Why is inclusivity in advertising important?

Inclusivity in advertising is important as consumers need to feel that brands truly understand them. For a customer to build relationships with brands they must feel their morals align. GottaBe! Ethnic will be discussing the importance of inclusivity in advertising and why it is beneficial for your brand to invest in inclusivity. 

1 in 6 people living in the UK are from an ethnic minority and a huge 69% of ethnic minorities feel that UK media has little to no relevance to them. GottaBe! Ethnic understands that each ethnic community is different, with constantly evolving consumer needs, tastes, and behaviours. Understanding the differing needs of communities is highly important to successfully leading customers down the marketing funnel but can be time-consuming as things change so rapidly. 

Make inclusion everyone’s business

Customers are holding companies accountable for their actions. With the rise in ethnic brands, consumers are no longer forced to buy from brands that show no consideration to ethnic minorities. Consumers are voting with their feet and forcing the hands of companies. 

Inclusion should be ingrained into every business but until this is possible brands need to educate themselves on ethnic minorities. As a multicultural agency GottaBe! Ethnic offers webinars and training sessions to help your brand understand how best to reach ethnic minorities. The team had the pleasure of joining Thrive Tribe to help their team understand how to reach new customers in ethnic communities across the UK. 

How can my brand be successfully inclusive?

Being authentic with your approach to inclusivity will ensure that you successfully reach ethnic minorities. Not only is inclusivity financially beneficial to your brand but it is the right thing to do. In recent years we have seen the rise of inclusive advertising from big brands across the globe despite this our research finds that only 1 in 5 brands actively target / communicate with ethnic minorities. 

Company-wide inclusivity 

Inclusivity starts in the board room. Your brand cannot be truly inclusive if your staff are not. A multicultural team has differing opinions, life experiences and understands what minorities want and need. Think of your employees as the eyes on the ground, with ethnic minorities constantly evolving, having members of those communities within your corporation you can see first-hand the consumer’s needs.

Employees should be seen as an asset that is continually helping the business to grow and expand to new audiences. Using the knowledge of a multicultural team is cost-effective and financially beneficial as companies with multicultural teams are 35% more likely to generate above-average financial returns according to McKinsey Diversity. Discover our 5 top tips on how to authentically adopt ethnic diversity and inclusivity within your company.

Brand messaging 

Once your team is multicultural your brand messaging becomes more authentic by showing your target audiences that you truly care, and they are understood. Brand messaging is important to customers as they like to buy from brands that represent their desired lifestyle. Customers must feel that they are included with the brand so they can imagine using the products. The brand image reflects how customers would like to be perceived as people buy from brands that reflect the lifestyle they aspire to have.

Representation 

To be able to showcase your inclusivity to a target audience it must be transferable within your marketing campaigns. Adverts must include ethnic minorities as long gone are the days of using a slim, white model to represent all. However, for your marketing campaigns to be representative your brand should only create multicultural content if it serves the purpose. When we look to represent all demographics, we must be careful to avoid tokenism as it is clearly seen by consumers. Diversity should not be approached as a check list task, and your brand must authentically look to represent in a culturally appropriate way. Inclusivity in advertising goes beyond race, gender, age, and ability it has the power to mirror and shape society. GottaBe! Ethnic has created a 2022 Ethnic calendar to help you keep up to date with over 80 multicultural holidays.

Why do inclusive brands perform better?

Quite simply, inclusive brands perform better as they are more trustworthy. By including everyone in their advertising brands have a larger reach so the total number of customers is higher. 

In the height of the Black Lives Matter movement and after the death of George Floyd, many brands pledged allegiance but how many have continued to show support, and how many were doing so to follow trends. While brands may have gotten away with this in the past, consumers are now much more aware of the brand’s behaviours and will avoid those that are not authentic with their approach. Consumers need to feel a sense of belonging and brands can help to do this through representative advertising. 

What GottaBe! Ethnic can do to help!

GottaBe! Ethnic specialise in multicultural marketing so are here to support your inclusive advertising. We can source models or promo staff and create materials that represent and connect your brand with the ‘hard to reach’ communities. Whatever your needs are we can help market your product. Contact the team today to discuss your multicultural marketing options.