Hispanic Millennials: The First Mobile-First Generation

Research Brief: From the Center for Media Research

 by Jack Loechner, Apr 14, 2014, 6:15 AM

According to a report from Univision and the Interactive Advertising Bureau, there are 17 million Hispanic millennials in the United States today that are between the ages of 18-30 years old, and 76% of U.S. Hispanic adults, with a mobile device, own a smartphone, up from 67% of the overall population.

The respondents owned an average of five different mobile devices, and viewed owning their first smartphone as a major life moment. Marketers are particularly interested in this demographic because the group over-indexes on mobile and gives marketers some insight into what marketing will look like in the coming years, says the report.

Joe Laszlo, senior director of the Mobile Marketing Center of Excellence at the IAB, says “… …millennials are living their lives in a slightly different way than the rest of us because smartphones… (have been) such a part of their lives for such a long time… “

One of the more interesting findings from the “US Hispanic Millennials: Portraits of a Mobile-First Generation,” is that Hispanic millennials do not view a difference between being online and offline. In fact, this group only views themselves as going offline when they want to hide or make themselves unavailable to others, says the report.

Marshall Cohen, executive vice president of corporate research at Univision Communications, observed that “… all these devices… (are) now all in one place [with] the convenience of the smartphone…”said, New York.

When it comes to specific mobile tactics, SMS is a key part in how millennial Hispanics interact with their mobile devices, while email is viewed as a more formal marketing medium. And these consumers are devouring social media from their smartphones and tablets, says the report. Facebook and Instagram were singled out as the two most used social platforms. Twitter was the third most-used platform.

Finally, according to the research, millennials are receptive to mobile advertising as long as it is relevant and contextual to their everyday lives.