Rural Marketing

By Mahesh Huded

5/23/12

Introduction

The term Rural Marketing which was earlier used as an umbrella term to refer to all commercials transactions of rural people, acquired a separate meaning of great significance in 1990s Rural marketing refers to marketing of rural products in rural and urban areas and agricultural products in rural markets. It was considered 5/23/12

Consumer Behaviour
Consumer is the basic foundation of every business. What consumer sees, thinks, prefers and buys is of great importance to marketers to fine tune their marketing offers and achieve high level of consumer acceptance and satisfaction. The emergence of rural market as a viable proposition has sparked a new interest among marketers to explore and understand 5/23/12 them.

Continued
Though some Indian giants like HLL, Godrej, Asian Paints, and Philips are in the fray, the profile of rural consumers are still hazy. Gaining an understanding of the rural market composition and behaviour is considered one of the current challenges for the following reasons

Lack of right competence Partial approach Limited knowledge and bias

5/23/12

Marketing Information System

A Marketing Information System (MKIS) may be defined as follows An assembly of interrelated information subsystems receiving, processing, and disseminating information on a continues basis to help make marketing decisions. The system aims at providing information support to managers in their decision making and implementation. The subsystems of marketing information systems are

Internal reporting systems Marketing intelligence systems Marketing research systems

5/23/12 Marketing

decision support systems

Selecting and Attracting Markets

Companies are today developing different brands in different pack sizes and formulations to win over the consumers. Different people want different quantities, and different mixes of benefits from the product they buy. No longer are the companies depending on the philosophy that consumers are humans with little or no differences and that their aspirations, tastes, preferences, actions and consumption levels do not vary. In reality they are dividing the markets into attractive segments to reach 5/23/12

Product Strategy
The central decision in marketing mix strategy is product decision. In the emergent dynamic, competitive environment, multi product firms are fighting hard to gain commanding market share through their product strategies. It is through continues design and redesign of product mixes that a company lays its way to success to fame. Products required in rural areas may be classified in different ways

Tangible goods referred to as products. Intangible goods referred to as services.

5/23/12

Pricing Strategy
A price represents the market value of a product. It can be explained in monetary and non-monetary terms corporate enterprises are adopting pricing policies and methods that make products affordable Pricing objectives

Profit Sales Competition Development 5/23/12

Promotion Strategy
The battle for the rural consumer market has been increasing in intensity over the years. Product promotion has become the biggest challenge. To rural marketers today only those who overcome will emerge successful. Importance of promotion strategy

To explore available media at the different locations. To develop region-specific consumer profiles to 5/23/12understand the characteristics of target

Distribution Strategy
Central to the success of rural marketing strategy is distribution. However, the distribution channel, a much-published means of merchandising in urban markets has remained in the background in the rural areas. Now distribution has to be virtually reworked from scratch with full rural orientation and awareness of existing rural channel of distribution.

5/23/12