Interesting Rural Marketing Examples

Sitting through a class of rural marketing I came across a number of interesting examples of innovative marketing in rural areas. The examples were neat and can help people understand the vast differences between the rural and the urban psyche.

• Henko failed in maharashtra. Why?

It sound like "Hey Nako" which means No, giving the brand a negative connotation in Marathi.

• Dabur's health tooth powder containing Tulsi failed. why?

Tooth powder meant spitting the tulsi out which was considered sacrilege in the rural areas..

• Mahindra with its MAXX model offered metallic colours, aluminium footstep and an elegant spare wheel cover for rural market . Why?

An interesting observation showed that in rural India the cars are generally rented out for functions and ceremonies. The usage pattern necessitates the grandeur that is offered by MAXX with the aluminium footstep, colours and the spare wheel cover.

• In rural west U.P the sales of MP3 players among the farmers is very strong, especially the chinese models.

Chinese models have the perception of being cheap. Moreover the farmer is used to listening to the transistor and the availability of new technology has just substituted the existing need with the option of controlling the songs that can be played.

• Dabur traditionally paints the walls of the roads leading to the temples and mosques in the villages . Why?

The crowd aggregates during all the major festivals, and the huge traffic to enter the temple and mosque provides the marketer the ideal opportunity to tap into his mind space making use of the wall space available. Dabur did just that.

• Cadbury launched the biscuit ChocoBix which was a runaway sucess. Why?

Rural moms still feel that biscuits are very healthy and the child got attracted by the chocolated content. So this provided the perfect product satisfying the buyer and decision maker(mother) as well as the influencer(child).

• Although black is not a lively color and has a lot of negative conotation to it, it worked for "Chik" shampoo. how?

Perception that if the shampoo is black then the hair would be pitch black too. (Funny, but true. Percetion is all that matters)

• In part of U.P, there is a popular brand of gripe water called "daei jee ki 112 saal purani ghutti". What's special?

In rural india "Dae ji" or the mid-wife takes the dual role of acting as the gynaecologist as well as the paediatrician till the child becomes 1-2 years old. She is a huge influencer and positioning a product with "Dae ji" in focus was a big positive. Moreover villages believe in heritage and hence the 112 years mentioned in the positioning statement further cemented the positive impact that dae ji achieved thereby resulting in the sucess of the product.

A special thanks to my professor Mr.Karthik Raina for this lecture,which helped in writing the post.