The Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) community is highly diverse and the fastest-growing segment within the United States population. According to a Pew Research report, the AAPI population has nearly doubled since 2000 and is projected to surpass 46 million by 2060, nearly four times the current total. A significant portion of the population identifies as Chinese, Filipino, Korean, Vietnamese, Indian, Japanese, and Pacific Islander. Each segment has its own language, culture, and traditions. Honoring these differences, as well as featuring diverse Asian identities in your marketing campaigns, will help your organization connect with this growing demographic of consumers in a meaningful way.
Not to mention, AAPI consumers made up about $1 trillion in buying power and are expected to grow to $1.3 trillion this year. By next year, it will continue to grow to $1.6 trillion. Marketing campaigns that resonate with AAPI consumers generate even more revenue and brand loyalty, especially if they can connect to the AAPI community in an authentic way instead of relying on stereotypes or old tropes.
Tip #1 Learn, listen, and platform AAPI stories with community-based partners and AAPI-led businesses
A common mistake in the United States is to treat the AAPI community as monolithic, which overlooks the rich diversity found within it. According to Julie Wang, “storytelling is one of the most important tools in our arsenal as communications professionals, and it’s one of the most powerful ways to promote equity and inclusion.” If your company wishes to foster trust with your AAPI audience, you must be willing to connect to their individualized stories.
The AAPI community is so diverse that telling the stories of one segment to reflect all segments isolates and discriminates, and leads your marketing campaigns to look tone-deaf. You humanize your audience when your marketing team listens to and acknowledges the uniqueness within each segment of the community and celebrates their distinctions.
Reach out to AAPI social media influencers and other small and/or local businesses within the community to understand what shapes their identity. Make a concerted effort to like, follow, share, and amplify their voices on your platform to celebrate their culture from their point of view.
Your organization may want to try partnering with AAPI-led businesses or individuals from the community to celebrate special holidays and celebrations, incorporating appropriate cultural traditions. It is important that when you do this, it may be a great opportunity to give the lead over to or platform these community-based partners and AAPI-led businesses instead of centering your organization, so cultural traditions are appropriately reflected instead of appropriated.
For example, Elix, a New York-based health supplement brand focusing on Chinese herbal medicine, incorporated a few Chinese cultural traditions for its 2023 Lunar New Year marketing campaign. When their audience buys one of their products, accompanied it would be a red envelope, that symbolizes prosperity, protection, and good health in the Chinese tradition. That envelope would be full of “cash” and vouchers that could be used to go towards buying future products from the company and complimentary health coaching sessions with doctors of Chinese medicine. Elix’s founder, Lulu Ge, is a Chinese American from California, so this campaign incorporated her cultural traditions. But, what was quite effective about this campaign is that even though it referenced Chinese culture, it was relevant to all of its audience, the brand, and the holiday, and supported their audience’s future needs.
Tip #2 Develop authentic community-based partnerships on social media and invest in social causes that matter to them
Asian American Heritage month is in May, and though it may be a good idea to honor that month with a marketing campaign geared towards the AAPI community, it shouldn’t be the only time your company attempts to connect. Take time throughout the year to meet, learn from, and connect with AAPI business and community leaders to build genuine relationships and explore mutually beneficial multi-year partnerships. Connect to their families’ stories that have shaped their lived experiences.
Social media can be a great tool for connecting to AAPI influencers, celebrities, and activists. Host social media events with prominent members of the AAPI community and discuss social issues that their community is interested in. Asian American consumers care about causes; in fact, 26% of AAPI consumers are more likely to support your brand if it supports a cause. Pledge money or collaborate on GoFundMe campaigns to support the AAPI community to end systemic problems derived from racism and anti-immigration sentiments.
This can be especially powerful now, given the current socio-political climate. Since early 2020, at the start of the pandemic, there has been a rise in AAPI hate crimes. Nearly 3,000 hate incidents have been recorded since then that have taken place against the AAPI community. Your organization can show genuine support and allyship by building genuine partnerships that contribute to the cause #StopAsianHate and to nonprofit organizations and foundations working on initiatives supporting social justice and equality for this community.
Tip #3 Invest in digital content strategies that actually resonate
The digital space is very important to the AAPI community. 74% of Asian American consumers shopped online in the past three months, particularly on Amazon. Streaming video, social media, and E-sports are all strongly supported by the community, and 25% of Asian American consumers are considered “cord-cutters,” i.e., relying on wireless or internet-based services. In a nutshell, the majority of media consumption by this community is digital first.
Also, online ratings and reviews are particularly important within the AAPI community, and 24% believe that ratings and reviews are an essential reason for social media. 50% of Asian Americans are likelier to use the internet/apps for consumer reviews. Not to mention 53% of Asian Americans believe their spouse significantly impacts the brands they buy from, and 42% said they are influenced by their children’s choices. It is imperative that your company listens and engages with the feedback you are receiving from this community, as they value insights and reviews from those they most trust, which can have a significant impact on the growth of your brand.
Consider incorporating diverse consumer reviews on key pages of your website or other high-traffic pages where you can demonstrate transparency between your brand and your ideal consumer base. You can also share ratings in your social posts, featuring consumer experiences, including their direct quotes, as well as sharing their reviews in your email campaigns. When you are leveraging your company’s reputation to drive more multicultural consumer engagement, your organization should consider featuring reviews from a multicultural consumer base.
Generally, in order to reach this community, your organization has to be willing to invest in reaching this audience online. Use social media as a way to connect with your audience and find out what is relevant to them and what type of content they are following and supporting. Utilize paid ad campaigns to share exclusive offers, coupons, or other discounts to reach your audience.
Tip #4 Support your local and national AAPI chamber of commerce
Supporting or becoming a member of your local or national AAPI chamber of commerce opens up so many doors to positively impact the AAPI community. It allows your company to find partnerships with local AAPI-led businesses that you can amplify and learn from. It gives your business the opportunity to get involved in projects that can positively impact AAPI neighborhoods. It will allow your company to learn directly from the AAPI community’s lived experiences.
Your company also has the opportunity to hear the concerns of the AAPI community and can start to think of ways your brand solves their pain points.
There are two national Chamber of Commerce branches that you can support and invest in: the National Asian/Pacific Islander American Chamber of Commerce and Entrepreneurship, which advocates for economic development and community building for AAPI entrepreneurs; and the US Pan Asian American Chamber of Commerce Education Foundation (USPAACC), which serves as an education and networking organization. You can also discover which of your local AAPI Chamber of Commerce to support in the directory.
Tip #5 Hire a multicultural marketing expert who understands the community
Your company’s employees should reflect the diversity of the audience that your products or services serve. And it is worth reiterating that when you operationalize diversity, equity, and inclusion at every level of your organization, your marketing campaigns will more accurately reflect the lived experience of your diverse audience.
Your company must incorporate that with a marketing team and experts who are also multicultural and who understand the AAPI audience segments that are within the community. A diverse marketing team and consultants can inform authentic strategies for supporting and connecting with AAPI communities, including knowing which marketing channels connect the most with these consumers in an authentic and intentional way. Plus, they can engage in research and data-driven insights that introduce varied AAPI lived experiences that reflect the diversity within the community.
This is particularly helpful for social media campaigns. Many AAPI consumers identify as multicultural and use multiple social media apps such as: Tiktok, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Snapchat, etc. Working with diverse marketing experts can help you create meaningful cross-channel campaigns that utilize effective tones across each channel that speaks to multicultural AAPI audiences. If your brand wants to target a particular segment of the AAPI community, particularly the Chinese American community, it may be helpful to work with a marketing expert who would be familiar with creating campaigns for popular social media channels WeChat and Little Red Book, two apps that are heavily used for obtaining useful shopping information.
