How to Market to People Not Like You: "Know It or Blow It" Rules for Reaching Diverse Customers

Chapter 13. Asians and Asian-Americans: The Highest Household Income of Any Racial or Ethnic Group

From a marketing perspective, the strength of the Asian population is pretty irrefutable. It's the largest population in the world, numbering nearly 8 billion as of this writing, and in the United States and Canada, Asian-Americans have the highest household income of any race or ethnicity. So whether you're trying to sell shoes in China or home mortgages in Canada, learning about the Asian market is worth your time.

So what is the definition of Asian? It varies from country to country around the world, but the most common definition is a person who descends from East Asia, South Asia, and Southeast Asia. Here are some (but not all) of the groups that are considered to be Asian:

Chinese	Filipino	Yemeni
Pakistani	Korean	Thai
Vietnamese	Lebanese	Burmese
Iranian	Sri Lankan	Sakha
Japanese	Afghani	Nepali
Syrian	Iraqi	Malaysian
Cambodian	Bangladeshi	Jordanian
Palestinian	Laotian	Tibetan
Taiwanese	Indonesian	Mongolian
Saudi	Singaporian

THE U.S. ASIAN POPULATION

Current estimates indicate that about 5 percent of the U.S. population report themselves as having either full or partial Asian heritage (approximately 15 million people). The largest ethnic subgroups are Chinese, Filipinos, Indians, Vietnamese, Koreans, and Japanese. Other sizable groups are Cambodian/Khmer, Pakistanis, Laotians, Hmong, and Thais. Figure 13.1 shows the percentage of the composition of several key groups of Asian-Americans.

The Asian-American population ...