Minority Use Of Internet: Only 4/10 Regularly Use; Lack Of Access To Computers Attributed

In December 2009, researcher and pollster Cornell Belcher conducted a national survey of minorities and the Internet.  The survey reports are being reported by the Center For Media Research, and contain some interesting data.

Among the areas of inquiry covered by the survey include minority use of the Internet, attitudes toward the Internet, and obstacles to use of the Internet.  Below is a table that shows the frequency of Internet use as a percentage of the minority population.

Note that no minority populations other than Blacks and Hispanics were included in the survey.

The table below shows the survey’s results when respondents were asked what changes in the Internet would make access more likely.  Better privacy and affordability were cited as the two most significant changes.

Finally, the table below shows survey data about the primary obstacles to greater minority use of the Internet.  This is, perhaps, the most interesting aspect of the entire survey.  The results show that, for both Blacks and Hispanics, respondents reported either “no need for the Internet” or “do not have a computer or Internet enabled device.”

This is only a portion of the full results of the survey.  If you are interested in further review of these statistics, you can link to the homepage for the Center for Media Research here.  For those lawyers or law firms marketing to either Hispanic or Black communities, these results suggest that you may need to adopt either more aggressive online marketing efforts or tailor those efforts to more effectively reach these target populations.