Rural Markets: land of opportunities

In a country, where almost its 70% population lives in villages,It has taken so long to Go Rural mantra to start in the marketers.Well the villages whose number almost touches 6.5 lakhs grows at compounded growth rate of 6.2% from the 2000s. And its been almost the 1.5 times its urban counterpart.Well looking at the projected numbers for the rural markets it would be dumb to ignore it.

Well thats the figure only for the Fmcg products. The total spending of the rural consumers out paced its urban counterpart by 25% during 2009-2012.This is just an indication of the might of the rural markets.In the last decade only 75% of manufacturing factories were built in rural areas which contributes 55% of the manufacturing GDP. With the focus on the Make it in India its bound to go up.Rural multiplier effect is the most exciting prospect in this.The growth  bound to happen in is exponential rather than the linear.

The reasons for the marketers to follow the Rural hullabooo are many fold.some are :

• Sheer Number of population in rural area;around 11% of world population.
• Purchasing power capacity of the rural consumers has been on the rise for past decade and so.
• Market growth.
• Government initiatives has lead to better Infrastructures which is doing better and better.
• Increase in Aspirational factor for the Rural people.
• Changing taste and preferences. Times  are gone when rural market was used for dumping ground for outdated urban products.Now the rural people are more aware.

  But as they say All that Glitters is not gold.There are lot of challenges faced by the companies.few of them are:

• Reaching the rural consumer:it is the biggest challenge even now.sheer scattered population of the rural population makes it even harder to reach.The cost of reaching the consumers is high making it some sort of barrier.
• Seasonality of the rural demands make it tough for the marketers and so does the need for specialized sales force.
• Language barriers:nothing more to be said about this.
• Illiteracy
• Underdeveloped logistics and infrastructure

 But challenges can be overpowered Through focusing on the Basics of rural marketing that is :

• Availability
• Awareness
• Acceptability
• Affordability

Making the goods available should be the first priority as its a challenge as well; project shakti, ITC e-choupal are example of that.Acceptability it focuses on convincing the consumers to buy the products Here personal selling approach is required more in rural area than the urban area.Affordability means making products focused on value pricing.But with rise in aspirational group R1 in the villages affordability is becoming less of a concern.But awareness is the most important point In the country where the literacy rate leaves much to desire, consumers himself doesn't know that he requires a specific product .so Awareness is much required factor in rural marketing.

At last I end with Hope that Rural marketers overcome the challenges as it will not only Help the bottom-line of the company, it will also help in socio-economic development in rural areas.