produced for Telemundo and Univision, as well as working in stations across Miami.  I sat down with him to talk shop, and gain a greater understanding of what the changing media landscape means for multicultural opportunities.

“The general market media tour world was becoming more difficult to penetrate, and so more companies are turning to diverse cultural options for their content,” Robles told me. And recent research suggests non-white Americans are consuming news content at a strong rate.

According to the Pew Research Center, “on a typical weekday, three-quarters of U.S. Latinos get their news from internet sources, nearly equal to the share who do so from television.” There’s insight here.

As the media environment continues its galaxy-like expansion, the capacity to reach a more varied cultural audience expands as well.  Multicultural media tours have an opportunity to experience a renaissance driven by diverse tactics, and agencies with an eye on the future should be looking to capitalize.

Robles said multicultural outreach is a function of making people of all types comfortable with the media they’re consuming.

“Hispanic people, for example, try and find information they’re more comfortable with, and so often times that means it’s in their language,” Robles said. “What’s interesting though is that we had a generation of Spanish speakers who consumed news only in their language—and now, we’re seeing a generation of kids who watch TV and read in Spanish and English.”

Satellite Media Tours Multicultural

report by Nielsen suggests that many modern Hispanic households are tied to two cultures simultaneously.  “54 percent of Hispanic children under the age of 18 live in a household with at least one foreign-born parent, which means that they are connected to two cultures at once—and in total, 55 percent of Hispanics are bilingual,” according to the report.

For Robles, the changing nature of multicultural media makes branded outreach easier in some senses, but also requires extra consideration from someone with an inside track.

“There are 210 major media markets—just a tiny percentage of those are going to have stations broadcasting in Spanish,” Robles said. “So because you have far fewer options, the inventory can really provide a challenge, but the flip side is that it can be easier to place content on Spanish channels, because they’re more likely to be in search of content provided specifically for their viewers.”

A bit of research proves Robles’ point on a pretty amazing scale. A report from Pew shows that there are 1,097 general market stations in the U.S., all broadcasting an average of 5.7 hours of content per day. Meanwhile, there are far fewer statistics available for Spanish stations, but Robles said the majority broadcast in 30 minute time slots three or so times a day. Of course there will be exceptions, but the gist is this: There’s a major discrepancy in programming time.

Don’t miss the insight in this particular point.  An advertiser who wants to make an inroad may have fewer options to place its content, but the payoff can potentially be huge for the reason just noted—there’s a large, relatively untapped market in search of content created specifically for them, which makes the performance of satellite media tours an even more meaningful tactic.

Through an SMT, an advertiser can reach a huge percentage of that market in a single morning—providing the kind of tailored content that an entire community is in search of.  It makes total sense, and we at 4media have done it a time or two.

Are you interested in reaching diverse markets, or expanding brand awareness beyond your traditional sphere? Reach out, and we can provide expert consultation from the first step through the completion of a successful tour.