What if you could build connections with a broader population to make more consumers feel valued and want to support your business?

Being inclusive involves adding more representation of different ages, genders, races, abilities, sexual orientations to make your marketing story more accessible to a wider audience. By including more people in your branding, you are demonstrating that your products are for everyone.

Inclusive marketing involves more than distancing your business from oppressive behavior. The goal is instead to:

• Diversify mainstream media
• Offer more opportunities for marginalized groups in marketing
• Feature voices and stories from marginalized groups
• Reduce cultural bias and stereotypes often established through media
• Create projects that dignify people and make them feel respected

Why Inclusive Marketing Matters

Sharing the same stories from the same people will make your branding monotonous. By telling more diverse stories and representing a wide range of target consumers in your marketing campaign, you’re elevating your business intrigue. Your company will show that you are multidimensional and appreciate a diverse set of consumers who want to feel heard and seen in the world.

Many groups have been historically marginalized and exempt from the mainstream. By excluding voices, you’re not giving your audience the entire story. You’re also intensely limiting your marketing scope, as audiences could have a more challenging time imagining themselves enjoying your products or services if they don’t see people like them using them.

Creating inclusive marketing campaigns makes the mainstream more dynamic and attractive to a wider audience. By including people from marginalized, oppressed, or minority groups in your ads, more people will connect with your company. You will notice that being inclusive in your marketing will involve positive public reception, as people understand that your brand ultimately supports equality.

How Inclusive Marketing Can Impact Your Business

The concept is quite simple: by representing more people in your inclusive marketing ads, more people will want to support your company. If children see other kids that look like them enjoying fun toys, they’ll be more likely to want that toy. If you have curly hair and see someone with curly hair promoting a shampoo, you may choose to try it.

According to a recent Google study, the demographics that see themselves involved in business promotions will, in fact, be responsive and want to invest. The results revealed that 69% of black consumers were more likely to invest in a brand that reflects them positively. 71% of LGBTQIA+ consumers also shared they will more likely respond to an ad if its branding includes people with their sexual orientation.

By positively reflecting groups that have been historically excluded from marketing videos, you’ll likely experience a boost in your sales. Authentic, inclusive marketing ads will make people feel more welcomed by your company and feel comfortable supporting it.

When considering the business benefits of genuine, inclusive marketing videos, there are several ways your company will gain. Appropriately reflecting demographics will begin a positive ripple effect. You will:

• Expand your business reach
• Improve consumer retention and loyalty
• Promote consumer engagement
• Improve your company reputation
• Boost business sales
• Increase profits

Measure Your Company’s Diversity and Inclusivity

As you understand the value of inclusive marketing, it’s helpful first to look within and determine where your brand stands. Consider your company culture and whether you truly “walk the talk.” If your business is driven by the same inclusive goals you want to exhibit in your marketing videos, your branding will be more genuine and authentic. Take time to review your past ads and campaigns to recognize missing demographics that fall under your target audience.

While it’s challenging to measure your inclusivity tactically, there are methods available to help companies track their progress and learn where they could improve. Having an awareness of your business and being accountable is the first significant step to reshaping your brand to promote equality and appeal to more expansive, diverse audiences.

Who Needs More Representation

As you approach your inclusive marketing advertisement campaign, it helps to know the marginalized groups that deserve more representation:

• Racial/cultural minorities
• People with cognitive impairment and developmental disorders
• Persons with visual and hearing challenges
• People with physical challenges
• People with mental health conditions
• LGBTQIA+ community
• Seniors
• Immigrants
• People with varying body types that stray from defined, limiting beauty standards
• Impoverished groups

So you want to make your marketing media more inclusive, but how do you proceed? Whose voices should be shared more through your branding?

Remember to remain focused on your target audience. Like any strategic branding, your advertisements will only be effective if you promote your products and services to people who need them or would want them. However, as you take more measures to be inclusive and diversify your following, it’s worth being open-minded about who your target audience is.

Consider the needs that your business meets rather than limiting your target consumer identity to one group. For example, makeup is not just for girls. However, the target users would be people who care about aesthetics, beauty, glamor, and so on. This will help you expand your target audience and who should be included in your ads while remaining focused and appealing to your potential consumers. By revisiting your target audience and expanding it, you can determine who to involve in your ads. From there, you can find the best strategy for planning a respectful, impactful, inclusive marketing campaign.

Researching How to Represent Groups Accurately

By conducting thorough research, you can effectively represent your diverse target audience in a dignified manner. It’s essential to understand your marginalized consumers’ needs, wants, and motivations. That way, you can target their pain points with empathy to establish a connection that will strengthen your consumer loyalty.

To find who should be represented in your campaigns, consider your current and potential new consumers. Who is buying your product, and who else do you want to reach that could be interested?

Your inclusive marketing should involve inclusive consultation, too. Analyze data about these groups and how you can include them in your video marketing. Use focus groups, review polls, and conduct other studies to further understand how to appeal to your diverse target audience. As you comprehend their points of view through your research, you will know how to share them through your media authentically.

In the past, organizations’ efforts to share diverse perspectives in their ads ended up lacking taste and encouraging stereotypes. If your inclusive ads are not well-planned, they could end up offending groups. Another poor result is that people will perceive your inclusive marketing as a PR stunt rather than a genuine effort to make more people feel seen and heard.

So how do you proceed along these delicate lines? How can you represent groups sensitively and accurately without crossing any boundaries?

1. An Inclusive and Realistic Script

As you start getting down to your marketing video’s brass tax, it’s time to develop your script. You’ve done your research on how to represent marginalized members within your target audience, and now it’s time to put it into your scriptwriting.

Writing an easy-to-follow, natural, yet impactful marketing video script is a fine art. You’ll need to organically promote your business values along with specific products or services in a way that will catch your diverse audience’s attention. You will also count on your script to outline the associated visuals for your marketing video.

When creating an inclusive, realistic script for your ad, you will need to choose the right theme, plot, and language conventions to connect with your target audience. What dynamics can you include in your writing to catch your viewers’ attention and motivate consumers to act? Is the language inclusive?

Some methods you can implement to ensure your script will appeal to diverse viewers include:

• Implement people-first language, which highlights the person before their social labels. Include descriptive characteristics only if it is organic.
• Avoid limiting language, like idioms and slang, that only applies to a specific group and excludes other demographics.
• When empathizing with your audience, avoid harsh terms like “victim,” “suffering,” and so on. This adds negative connotations around their lifestyle that could be offensive or turn them away from investing.
• Learn about affirmative terms and negative terms to understand the best inclusive language practices when discussing marginalized groups.

2. Hiring actors from non-represented groups

Your casting will be the primary visual cue for your marketing video viewers to see your company’s inclusive values. However, there are some practices you should follow to cast your video with people who will represent your brand:

• Envision multiple people playing your script roles. Have an open mind about the characters and how their personality or identity could be well-portrayed by a range of people from different demographics.
• Source your talent from multiple outlets to expand and diversify your casting pool.
• Avoid bias in your casting process by consulting with multiple team members to choose your actors.

3. Hiring a diversity consultant

When casting and planning your inclusive marketing video, consult with fellow team members who understand the groups you represent. They will be well-versed in inclusive language, pain points of marginalized groups, and how to exhibit genuine empathy in your marketing.

Hiring a committed diversity consultant could benefit your campaign to ensure you effectively represent the demographics included in your inclusive marketing ad. This will prevent the chances of offending groups or excluding demographics that would want access to your products and services. Your consultant will guide you to keep your content respectful and accurate so your viewers will feel included in your brand messaging and want to invest in your products.

Hiring a diversity consultant will support your inclusive marketing efforts, but it’s important to hire a diverse staff or crew, too. Involving people with different backgrounds and life experiences in your video marketing process will offer a range of perspectives to create a successful project. That way, you can appeal to your broad audience in a genuine, authentic manner. 

What Makes an Inclusive Video Set?

While your inclusive marketing video set will require a diverse cast and crew, there are also positive behaviors and actions you will need to exhibit. To ensure everyone feels respected and valued on your set, you should:

• Compensate your diverse staff with fair wages
• Eliminate micro-aggressions and subconscious negative connotations when addressing or discussing marginalized individuals
• Work with a diversity consultant to review statistics on group demographics to ensure authentic representation
• Be kind, open-minded, and accepting toward all team members involved

Benefits of Diverse and Inclusive Marketing

By taking steps to be an inclusive business, you can make a massive impact in a hopeful future for people from all walks of life. You are opening more doors for members of demographics that have been historically excluded from opportunities. Your inclusive branding will involve broadening your target audience and representing consumers who have felt “invisible” due to lack of inclusion in mainstream culture. These actions will impact media as you integrate more marginalized groups into the mainstream, ultimately showing that they deserve to be heard and should feel welcome in media and all platforms. 

Your inclusive marketing advertisements also demonstrate that your products and services are available to anyone who wants them. People will recognize the accessibility of your goods and services. A well-produced marketing video with diverse casting and quality writing will help your company reach a wider audience. You’ll experience more active consumers from a range of demographics who want to support businesses that support them.

Inclusivity will ultimately bring your business a loyal customer base and a positive, long-lasting reputation. You could change the world of marketing by being kind, open-minded, and respectful to all people.

To create a memorable, influential, inclusive marketing video for your ad campaign, trust the Dream It Reel experts. Our filmmakers will work with you through all steps of your marketing video planning and execution to share your branding with a broad consumer base. We will promote your company’s story through empathetic storytelling and high-quality filmmaking methods.

Let us help you create video marketing media that will make a difference. Schedule a Dream it Reel demo today.