• by Larry Dobrow , January 13, 2004

The Asian Lunar New Year, which begins on Jan. 22, is considered one of the prime periods for companies to reach out to Asian Americans, usually via promotional offers or campaigns related to the holiday. But to hear Kang & Lee Advertising's Saul Gitlin tell it, the few product categories that are dipping deep into the Asian market are hamstrung by a single factor: the relative lack of sophistication and knowledge about the market among media planners and buyers.

Gitlin, K&L's executive vice president, strategic marketing services/new business, says the primary problem is one of communication - namely, that media and ad execs automatically assume that whatever programs they're doing in English are reaching the Asian-American audience, which is predominantly composed of immigrants.

"They skew highly in terms of a preference to communicate in their native language," he explains. "Most companies will say that Asians are an important audience, but they seem to think that there's a linear progression through which they learn English and right away start using the language and consuming the media."

"We used to refer to Asians in New York as one million people who have never heard of Jerry Seinfeld," Gitlin continues. "It was just a line, but it illustrated the point: [Asian-Americans] are living and working in the same places everybody else is, but their media consumption is entirely different .I think that's something that's still lost on a lot of people."

Gitlin isn't criticizing media execs, nor is he implying ignorance within the media community of one of the country's largest ethnic groups. He merely believes that until a series of misperceptions about the Asian-American market are addressed, media planners and buyers will continue to under-serve what is quickly becoming a vital constituency.

For one, media execs often aren't aware of the vast reach of native-language offerings across every major medium. "We're not talking about one or two newspapers and a radio station," Gitlin notes. "Nationally, there are almost 600 Asian-language media vehicles. More often than not, the biggest challenge for our media planners is picking and choosing among them."

Given this, Gitlin believes the Asian market is a tough nut to crack without an experienced hand guiding a company's efforts. Unlike just about every medium in the United States, the Asian media is largely unaudited, meaning that media pros are usually left without the hard metrics upon which they are used to relying. Similarly, although much consumer research exists, it is often hard to come by unless you know where to look. "This might inhibit the progression of a client up the learning curve," Gitlin concedes. "They'll say, 'I've scratched the surface and I'm not getting much,' then back away from it."

For those companies with the combination of foresight and patience to attempt to make inroads in the Asian-American market - and Gitlin notes that a host of big-ticket categories, ranging from packaged goods to pharmaceuticals to automotives, have almost entirely stayed away - an across-the-board media mix is crucial. Home computer penetration is higher among Asians than among any other ethnic group in the United States, while Asians are considered among the most sophisticated users of the Web. This could open a wealth of online marketing opportunities for any company savvy enough to take advantage of them.

Gitlin cites out-of-home as perhaps the fastest-growing medium, with ads on billboards and shelters achieving particularly strong returns. "In cities like San Francisco or Los Angeles, the Asian communities are densely concentrated geographically," he says. "If a company puts up a billboard in a key location within a community, most of that community is going to see it."

As for the more traditional mediums, newspapers remain the top option for most Asian-Americans ("historically and currently, they've been dominant"). Only here can the population get the breadth of editorial coverage they're used to, despite the growing presence of native-language radio and television stations in metropolitan areas. "If you pick up either of the two daily Chinese newspapers, they're comparable in size and thickness to The New York Times," Gitlin says. "They drill down so much deeper than you'd think they would be able to."