Why Your Healthcare Brand Needs a Multicultural Strategy

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Alex Membrillo: What’s going on, everybody? This is going to be fun. It’s going to be different. We’ve never talked about multicultural marketing on Ignite, so this is going to be good, and we get to do it in the frame of DSO, MSO, so very fun, muy divertido. Diana, welcome to Ignite. How’re you doing?

Diana: I’m doing great. So happy to be here, and so happy to hear that we’re going to have a different conversation this morning.

Alex: It’s going to be different. It’s going to be different. We’re usually talking PPC and the SEOs and all the acronyms, and we’ll get to do some of that, but we’re going to talk about cultural nuance, which is really fun. You live in my favorite name city in the country, the rat’s mouth, Boca Raton. I can’t believe they named it that. I wonder sometimes if people know what they’re naming cities, but anyway, I think they all speak Spanish.

My friend that I worked with here at Cardinal for like seven years, he lived on a road called Vista View, and he was like, “Do you think these white people knew that it was just View View?” I don’t think they knew. Diana, where do you work?

Diana: I work for Sage Dental.

Alex: What is Sage Dental? I know, y’all were our client for a couple of years, but what’s Sage Dental?

Diana: I’m happy to hear that. Sage Dental, we offer about 145 locations throughout the Southeast, Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, and we offer dental services from general dentistry all the way to specialties like cosmetic and orthodontist, et cetera.

Alex: Sage, not House of Brands, correct? When you go to a location, it’s Sage. That’s right. That makes it a little bit easier. That’s good. Diana, what does your role encompass? It’s a little different than our typical interviewee on here, which is exciting. What is your role?

Diana: My role is to help organizations to connect with their ideal audience through an authentic way, but also by turning data in one layer over, which is cultural intelligence, to make sure that you really connect with the audience and are able to engage with them through their mindset and through their cultural lens.

Alex: How do we do that? What is something you’ve found tactically help our three to five– actually, Todd’s our fifth listener. I think we’re looking for number six now, which is exciting. Our six listeners, tell them how do you tactically do that when you come into a new organ? You’ve been doing this for many years. What are you training the team to look– Do they need to do more research in markets that have heavily Hispanic theme? Do they change social? Do they get more in the community? What do they do, Diana, differently? How do you start? Where do you start?

Diana: First things first, data. We need to know who our audience is, how acculturated they are, what language do they speak, what’s their family composition, standard demographics, but beyond that, it’s really understand ethnicity and acculturation levels. I think that’s one of the key elements that we miss as organizations, being in the country that we are in, that is such a melting pot. Right now, it is projected that for 2026, 55% it’s going to be non-Hispanic white, while the other 45% is going to be multicultural.

Alex: In all of America or in Georgia, Florida, et cetera?

Diana: Mass population.

Alex: Yes, I love it. I love it. I love it. 55% white, 45% not vanilla. I love that.

Diana: Out of that, 20% is Hispanic.

Alex: Total? 20% of the 100 or 20% of the 45?

Diana: The 45% that I mentioned, of the multicultural category, 20% is Hispanic, and I believe 12% Black, and 7% Asian.

Alex: Where do you get your data? Because I’m sure you’re honing it in on the markets that Sage is in, ethnic data. Where re you getting it?

Diana: I work with a company that actually specializes in ethnic data.

Alex: Como se llama?

Diana: Claritas.

Alex: Claritas. Okay, guys, there you go. A little tip.

Diana: I’ve been using them for years. Everywhere I go, I take them with me.

Alex: All right, cool. I’m sure they’re very thankful for that. Claritas can help you all the time. They’re going to keep going with you.

Diana: Because, Alex, it’s the foundation. You cannot build a relationship with anybody, whether it’s family, friends, business, customer relationships, if you don’t know who they are, and what’s important for them.

Alex: We start with the ethnic data, then you have to frame up what’s important to them. It tells you who they are, but what do you do next?

Diana: Then you can build segmentations. At that point, you really understand how acculturated your customer, your universe, you target it. It’s not going to be the same, for example, in Miami versus New York. It’s going to be different. Out of that analysis, you’re going to be able to understand, “Okay, well, if I’m going to target X city, now I’m talking to maybe people that are more Spanish dominant, recent immigrants, or maybe they are bicultural, they live in between these two worlds. I need to make sure that my communication is bilingual, that I sprinkle the cultural nuances.”

Also, with that acculturation, understanding that acculturation phase, where they are, it also comes mindset. What are those fears, aspirations, motivators? How can I communicate with my customer? What’s important for my customer when it comes to my survey? Then I can align that.

Alex: Then, tactically, so you find out in Miami– and we all know Miami, what that largely is. We’ll use Miami as a for instance. By the way, I love going to Miami because you get to just speak Spanish. No one speaks English. I love it. I get to practice.

Diana: Where are you located?

Alex: I’m in Atlanta. We have some clients and PE firms that are down there. I’ll go to just get away from things. Yes, it’s awesome. Anyways, it’s where my parents met. I love Miami. Other than Miami, let’s say you’re in a community that’s heavily Hispanic. What do you do differently then? Do you serve ads in Spanish? Do you have different landing pages? Social channels are in both languages. What do marketers need to be doing differently?

Diana: You have to be where your customers are. When you learn your customer, you will find out, “Well, do they watch Univision?” If they are recent immigrants and they’re more Spanish, they may be bilingual, but lean more into the Spanish side, less acculturated, most likely you will find them in Univision, Telemundo. That will help you understand, “Should I be using Spanish? Should I be bilingual? Should I even test Spanglish?” Depending on that acculturation level, it’s going to dictate what kind of testing should I be leading to be able to engage with this audience. It’s also going to help you define the messaging.

Alex: That will totally take. It’s interesting, guys. Diana’s saying it’s not even just Hispanic, non-Hispanic. It’s recent immigrants, how long they’ve been here, how they think, probably sometimes what countries they come from because those are going to have– a Spaniard will have very different beliefs than someone from Guatemala. All of that, I guess, is part of the discovery process, right, Diana?

Diana: Right. It’s really connecting with the audience in an authentic way. I think nowadays, customers are really asking for that. I think the true marketers are going to win are the marketers that really do the homework and understand whether they’re really clear.

Alex: Yes. You believe heavily in that, the why, the why in getting patients from hesitation to action, but understanding the rationale behind all of that. I know you really believe in healthcare decisions are not purely rational. Why do you feel that way?

Diana: I don’t think anything that we do– I mean, human beings, we are emotional creatures. [chuckles]

Alex: That’s why we’re better than the robots, by the way. Imperfect, but yes.

Diana: I think when you’re on the marketing seat, you have to understand, whether it’s a B2C or B2B, you’re always dealing with a human being and there’s always an emotional trigger. I believe that even for healthcare, when we are– I think I said this to you and I always mention this, it’s the business of people. It’s not a business of beverage, a business of healthcare, business of finance. You’re dealing with people and really understanding what’s holding them back. What’s the cultural limitation that they may have, for example, when it comes to dental services?

I recently saw a stat that they believe that when the doctors don’t speak their language, worse healthcare outcomes happen. How do we manage that internal belief that they have to make them feel comfortable, and they can trust us, and come to us for services? It is always an emotional decision that is made, whether it’s trust, being comfortable, aspirational, motivation, whatever it is. There’s always an emotion behind.

Alex: Yes, I know you feel like healthcare marketing too often leads with facts instead of building a connection with their patients. It’s got to be a blend of both. I think often we do go, best outcomes, most cardiologists.

Diana: Right. It has to be factual. We need to educate our audience on what’s really happening because there are a lot of misconceptions. Also, when you are being factual and you’re bringing that education, you’re showing that you care.

Alex: Yes, absolutely. By the way, I do believe in not speaking the same language leads to worse outcomes. Not because the provider’s not explaining themselves well because most people are bilingual. It’s because the person on the other side isn’t comfortable asking the right questions, and won’t keep asking questions. They just get served the information and go home instead of being their own advocate.

My mother volunteered at Grady here in downtown Atlanta to help Hispanic new moms acclimate to pregnancy and all that stuff who were afraid to ask questions. I do believe very heavily, Diana is right. By the way, I’m learning acculturation. I’ve never heard that word before. See, I’m learning. This is very fun. Is community really important with these? It’s not just more PPC and social ads. Do you advocate for multi-site DSOs to get more involved in these communities in different ways than they would if it were just all white people or all one type of culture in a city?

Diana: 100%. Sense of belonging, family trust, it’s super important for Latinos. We want to see you walking the talk. It’s important. I always recommend, and not only, obviously, we need to be where they are, digital, heavy adopters of technology. Yes, you want to target Latinos, you have to be where they are, but also mass media, but also community engagement. It’s important. They want to see that you are representing there, and they want to also be represented.

Alex: What does walking the talk mean? That you have that community within your own MSO or DSO? Is that part of the talk?

Diana: You want to be out there. If you’re saying that you’re targeting me because as a Latina, I’m getting myself in the seat of a consumer, and you say that you care about the Latino audience, well, let me see you really caring. How do you care? What are you doing? How are you supporting my growth, the growth of my community?

Alex: Is it just a finance play because you ran out of your own community, or do you actually care, and it’s central to your business? I think people can read through that pretty easily.

Diana: People can easily read, are you being transactional, or are you really caring about connecting? You have many options, Alex, nowadays. I think marketers are also getting very smart about it, and they know companies do understand that.

Alex: Real tactically, if you were running Google Ads, do you suggest running ads in Spanish to Spanish or whatever language landing page and stuff? Do you have to separate the whole thing? I don’t think Cardinal runs any different campaigns for anyone. Does that matter? Does anyone do that?

Diana: What I have always done and what I always recommend is we need to have the option when it comes to the website. The website definitely should be in both languages. There’s no reason why the technology is there to have it available. Also, it will be a really poor experience if you engage with the customers through a Spanish ad, and then you bring them to an English landing page. It will be a total disconnect.

Alex: Or a call center that only speaks English, or a provider, a mid-level that only speaks English. The whole thing probably has to be–

Diana: Right. I think when it comes to how we’re going to target, whether it’s English or Spanish, again, that’s going to be based on the targeting criteria. If you do know that in a specific state code area, you have more Spanish speakers, or Spanish-dependent customers, then it should be in Spanish. Again, when you’re going to selecting that criteria, there are parameters that you can select to make sure that you’re actually doing the right target, that you’re not targeting people that speak English and vice versa.

That’s another thing that you should also test it. At that point, if you’re targeting Spanish speakers, Spanish dominant, then you’re you can test whether a Spanish ad or maybe a Spanglish ad works better, a bilingual ad.

Alex: It’s funny that Spanglish has actually made its way into a formal type of language. Whatever works, dude. I was just watching family videos last night, and my wife got them transcribed. In every one, my dad speaks Spanish to us, but we speak English back. I think this is where it probably started 30 years ago. It’s a kid that spoke English back to their immigrant parents.

Diana, anything else you’d love for the healthcare marketing community to know? This is your chance to educate. Is there any misconception, misnomer, anything we’re all doing wrong you want to correct that we haven’t discussed yet?

Diana: I just wanted to leave everybody understanding that the Hispanic community is growing. It’s the fastest-growing population in the United States. It’s not going anywhere. If you want to win in your business, which I’m assuming everybody’s in business to move the needle, and to drive revenue, you need to be able to understand the audience and do it in an authentic way. Really learning what matters for us– because I am Latino myself, and really find us where we are.

Alex: Yes. Guys, it’s a whole business initiative, and you’d have to have somebody advocating and somebody that can speak from experience, and from landing page to ad, call center, providers. The whole thing has to–

Diana: Alex, it’s a growth strategy.

Alex: Yes. Oh, I believe it. I believe it. We are part of that, and it is reassuring when people can speak the same language, whatever language that is. I think that’s part of why I really enjoyed learning different languages, is it helps you connect with people, and it surprises them. When you’re as awkward as I am, it gives you something common fun. Diana, this was really fun and really different. I think, if nothing else, it gets a lot of marketers thinking in a different way. That is very, very important here for the next– well, it’s already very important in America because this is a very diverse country. It’s awesome because of its diversity.

Now, let’s make the marketing match the demographic. Diana, thank you for enjoying-

Diana: Thank you.

Alex: Well, I don’t know if you enjoy it. Thank you for joining Ignite.

Diana: I did enjoy it. Thank you, Alex. Thank you for having me.

Alex: Yes, absolutely.

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