PRSA Chair and CEO Rosanna Fiske's speech on the need to make diversity a strategic initiative within business' marketing and PR programs.

1. State of Diversity in Marketing and Media
Rosanna M. Fiske, APR
Chair and CEO, PRSA
Delivered: March 16, 2011, in Miami
Center for Hispanic Leadership 2011-12 Tour
• Fifty million people. One trillion dollars in buying power. Ad spending up 164% since
2001 to $3.88 billion. Hundreds of Spanish-language TV stations across the U.S.
o That’s just a single representation of one non-white audience that PR
professionals reach every day: Hispanic-Americans.
o These eye-catching numbers represent the immense, and largely untapped,
scale and wealth of the Hispanic-American media market.
o Put into greater perspective, if Hispanic-Americans comprised their own country,
it would be larger, by population, than Canada and the fifth-most populous nation
in the European Union. And this demographic is growing — rapidly.
• Despite the prevalence of white, Caucasians on social media, a great migration is
currently taking place within diverse cultures.
o Whereas even 2-3 years ago, many non-white cultures preferred more traditional
forms of marketing and communications — ad circulars, direct mail, word-of-
mouth (which is still huge in almost every culture — recent studies point to 93%
of all marketing taking place via in-person, word-of-mouth marketing), culturally-
diverse demographics represent one of the fastest growing segments of social
media.
 A 2010 PRSA survey found that 36% of English-preferring Hispanics
regularly used social networks, followed closely by 34% of Asians, 27% of

2. Spanish-preferring Hispanics, 26% of African-Americans and 18% of non-
Hispanic Caucasians.
 All of which points to a marketplace for PR professionals that looks
nothing like it did even five years ago, let alone at the dawn of this
millennium.
• Wide divide still exists between this reality and the promise for greater diversity in senior
management within the ranks of media, communications, PR and advertising.
• As my friend and Hispanicize founder, Manny Ruiz, recently told PRNewser: "The future
of our nation depends on what happens in the Hispanic-American and other diverse and
growing populations, a segment of Americans that have not always gotten the
opportunities," they deserve.
o This lack of opportunity has led to Hispanic-Americans being underrepresented
in corporate boardrooms. According to the 2009 Hispanic Association for
Corporate Responsibility Corporate Inclusion Index survey, only 4.8 percent of all
Fortune 100 executive- and director-level positions are held by Hispanics.
Similarly, Hispanics account for only 6 percent of representatives on Fortune 100
boards.
o It took my own professional organization, the Public Relations Society of
America, 48 years before Luis Morales became its first Hispanic president in
1996. Fifteen years later, I'm the first Latina to serve as chair and CEO.
• It's quite simple, really: Diversity within the media industry will be crucial to its success in
years to come, as businesses continue seeking a more global perspective to their
communications.

3. o That means it is the responsibility of the communications and media industries --
along with businesses that use our services -- to place an immediate focus on
the business value of diversity and a diverse boardroom.
o American companies must be prepared to tap into burgeoning and increasingly
diverse markets for new revenue and growth.
 Having a more diverse executive suite, which reflects the modern ethnic
makeup of the U.S., will better prepare the media industry to reap the
immense financial rewards of a modern and very diverse America.
• Marketing to diverse cultures, whether Hispanic-Americans, Asian-Americans, Italian-
Americans, etc., is a remarkably complex, and yet oddly simple, concept.
o At the end of the day, everyone has similar human instincts to connect with each
other; to relate to others’ experiences; to share in the excitement, sorrow, joy and
fear of life.
o That transcends cultures and it is at the heart of what makes public relations and
marketing successful: reaching a variety of diverse audiences in ways that
impact their lives and help them to connect with something meaningful to them
and to their culture.
o At the same time, reality tells us that there are vast culture differences that we
must be cognizant of when communicating — whether via a press release, a TV
interview or on Twitter — with different cultures.
 As a Hispanic-American, I can tell you that the way I communicate with
my Latina followers on Twitter is vastly different to how I would
communicate with a culture that is more reserved or quiet.

4. • That’s all part of understanding, and more importantly, respecting,
cultural differences in how businesses communicate.
• All of which makes for a remarkably challenging landscape for
businesses in the digital age to market and communicate in.
o A marketing message to “buy this product on sale …
today!” from a multinational company sent via Twitter may
be perceived by some customers as a call-to-action that
they want to seize upon. For others, it may be viewed as
too pushy and overly promotional. Marketers must keep
these cultural differences in mind in the vastly changing
landscape of social media.