Linda Lane González

Linda Lane González is Program Director for the Multicultural Marketing Council at The Conference Board. She is the founder and president of Viva, a consumer research company. At Viva’s helm since founding the company in January 1997, Linda provides the overall vision, direction, and creative inspiration for every facet of multicultural consumer research and UX/CX, account services, media, and integrated marketing strategies. 

Linda has been fascinated by language and culture since childhood, having grown up between San Antonio, TX and Guanajuato, Mexico followed by Brazil and Puerto Rico. This led to degrees in Latin American Studies and M.Ed. in Second Language Acquisition.

Her professional passion has been to help companies and brands grow their business in the multicultural markets by uncovering yet undiscovered insights as well as business and marketing solutions that are relevant, consistent with brand messaging, and results-driven. This approach has proven successful for many brands over the years, including Disney World, Burlington, Sparkling Ice, Amazon, Verizon, Sandoz Novartis, Hallmark, Cricket, Oster, mikes hard lemonade, HBO, and Neutrogena among others.

She is also a member and recent past chair of the Culture Marketing Council (previously known as AHAA) and is an active member and part of the founding Board of the Association of National Advertiser’s (ANA) Alliance for Inclusive Multicultural Marketing (AIMM). Linda’s consultancy has been named one of the “top 50 women-led businesses” by the Commonwealth Institute in 2011, 2012, and 2016.

A commentator for CNN, HLN, CNN Dinero, NPR, Bloomberg, and The Hill Latino, as well as a frequent speaker on diversity marketing and women in business, Linda has been active on several boards and committees including UPS-sponsored Go for the Greens, the Women’s President Organization, and the Effie Worldwide Multicultural Planning Committee.