Information outreach: campaign linked to health outcomes. (Ethnic Marketing).

A new fundraising effort by the American Heart Association (AHA) seeks to tap into the growing Latino market. Despite programs that have been turning risk factors into healthy outcomes for four years, the fundraising department has yet to take advantage of its results with this population.

"This is more of an outreach than ever," said Janet Brooks, vice president of minority initiatives for the Dallas-based AHA. "We need to show what our programs are doing so donors become aware of the effort and needs of the organization."

The African-American community suffers the highest death rate from stroke compared to any other group, although the Latino population is close, according to Brooks. Both suffer at rates greater than society as a whole.

The fundraising campaign will start after AHA analyzes information from the New York City-based Lumina Americas Inc., an integrated marketing firm about nuances in the Latino market, "Lumina has completed a competitive analysis about how other organizations reach out to this population," she said. "They will help us develop a strategy to target the Latino market."

The AHA runs community-based programs that can measure awareness of heart conditions. Outcome reports reveal that risk factors have been reduced and the organization tracks the impact on the Latino community.

"We have a hands-on program through churches and community centers," she said. "A six-month to two-year program teaches risk factors and prevention instead of just giving out literature."

The programs give explicit instructions about daily living behavior that includes cooking to show how to avoid problems with such food as lard or other saturated fats. The teaching stresses alternatives so people come away with a new view about changing their lives.

"The programs give them tools they need to make foods interesting," Brooks said. "As long as the food tastes good they will change behavior so we have to be creative to cross cultural barries."

In some areas the risk factors have been reduced such as cholesterol levels going down. Changed levels of inactivity arise because of greater exercise from efforts like walking clubs within church groups.

"We complete a pre-and post-assessment within a year," Brooks said. "The awareness of obesity has increased and one group lost 30 to 40 pounds on average per person."

However, such a success was not reflected in fundraising with the Latino population. "We saw the Latino was a missing segment for us," said Suzie Upton, vice president of development. "We didn't have any fundraising appeals that were attractive to the Latino population."

The AHA recognized this population as a growing sector of the society. "Latinos represent 13 percent of the entire population but our volunteer ranks and donors don't match that number."

The AHA turned to Lumina because of its reputation in the Latino market. "We hired them to help us look at what health organizations are doing to educate the Latino population and how they were raising money," she said. "One person in two faces problems with heart conditions but that figure is slightly higher with the Latino population."

She explained that the AHA is in the very early stages of implementing a strategy. Lumina's preliminary report from focus groups in Miami and Houston recommended strategies about testing some mail pieces. "We're taking that report through our analysis and trying to decide how to move forward," she said.

Upton indicated that some Latinos are aware of the AHA's success, however, many are not. "We aren't at the point of understanding what the key differences are in structuring our message, and for now we have just put our toes in the water," she said. "We have to figure out how to increase that awareness."

The AHA seeks to increase the awareness about how its risk factor focus is helping the very population where new donors exist. "We want to be able to move the needle so people will respond because they know what we are about," Upton said. "Success of our awareness campaign will be based on more people receiving information."

According to David Perez, president and founder of Lumina, many segments exist because recent arrivals from immigrants could form one market where many are low-income and low-educated people. However, another market includes those born and raised in the United States where the first language is English.

"The marketplace is a speech thing," he said. "Accents and culture differ between the Mexican-dominated part of the Latino population in the West and the Cuban, Puerto Rican sector in the Northeast."

Lumina conducts specific research to understand attitudes about brands and gives advice about which media to use to target consumers. In its report for the AHA, the firm examined what consumers think of the mission and service of the AHA. "Through data analysis we are able to discern varying degrees of probability about who are the existing Latino customers for the AHA," he said.

For example, Lumina could devise a strategy to reach a target of 21-to 40-year old women who speak Spanish who are the heads of households with two children, and make all of the purchases for the home.

Recommendations could include direct response mailing to acquire new donors or an awareness focus that involves traditional advertising, billboards and radio spots.

"A strategy may also include promotions in street fairs in Miami, Los Angeles or New York," he said. "The presence of an organization that participates in the fairs and develops Latino Web sites brings the organization closer to the community."

Different messages are needed to recognize culturally relevant factors. "Communications that speak to hearts and souls might not be the same communications that speak to the ears," he said. "Some people might converse well in English, but they could feel more comfortable in reading information about financial or health issues that comes in Spanish."

Lumina has designed sites like comidakraft.com, a Latino targeted Web presence for Kraft that increased a community of 30,000 registered members over ten months.

"We tied in the Web address with their traditional advertising and have direct email campaigns that have been effective in driving people to the site," he said.

The exact nature of the new AHA campaign is being formulated now. The organization wants to communicate the theme of its usual message to a specific audience. "I don't think our message will change," Upton said. "We want our message to show that risk factors are warning signs."

One preliminary finding could affect the tone of the message. Focus groups revealed that once the Latino population has an awareness of what the AHA does, it would consider health issues as crucial because the family stands out as a vital part of the community.

One cultural difference occurs with how Latinos share information about health issues. The society in general will have the nuclear family making decisions. However, the Latino family depends on extended family members who participate with decisions.

"They want health organizations to provide information that is easy to understand and we have to figure out how to do that," she said.

The AHA fundraising has long segmented donors by age, and behavior or frequency. "These techniques have not necessarily been applied to the Latino market," she said. "The resulting material might not be with direct mail; We're trying to discover the best vehicle to reach the audience right now."

Tom Pope is a New York City- based journalist who writes about management issues.