abhishreshthaa
Abhijeet S
• RURAL FOLK MEDIA:
As a general rule, rural marketing involves more intensive personal selling efforts compared to urban marketing. Marketers need to understand the psyche of the rural consumers and then act accordingly. To effectively tap the rural market a brand must associate it with the same things the rural folks do.
Utilizing the various rural folk media to reach them in their own language and in large numbers so that the brand can be associated with the myriad rituals, celebrations, festivals, melas and other activities where they assemble, can do this.
In the Indian rural marketing context, perhaps linguistics could provide a new approach to tackling communication issues and arriving at a better understanding of rural consumers. Also, the manner in which symbols and icons are used, which provides insights and clues into the mindsets of rural audiences, can be deployed to grab their attention.
Though television and radio fare better then print, the best way to kick start sales are events. Where the company meets and interacts with the audience, talks to them in their own idioms and tells them what this product offers. Marketers should think up games and events, which would attract the attention of the villagers from all professions uniformly. This would require local level goods creation and social negotiation skills.
The best choice comes from weekly bazaars. With varying populations, one shop or few shops cannot really cater to all the needs of the consumers. Thus, it makes sense to have weekly outlets that caters to the needs of the consumers in these regions. Frugal though the rural consumer is success from these weekly outlets is that much more pertinent. What attracts her is the freshness of the produce, buying in the bulk for a week and the bargaining power.
These markets (haats and shandies) have high potential that corporates are now waking up to. The scope that these markets offer to distribution is something that has to be seriously considered. Distribution is clearly the key to rural marketing.
As a general rule, rural marketing involves more intensive personal selling efforts compared to urban marketing. Marketers need to understand the psyche of the rural consumers and then act accordingly. To effectively tap the rural market a brand must associate it with the same things the rural folks do.
Utilizing the various rural folk media to reach them in their own language and in large numbers so that the brand can be associated with the myriad rituals, celebrations, festivals, melas and other activities where they assemble, can do this.
In the Indian rural marketing context, perhaps linguistics could provide a new approach to tackling communication issues and arriving at a better understanding of rural consumers. Also, the manner in which symbols and icons are used, which provides insights and clues into the mindsets of rural audiences, can be deployed to grab their attention.
Though television and radio fare better then print, the best way to kick start sales are events. Where the company meets and interacts with the audience, talks to them in their own idioms and tells them what this product offers. Marketers should think up games and events, which would attract the attention of the villagers from all professions uniformly. This would require local level goods creation and social negotiation skills.
The best choice comes from weekly bazaars. With varying populations, one shop or few shops cannot really cater to all the needs of the consumers. Thus, it makes sense to have weekly outlets that caters to the needs of the consumers in these regions. Frugal though the rural consumer is success from these weekly outlets is that much more pertinent. What attracts her is the freshness of the produce, buying in the bulk for a week and the bargaining power.
These markets (haats and shandies) have high potential that corporates are now waking up to. The scope that these markets offer to distribution is something that has to be seriously considered. Distribution is clearly the key to rural marketing.