We’re back with our Accessing Culture Beyond Ethnicity series where we’re taking a deep dive into our approach to using technology to access multicultural audiences for digital advertisers. One of the most important changes to advertising in the last twenty years has been the shift of power from the brand, to the consumer. Consumers are smarter, more particular, and they research and buy across a wide range of channels and devices. With rare exceptions, brands can’t tell them what to do. They make their own decisions. These decisions are often based on how much of a connection they feel with a certain brand or publisher – and how well the brand appears to understand them and their cultural tastes and values, nuances and all. A recent study called Wantedness found that 88% of U.S. consumers want to engage with brands that are setting new standards in meeting their expectations. 56% said they feel more loyal to brands who ‘get me’ and show a deep understanding of their priorities and preferences.

DECODING MULTICULTURAL DNA WITH PASSIONS

Today, let’s break down one of our four fundamental elements we use to decoding the multicultural audience: passions. How do we figure out what people are passionate about? What gets people excited? One answer is content. Taking a look at a snapshot of video content that a user is consuming online over a period of time, gives you a clear understanding of a topic(s) that user is interested in. You would definitely not be binge watching hours of chocolate content, if you weren’t passionate about chocolate! By looking at video viewership behaviors, we can obtain a clear understanding of the user’s passion points.

Take an example where a user online is found to have watched all of these videos:

These video viewing behaviors speak volumes about their passion points, have you guessed them already? … What about fitness and sports?

Using video content tags to understand a user’s passion points are an important component to accessing multicultural audiences with technology. The Acuity algorithm also incorporates this information into bidding, so that we can more accurately value the conversion propensity (or probability of reacting favorably) to a specific advertisement.

Advertisers who consider passion points of users online will ultimately drive far greater brand loyalty and beat out the competition. As consumers, we tell the world who we are (or at least who we want to be) each and every day via social media, our search patterns and digital interactions. The marketers and advertisers that see this on an individual and cultural basis holistically – and integrate this cultural DNA into their digital advertising strategy will win the hearts and minds (not to mention dollars) of their target audience.

For questions related to in-culture advertising or ways it can benefit your next program, contact us today!