Rural Advertising in India

By – Sunaina Arora, PGDM (2017-19)

The concept of Rural Marketing determines the carrying out of business activities that bring the rural areas closer to the urban areas. These activities include precisely two sections:

• Selling of rural (agricultural) products to the urban areas, and
• Selling of the urban manufactured products in the rural areas.

The difference between regular marketing and rural marketing is only in the terms of buyers and/or manufacturers. It is related to the application of marketing concepts, principles, processes and theories to the rural markets.

Read: The Promotional Mix

An example of rural marketing is eKOcool. It is a solar powered cooler launched in 2011 by Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages. Its objective was to provide cool beverages to parts of rural areas. When the prototype of the cooler was developed, a survey was conducted to get an idea of the market response which was a success; hence, the company distributed eKOcool to various rural areas across India. The picture above shows a lady from rural India with an eKOcool.

Rural Marketing Strategies:

The rural audience cannot be treated the same way a marketer treats the urban audience. It is important to understand the audience. Consumers in every region have a different set of customs and beliefs, therefore studying and researching about them are essential before approaching them.

The rural marketing strategies should involve:

1. Product Related strategy

A company should find out what is needed in the rural areas and hence produce according to the conditions of the area like rough and tough, low electricity consumption, easing the physical and manual work of the people, small packaging, etc. For example, Phillips designed a ‘free power radio’ especially for the rural areas that don’t require batteries or an external power source to run. Also, if we talk about packaging, the sachet package culture was introduced for the villages only as they are low on cost and less in quantity.

2. Price-Related Strategy

A rural customer will pay more attention to the pricing than the quality of the product. The manufacturer needs to pay attention to reducing the overall producing cost of the product to make it more affordable for the customers and make it easier for the marketer to be able to sell it in the targeted region.

3. Promotional Strategy

The main motive behind the promotion of a product is spreading awareness amongst the target audience. A marketer needs to decide the type of promotional mix that is to be adopted in order to inform, persuade and influence the customers to buy. The promotional strategy used should be simple and easy to understand, considering the fact that the level of literacy is not much in the rural areas; therefore, advertisements in newspapers are not recommended, whereas radio, television and cinema advertisements are highly recommended.

Read: Organizing for Advertising and Promotion

Brands like HUL, ITC and Parle take the help of sports like kabbadi, kho-kho, etc to promote their brands in rural areas.

4. Distribution Strategies 

It is difficult to penetrate through the rural market because of the unavailability of the products at these remote areas. The companies could adopt various distribution strategies to get their product reach to every nook and corner of the rural area. These strategies could be- using company delivery vans that reach out to the rural markets, also giving a one-to-one interaction with the ultimate consumer; opening up of retail outlets and bringing the retail format stores in these areas; village fairs, haats, and melas are another ways of bringing in the urban products and introducing them to the rural customers.

Read: How to Become a Retail Store Manager

Rural Advertising Strategies:

Advertising is a form of promotional mix that helps in increasing sales. In the case of rural areas, the audience is sensitive and so can be their reactions towards any kind of media used for the purpose. A few methods used in rural areas are-

• Local newspaper
• Gramsabha
• Puppet shows
• Folk shows and songs
• Farm field school

But there are certain factors that pose as a challenge in promoting and advertising there like- Cultural factors, Low literacy, Transportation, Communication problem, Traditional Life, Price, Lack of desire for new styles, and many more. To fill the gap, creative advertising strategies are being used in the rural areas.

1. Reverse Innovation

Reverse innovation is the kind of innovation that primarily started in the developing areas and then adopted by the industrialized areas. An example of it is Tata’s Swachh water purifier. Swachh (which means pure in Hindi) was advertised as the cheapest water purifier in the Indian market that does not require running water, power or boiling, rather uses paddy husk ash to purify it; that can provide, a family of 5, clean water for a year.

2. Change in Perception

Rural India is closest to nature. They can easily use Neem sticks/branches for brushing their teeth, but it is because of the rigorous advertising strategies in the remote areas that in spite of the neem tree branches, they are using toothpaste in a tube and replacing the traditional methods of cleaning teeth.

3. Understanding Social Values and Culture

In rural areas, it is their tendency to accept a product or a brand that is closer to their culture, considering the fact that the people there are not easily open to new experiences. Culture plays an important role in deciding what they will really put to use in their routine lives which may be at work or at homes.

4. Broad Strategies of Advertising in Rural India

As above said, it isn’t easy for the rural areas to adopt and switch to newer products. Due to this, certain strategies have been evolved, like:

Read: Behavioral Job Interview Questions

• Influencer Strategy- In this strategy, a person like a schoolmaster or the mukhiya or maybe the sarpanch (or any person of respect) of the village is chosen as the influencer to put across a powerful purchase intention and use them to endorse the brand or the product. For example, Asian paints, while launching their Utsav brand in the rural areas, painted the Sarpanch’s house to explain how paint is an ideal replacement of chuna and how it stays and doesn’t peel off.

• Participatory Strategy- There is a limited source of recreation or entertainment in the remote areas. Brands use it as an opportunity and sponsor different events, festivals, sports competitions, etc which in turn have high engagement from the residents. For example, Phillips conducted a jigsaw puzzle solving game contest consisting of their logo and their punch-line mainly to create brand awareness, the winner of which would be given a Phillips transistor.

• Show-and-Tell Strategy- Show and tell is a way of demonstrating and educating the people like that in the advertisement of Polio and AIDS awareness programmes. Also, Dabur, in its initiative entitled- ‘Astra’ (Advanced Sales Training for Rural and Retail) have managers across the country who educates the channel partners via audio-visual medium. Shopkeepers selling Dabur India would learn the marketing of their product by role play staged by professional actors at their shops.