Majority of them have never used the Internet, they do not go to malls, they do not spend much on traveling, yet they constitute a huge chuck of India’s population. Welcome to the rural market of India. With similar aspiration of their counterparts in urban, with plethora of dreams, ideas to touch the skies and produce products (agriculture, craft, etc) like no one can do, but yet sometimes cannot afford meal a day. A great leader once said that “India lives in its villages” it was none other that Mahatma Gandhi. However his words seems to still echoes in McKinsey’s estimates that in India in 2025, 63% of the population will live in rural areas and the rural market will be four times the size of today’s urban market.
The rural situation reminds me a story that was told to me when I was in a business school, and the story goes like this “once a sales person of a shoe company went to an island and he reported back that there is no market for the shoes as no one wear them, and similarly another sales person went and he reported that there is a huge potential as no one were shoes’. So I guess that was the perspective or individualist view point of seeing a situation. The story about the current rural market seems to be pretty much the same.
We as a marketer know that there is a huge chunk of market lying untapped purely due to the fact that who and how will tap it first. By no means I am trying to argue that there are no companies working towards addressing the needs of the rural economy, however the point I would like to make is the abundance of audience viewing plethora of product being marketed on air and I can assure you based upon my experience when people are watching TV in villages they are actually glued to it, as that’s the only way to connect to the so-called “modern society”. They are watching from SRK carrying phones to Rani dazzling with her new watch. The amount of TRP or eye balls that are stuck or glued (well that’s the word I would like to use) to a TV sets cannot be matched by any urban or rather few urban viewing put together.
Addressing the needs of rural market seems to be the key for the nation or in such a competitive environment I would say even for a company. Dr. Anil K. Rajvanshi, Director, Nimbkar Agricultural Research Institute (NARI) opined “With rural India shining, India will shine!” I would say merging this vision to the Mckinsey numbers it surely seems to be true, as we forget they basic fundamental factor that most of these people living in the rural or urban with low income are image seekers and would love to save an entire year to get their hands on a TV set or a mobile phone. But here is the catch they also wants the Brand. They prefer to by Colgate, makes calls on Nokia, watch a pirated Bollywood latest flick DVD, and so on.
I wonder, isn’t it amazing that they have limited finances yet most preferred products are the world best know brands. Something to think over for you and me this weekend. By this I am also asking for an excuse over the weekend for no posts as I have some important and time consuming task to achieve.
Have A Good Weekend.
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