What Is Transcreation? Why Culturally-Relevant Marketing Goes Beyond Translation

By Wilson Camelo, President & CMO, Camelo Communication
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If you’re a marketer trying to reach Hispanic or diverse audiences, this distinction matters more than you might think. Translation tells people what you said. Transcreation makes them feel what you meant.

If your organization serves multicultural communities — whether you’re a brand, a government agency, a healthcare system, or a nonprofit — this isn’t just a nice-to-know. It’s the difference between being heard and being ignored.

Why This Matters Now: The Numbers Behind the Shift

The U.S. is in the middle of a major demographic shift, and Hispanics are at the center of it. Between 2022 and 2023, the Hispanic population accounted for nearly 71% of all U.S. population growth, reaching over 65 million people — almost one in five Americans.[1] By 2024, that number crossed 68 million, with Latinos driving more than half of all U.S. population growth since 2000.[2]

The economic story is just as compelling. U.S. Latino GDP hit $4.1 trillion in 2023 — the equivalent of the world’s fifth-largest economy, bigger than Canada’s or South Korea’s. Latino purchasing power is growing 2.4 times faster than the national average.[3]

Let that sink in. This isn’t a niche audience. These are the primary growth drivers of the American economy. And yet, many organizations still think translating their English materials into Spanish is good enough.

It’s not.

Translation vs. Transcreation: What’s Actually Different?

At a glance, the two might sound similar. They’re not. Translation converts words from one language to another, prioritizing accuracy. Transcreation recreates the entire message — emotion, cultural context, humor, idioms, persuasive power — for a new audience. One is a language task. The other is a strategy.

Here’s a real-world example. Imagine a healthcare campaign urging Hispanic families to get vaccinated. A translated message might read: “Get vaccinated to protect your health.” A transcreated message might say: “Protect the people who sit at your table — get vaccinated for your family.”

Both are technically accurate. But only one speaks to a culture where family is the center of every decision. Only one builds trust.

Why Translation Alone Doesn’t Work in Marketing

There’s a stubborn assumption out there: that bilingual audiences don’t need culturally adapted content. That a direct Spanish translation of an English ad will do the job. The research says otherwise — and it’s not even close.

CSA Research found that 76% of consumers prefer to buy products with information in their native language, and 40% won’t buy from websites presented only in another language.[1] But language alone isn’t the full picture. The deeper barrier is cultural relevance.

Nielsen and the ANA’s Cultural Inclusion Accelerator found that cultural relevance accounts for 66% of a campaign’s sales lift, and that high-relevance campaigns deliver 2.8 times greater purchase intent.[2] That’s not a marginal improvement — it’s a fundamentally different outcome.

The trust data tells the same story. According to Nielsen’s Hispanic Sentiment Study, 84% of Latinos favor brands that play a positive role in their community, and 63% are more likely to buy from brands that feature people like them.[3] Kantar’s research puts it even more plainly: 64% of Hispanic consumers actively seek out brands that acknowledge their culture and traditions.[4]

And here’s the consequence of getting it wrong: Numerator reports that 60% of Hispanic consumers would stop buying from brands whose values don’t align with theirs — a higher percentage than any other demographic group.[5]

The bottom line? Translation delivers words. Transcreation builds trust. In multicultural marketing, trust is the currency that drives everything — engagement, loyalty, revenue. Multicultural campaigns deliver as much as 40% higher ROI than non-diverse ones, according to a Nielsen study cited by Forbes.[6] Organizations still relying on translation alone aren’t saving money. They’re leaving it on the table.

Why This Especially Matters for Mission-Driven Organizations

If you work in government, healthcare, or the nonprofit sector, the stakes here are even higher than ROI. When your messages don’t connect, people don’t just ignore your ad — they miss

critical health information, skip services they need, or lose faith in institutions that are supposed to serve them.

Think about it this way: when a public health department translates a COVID-19 safety brochure into Spanish without adapting it for cultural context, the information is technically available. But will it be trusted? Probably not. When a nonprofit translates a fundraising appeal without understanding the values of its donor community, the ask falls flat — not because the words were wrong, but because the feeling was missing.