Sydney and Melbourne have vast areas of wonderful cultural diversity concentrated in local communities. Multicultural marketing in these areas is actually reaching the mainstream.

Australia is one of the most multicultural countries in the world.  We may have heard the stats: almost one in four people in Australia were born overseas; one in five speak a language other than English at home.

That’s at a national level, but from a local perspective cultural diversity is even more fascinating.  


SBS has analysed cultural diversity by local government areas in both Sydney and Melbourne.  The result is a series of maps we call SBS hotspots.

Sydney Hotspots Map

In this Sydney hotspot map, the darker red, the stronger the concentration of non-English speaking residents.  And, as you can see, there is a lot of red!  The darkest red indicates areas where more than half of the local population speak a language other than English at home. Fairfield tops the list with almost seven in 10. In fact, seven Sydney council areas present darkest red – so that’s a lot of diversity, predominantly in the west, stretching east from Rockdale out west to Fairfield.  In these areas, more people speak a language other than English at home. Here, multicultural marketing is no longer niche, it’s mainstream marketing.

Westpac, Commonwealth and St George bank are some brands embracing the multicultural market. They actively promote the fact that their branch staff speak major local languages.   

Other businesses are also finding value in speaking local languages, Peter Warren Auto Group in Warwick (just outside of Cabramatta) promote the fact that they have sales consultants that speak a variety of languages, including Vietnamese.

Fairfield Advance local newspaper are a step ahead of the competitors through their community engagement strategy.

“The Fairfield Advance has translated our stories into Vietnamese, Chinese, Laotian, Khmer, Assyrian, Arabic and Italian, but our main three languages are Vietnamese, Chinese and Assyrian. These are the top three languages spoken in our distribution area,” Stacy Farrar, Editor, Fairfield Advance said.

”We started running translations as a way of providing a better service to our many readers who don't have English as a first language. It's been rewarding and well-received. We run them in full on our website at www.fairfieldadvance.com.au and in paper in monthly features.”

Marketers are also seeking to engage with communities through local cultural festivals.  We’re fielding more and more requests by clients in sponsoring SBS Radio’s outside broadcasts for major community festivals such as Moon Festival in Cabramatta and Haldon Street in Lakemba.

When it comes to engaging with culturally diverse communities, it pays to act local.

Doing something in the multicultural marketing and media

Email: thang.ngo@sbs.com.au
www.twitter.com/thangngo