Last year, many agencies and companies took a hard look in the mirror and offered commitments around diversity, equity, and inclusion. We saw promises to spend more on minority-owned media as well as pushes to hire more diversity officers. Not all came to fruition.

One agency, TBWA\Chiat\Day LA, has established a dedicated multicultural practice made up of four full-time employees working internally and with clients to ensure that the agency’s outputs reflect its DEI commitments. About a half dozen other staff from across agency disciplines like accounts, strategy, and creative contribute part-time to the division.

• Its lead, Oyinda Elias, told Marketing Brew that forming the practice was in part an effort to formalize what was often a side job for her. She said her decade of experience at various agencies often saw her working on multicultural issues, even if that wasn’t technically part of her role.
  
• “I would have to really raise my hand to say, ‘Hey, we have additional opportunities here that we can actually do,’” Elias said. “I think people are starting to also recognize that it’s actually beneficial to their bottom line.”

By December 2020, after months of piloting it across agency departments, she was leading a fully operational multicultural practice.

“General audience”

A core piece of her approach to this work, Elias said, is that the “general audience” so many marketers are trying to reach is far more diverse and multifaceted than brands typically account for.

“The idea of the traditional, general market, which for so long has served as a proxy to mean white and caucasian—that’s actually dead,” Elias said.

The Census Bureau projects that white people will account for less than half of the US population by 2045. While that statistical outlook is two decades away, Elias said the country is feeling the impact of the demographic shift today.

• For instance, credit goes to Black influence for popularizing things like sneaker culture, streetwear, and hip-hop. And some say engagement from Black Twitter was key in igniting the “chicken sandwich wars.”
• A report from the University of Georgia’s Selig Center for Economic Growth shows African Americans had a buying power of $1.6 trillion in 2020, up 61% from 2010.

Getting it right: Elias explained that the multicultural practice gets involved at various stages of a campaign’s development—anywhere from reviewing RFPs to production to media placement—in order to reach target audiences in a “culturally relevant way.”

“We’re seeing a slow, growing understanding of the real impact of media on people’s everyday lives, meaning the role of media in creating and furthering stereotypes, and how negative stereotypes are intrinsically tied to racist beliefs,” Elias said. “We have to hold ourselves accountable to use our influence as media for good.”

Click here to read about a partnership Elias forged through the multicultural practice and how the division acts as an internal resource for agency staff.—ZS

Good news: You can now try and make some $$ from that homemade fall vegetarian chili recipe you considered posting on Pinterest. Today, the platform is debuting “Creator Rewards,” a program that pays people for posts if they get enough engagement. As of now, it’s only running in the US, but will go global next year.

Pinterest said the barrier to entry is “really low”—creators must live in the US, be over the age of 18, and have at least 1,000 followers. Eligible creators also need to have three Idea Pins on their profile, which are basically Pinterest’s answer to stories (except they don’t disappear).

• According to the company, creators will “get paid based on whether their content meets all general content criteria and goal-specific criteria.” For instance, Pinterest might ask someone to make a fall-themed Idea Pin, paying them $100 if it gets five “takes,” a new feature that lets users put their own spin on a creator’s piece of content.
• Paid and promoted content do not count. And Pinterest is reviewing submissions manually.
• The company is setting aside $20 million “for Creator Rewards and other initiatives to support creators.”

The program is Pinterest’s latest attempt to make its platform more attractive to creators. In July, for instance, it rolled out a way for creators to make their Idea Pins shoppable.

Zoom out: Other platforms, like Snapchat and Facebook, also have programs that pay creators.

+1: PayPal is considering buying Pinterest, per Bloomberg.

If you can’t keep track of which actor is playing Batman these days, this could make things even more confusing.

At DC Comics’s FanDome event this weekend, Little Caesars invited TikTokers to make videos where they act as the superhero for a chance to be cast in a commercial cross-promoting the pizza chain and the movie The Batman, coming in March 2022.

• Entries need to use the hashtag #BeLikeTheBatman and tag the Little Caesars account.
• As of Wednesday morning, the hashtag had 6.7 million views on TikTok. However, that’s not an automatic indication of the engagement the campaign is getting, as many TikTokers use official hashtags to try to propel unrelated videos to the For You page.

Many companies are using a combination of fandom and user-generated content to promote themselves on TikTok. Gatorade recently held virtual tryouts to assemble a “Social Squad” of amateur athletes to promote its brand on the app, while Disney and Chipotle also recently established programs to get their top fans to make content.

Name in lights: For Little Caesars, the goal is not just to farm social media for promotional content, but also to find talent for a commercial. Legal copy in the TikTok announcement says entrants must be able to travel to Los Angeles in November if selected.—ZS

There are a lot of bad marketing tips out there. These aren’t those.

What’s next: Gaze into the crystal ball: Here are Social Media Today’s 26 predictions for social media marketing in 2022.

Purchases: If you don’t know what “community commerce” is, this study might be able to help.

Metrics: You can’t make a cake with the same measuring cup for flour and butter, so don’t use the same measurements for ads, either. These are the top seven video metrics to measure.

Slide into this DM diary: Get a sneak peek into the mind of ManyChat—the Instagram automation tool helping businesses and influencers up their Instagram game. Check out their diary entries here.*

^{*This is sponsored advertising content}

Stat: Netflix earned 4.4 million subscribers this quarter and expects to earn 8.5 million in Q4 .

Quote: “Neither Chief Hoskin or anyone in his administration has ever expressed the idea that the company’s use of our name is a great honor.”—A spokesperson from the Cherokee Nation, after Jeep CEO Christian Meunier said he’d heard from “a lot of people from the nation that love the name. They think it’s an honor to have their nation’s name on a great car.”

Read: The founder of Allbirds said in 2020 it was profitable. For the most part, it wasn’t. Cryptocurrency tether said it was completely backed by real US currency. The truth was...a bit more complicated. Ranjan Roy explains why companies are acting like teenagers.

We’re a week away from October’s The CTA event with Wieden+Kennedy’s Dr. Marcus Collins. Make sure to sign up for next week’s (free!) event on October 27, at 1:30pm ET. Especially if you’re a marketer that:

1. Wants to better understand WTF brand purpose means
2. Is confused about integrating brand purpose into marketing efforts

Catch up on a few Marketing Brew stories you might have missed.

• This company says it can measure attention
• What iSpot saw in Q3
• Who is Twitter following?