The African American population, with a median age of 30, is five years younger thanthe U.S. population, on average.
The African American population is expected to grow more than twice as fast as theCaucasian population between 1995 and 2020, reaching 45 million.
In 1998, 55 percent of African Americans lived in the South, yet the cities with thehighest African American population are not in the South.
In 2000, there were 8.7 million African American households, nearly half of themmarried.
For Merrill Lynch, all this information, plus its own proprietary information, helpedto design an advertising campaign targeting affluent African Americans. The companyidentified two clear priorities: the need for more community involvement from companiesAfrican Americans do business with and the need for more education about financial ser-vices. Merrill Lynch developed a series of financial-education programs for affluentAfrican Americans in Chicago and hosted three seminars————one targeted to small-businessowners, another for individual investors, and the third designed for clergy and nonprofitorganizations.7 More than 1,300 African Americans participated in the three seminars andMerrill Lynch acquired over $200,000 in new business.
Education The level of education attained by consumers is also an influence on theadvertising strategy. According to the 2000 Census （Figure 4.2） statistics show that U.S.males attain higher levels of education than U.S. females. Also, income corresponds withgender, regardless of level of education. As far as race is a factor, generally white U.S. con-sumers attain higher levels of education than blacks and Hispanics.
For advertisers, education tends to correlate with the type of medium consumers pre-fer, as well as the specific elements or programs within a medium. Consumers with lowereducation are higher users of television, especially cable. Consumers with hig
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