Ethnic Technologies, LLC Celebrates Black History Month

Americans have recognized Black history annually since 1926, first as “Negro History Week” and later as Black History Month.” What you might not know is that black history had barely begun to be studied-or even documented-when the tradition originated. Although Blacks have been in America at least as far back as colonial times, it was not until the 20th century that they gained a respectable presence in the history books.

Blacks Absent from History Books
We owe the celebration of Black History Month, and more importantly, the study of black history, to Dr. Carter D. Woodson. Born to parents who were former slaves, he spent his childhood working in the Kentucky coal mines and enrolled in high school at age twenty. He graduated within two years and later went on to earn a Ph.D. from Harvard. Dr. Woodson was disturbed to find in his studies that history books largely ignored the black American population and when blacks did figure into the picture, it was generally in ways that reflected the inferior social position they were assigned at the time.

Established Journal of Negro History
Woodson, always one to act on his ambitions, decided to take on the challenge of writing black Americans into the nation’s history. He established the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History (now called the Association for the Study of Afro-American Life and History) in 1915, and a year later founded the widely respected Journal of Negro History. In 1926, he launched Negro History Week as an initiative to bring national attention to the contributions of black people throughout American history.

Woodson chose the second week of February for Negro History Week because it marks the birthdays of two men who greatly influenced the black American population, Frederick Douglas and Abraham Lincoln However, February has much more than Douglass and Lincoln to show for its significance in black American history.

As with all aspects of American history, Black history is an indispensable key to understanding the nation’s past, present, and future. Unfortunately, much of this history began with the hundreds of thousands of Africans who reached the United States as slaves between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries. With such an abhorrent beginning, the freedom and other achievements eventually earned by African Americans cannot be simply disregarded. With each new advancement or right gained by African Americans, a new obstacle or restriction followed. The tumultuous beginnings of Black history in the United States, along with the truly admirable perseverance of those who withstood it all are strong parts of the growth of the nation as a whole.

Current Demographics and Lifestyle Attributes
In 2010, the population of African Americans including those of more than one race was estimated at over 42 million, making up 13.6 percent of the total U.S. population.

The Census Bureau projects that by the year 2050, there will be more than 65.7 million African American individuals in the United States, comprising 15 percent of the total U.S. population.

States with the largest percentage of Blacks per total population in 2010 were: Mississippi (38%), Louisiana (33%), Georgia (32 %), Maryland (31%), South Carolina (29%), and Alabama (27%).

States with the largest Black populations in 2010 were: New York (3.3million), Florida (3.2 million), Texas (3.2 million), Georgia (3.1 million), California (2.7 million), and North Carolina (2.2 million).

Marketing to African Americans
When advertising to African American consumers authenticity and specificity are key. Campaign tactics must not only be culturally relevant but must also speak to the diversity of the demography within the African American consumer group.
While traditional channels, like broadcast and radio, remain important, digital mediums are becoming increasingly vital and applicable to marketers seeking to engage multicultural audiences and segments within them.

Nielsen data validates that African Americans are dynamic and engaged consumers in the digital marketplace. Often early adaptors (driven by lower median age demos) have taken to wireless devices in strong numbers. As an example, smart phone adoption among African American mobile subscribers is at 52% and above compared with 45% for the general market. One driver is the younger median age of African Americans contributing to a larger percentage of the nation’s youth. Also, as these devices get more price competitive, cost conscious consumers seeking internet access see smart phones as viable alternatives to home broadband setups.

As such, African Americans are more likely to access the Internet, send and receive messages via text or email, interact with social media and produce or publish content using their mobile phones. African Americans over-index in digital behaviors like tweeting and blogging while consuming more Internet video and mobile video than other consumer segments.

Ethnic Technologies, LLC – African American Insight
Ethnic Technologies, LLC is the platinum standard in multicultural marketing. The result of over 40 years of continuous ethnic, religious and language preference research, E-Tech allows clients to segment their database by ethnicity, religion, language preference and country of origin more accurately and comprehensively than any other approach.

E-Tech uses unique linguistic and onomastic rules for identifying different African American consumer segments. After coding their specific names, E-Tech does a neighborhood analysis using multi-sourced information compiled from our analytics team. Using that data, E-Tech accurately identifies an African American individuals’ Country of Origin. The application of Enhanced Neighborhood Analytics (ENA) technology in E-Tech Version 8.1 establishes a new and unprecedented level of granularity in multicultural marketing.

Clients can also benefit from acquiring ethnic mailing, telemarketing and email lists covering both the US and Canada.  E-Tech’s Analytics Group offers ethnic data appending (enhancement) and demographic mapping providing marketers and advertisers with an overview of current customer penetration in existing markets and business potential in new markets.

Contact Karen Sinisi, Sales and Marketing Director at 866-333-8324 ext. 117 or karens@ethnictechnologies.com. Visit www.ethnictechnologies.com.

E-Tech ® and The EthniCenter ® are registered trademarks of Ethnic Technologies, LLC

Sources
DayInBlackHistory.com Team
The History of Black History by Elissa Haney