Rural Marketing: Challenges and Opportunities

Abstract

In country like India, 1JJhere the 70% of the people five in mral area, the mral v1arket holds a lot of marketingpotentiaL There is a wide spread difference in the standard of living between urban and rural India. In order to launch products and develop advertising/or rural market there is a need to understand both the rural context and aljo the consumer. To expand the market fry tapping the countryside, more and more MN C 's are forqying into India j- rural markets. Among those that have made some head1JJqy are Hindustan Lever, Coca-Cola, LG Electronics, Britannia, HDFC Standard Life, Philips, Colgate Palmolive and the telecom companies. This article p rovides the opportunity to explore consumers and the type marketingprogrammes which emphasizes the advertisingpatterns on consumer dividend that has been successful in emerging markets and more specifical!J in rural India. First it has been discussed about the marketing opportunity for companies in niral India and then we 111ill focus on some of the unique charactenstic of rural India and ho111 this translate into innovative advertisingprogrammes for companies entering the rural market and final!J to see the advertising in· rural area.