Truthset Reveals Underrepresentation For Hispanic Audiences In Consumer Data Sets

Truthset, the leading data validation-as-a-service offering, today released new results detailing how the overall data industry is currently underrepresenting the Hispanic population in the United States.

A Q2 2023 study revealed that the data industry includes just 58% of Hispanic audiences in the U.S. With 42% of Hispanic audiences not recorded in data sets, advertisers can’t properly allocate targeted ad spend, while content owners are missing opportunities to develop more programming for Hispanic viewers.

Unfortunately, the underrepresentation for Hispanic audiences is not a new development. Over the past eight quarters, Truthset found that the overall data industry never accounted for more than 62% of this audience (in Q2 2022), though has shown marginal improvements since a low of 53% in Q3 2021.

In 2022, U.S. Census results indicated that 19% of the adult population was Hispanic, equating to about 50 million people. Missing over 40% of that audience means data sets are not accounting for at least 20 million people.

“Underrepresentation is a crucial issue for the entire data industry, and despite greater investment in marketing to multicultural audiences, accuracy around those datasets has not made significant improvements,” said Chip Russo, President and CRO, Truthset. “Until consumer data fairly and accurately reflects the cultural makeup of the population, we’re all falling short of our true capabilities and responsibilities as an industry.”

Notably, Hispanic audiences were also accurately identified 89% of the time in Q2 2023. Meaning that when the data industry at-large included Hispanic audiences, there was a very high chance of accuracy – making that data all the more valuable to make decisions on. Where datasets currently lack a representation sample, however, render that potential accuracy less valuable.

Truthset works with a variety of stakeholders across the supply chain including networks, brands and platforms, powering everything from data validation, to audience building and measurement. Truthset also plays an integral role in data accuracy movements from trade organizations such as Coalition for Innovative Media Measurement (CIMM), Association of National Advertisers’ Alliance for Inclusive and Multicultural Marketing (AIMM) and the Advertising Research Foundation (ARF).