Rural Advertising in India free essay sample

Rural markets acquired greater importance in countries like India, China, etc. because of economic growth of the nations now highly depend up on the rural economy. Corporate companies are struggling a lot to get more sales/profits in urban areas i. e. almost all the companies are saturated in urban areas. â€Å"Go rural and be rural† seems to be the guiding principle of marketing. In this context, companies are diversified all their operations toward rural areas. Most of the populations with unmet needs are living in rural areas. Companies should ensure that they understood the hopes and aspirations of the rural population. They should take into consideration the low literacy levels, poor reach of the media and widespread audience and the tradition and culture of the target groups while advertising their product. This paper is developed to discuss the concept and process of rural advertising in India and successful ads. Introduction Customers are the central point in every business. We will write a custom essay sample on Rural Advertising in India or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page In present attracting and satisfying customer is more difficult than producing the goods. So seller has to make lot of efforts to attract and to persuade the persons to purchase his products and services. Advertising is an important means to influence the potential customers. Advertising influences customers’ attitudes and purchase behaviour. Advertisements increase brand-familiarity, develop brand-image and help the organization in increasing its market share. Advertising is used for communicating business information to the present and prospective customers. It provides information about the advertising firm, features of its products, qualities, place of availability of its products, different schemes offered, benefits of using its products etc. Advertising is important for both buyers and sellers. The simplest meaning of an advertisement is that it is a public announcement. The advertising is a paid form of non-personal communication with target audience through mass-media such as television, newspapers, magazines, telephone, internet, radio, direct-mail, outdoor displays. By looking at the challenges and the opportunities which rural markets offer to the marketers it can be said that the future is very promising for those who can understand the dynamics of rural markets and exploit them to their best advantage. A radical change in attitudes of marketers towards the vibrant and burgeoning rural markets is called for, so they can successfully impress on the 230 million rural consumers spread over approximately six hundred thousand villages in rural India. The rural market is very large in compare to the urban market as well as it is more challenging market. The consumer wants those products which are long lasting, good, easy to use and cheaper. The income level of rural consumers is not as high as the income level of urban consumers that’s why they want low price goods. It is one of the reasons that the sell of sachet is much larger in the rural area in all segments. Rural market has an untapped potential like rain but it is different from the urban market so it requires the different marketing strategies and marketer has to meet the challenges to be successful in rural market. The Indian advertising industry is talking business today. It has evolved from being a small-scale business to a full-fledged industry. It has emerged as one of the major industries and tertiary sectors and has broadened its horizons be it the creative aspect, the capital employed or the number of personnel involved. Indian advertising industry in very little time has carved a niche for itself and placed itself on the global map. The creative minds that the Indian advertising industry incorporates have come up with some mind-boggling concepts and work that can be termed as masterpieces in the field of advertising. Advertising agencies in the country too have taken a leap. They have come a long way from being small and medium sized industries to becoming well known brands in the business. Mudra, Ogilvy and Mathew (OM), Mccann Ericsonn, Rediffussion, Leo Burnett are some of the top agencies of the country. The Indian advertising today handles both national and international projects. This is primarily because of the reason that the industry offers a host of functions to its clients that include everything from start to finish that include client servicing, media planning, media buying, creative onceptualization, pre and post campaign analysis, market research, marketing, branding, and public relation services. Rural consumers are fundamentally different from their urban counterparts. The lower levels of literacy and limited exposure to product and services are well-known, but there are also differences in occupation options, with a direct impact on income levels and income flows, and a high level of inter-dependency affecting the dynamics of rural community behavior. All contribute to make rural consumer behavior starkly distinct from the urban. Rural marketing has become a greatest challenge to make goods available to the rural markets because of poor infrastructure and lack of understanding of rural consumers. Only 40 per cent of the villages in India were connected by roads and only one third of rural homes had electricity. The rural market in India has great potential, which is just waiting to be tapped. Progress has been made in this area by some, but there seems to be a long way for marketers to go in order to derive and reap maximum benefits. Moreover, rural India is not so poor as it used to be a decade or so back. Things are sure a changing. Companies should ensure that they understood the hopes and aspirations of the rural population. They should take into consideration the low literacy levels, poor reach of the media and widespread audience and the tradition and culture of the target groups while advertising their product. The communication package should be developed only after an in-depth study of the mindset of each rural region. However, while selling products to the rural population, companies should connect with the local people and make an attempt to understand their mindset. Rural communication was an integral part of rural marketing. But, most companies gave the concept of rural communication a step-motherly treatment. Companies needed to invest in the right communication methods aimed at specific target groups. Corporations and advertising agencies have started working in the rural area with a different approach as compared to urban areas, like puppet shows in Punjab, Folk media like Ragini in Haryana for communicating qualities of Virat cement, Pala and Daskathia in Orissa for promoting safe electricity consumption and tooth pastes of Colgate Palmolive, Baul songs in West Bengal for advertising insecticides are some of the examples. Britannia has entered in to the rural market by participating in rural melas and displaying its down market brand Britannia Tiger Biscuits. These rural melas and weekly haats have become more popular medium of rural advertising by the media planners. Through this arrangement they can break the saddle of scant geographical distribution of customers in rural markets as people of number of villages assemble together to participate in the fair. It is a good ground for brand awareness building, trial sales and sampling. It provides a wider audience at a fairly low cost. Companies like HLL, Titan and Colgate Palmolive use festivals like Rathyatra, umbhmela, and Onam for brand promotion. These companies are following a typical media schedule and are always in a march from one place to the other with our festival calendar and a collapsible arrangement of the exhibition setup. Companies can also use popular forms of entertainment like puppetry, nautanki, ragini, bhangra, qaualli and traditional dance shows to increase the brand experience. The companies can develop a story line relating to the brand and show the characters using the brands for their advantage and even the dresses of the characters can be that of the brand‘s packaging. Power of advertising Advertising is any paid form of non-personal presentation and promotion of products, services or concepts by an identified sponsor. Advertising has became our dominant creative industry – what Stuart Ewen calls ‘the prevailing vernacular of public address’. It sucks up our talent for art, design, creativity and storytelling. It has become such a routine part of everyday life that we rarely stop to think about its significance. For all their diversity, advertisements share one basic value system. Advertisements may be individually innocent;  collectively they are the propaganda wing of a consumerist ideology. The moral of the thousands of different stories they tell is that the only way to secure pleasure, popularity, security, happiness or fulfillment is through buying more; more consumption regardless of how much we already have. The research shows that a walk in the park, social interaction or volunteering – which cost nothing will do more for our well-being than any amount of ‘retail therapy’. Advertising, in that sense, pushes us towards maximizing our income rather than our free time. It pushes us away from activities that give pleasure and meaning to our lives towards an arena that cannot – what Sut Jhally calls ‘the dead world of things’. With the Rural advertising, it can reach more number to rural consumers and create potential market in rural areas. While designing advertisements for the rural audience, one must understand the mindset of the rural audience, keep the message simple and logical, and avoid making it gimmicky. The uses of â€Å"education with entertainment† and â€Å"slice of life† observations are good ideas. A good advertisement tells us we need something even before we think we do. It offers us a look into the ideal life, the ideal body, the ideal mate, all wrapped in an ideal world. In India, the advertising is mostly in English or Hindi and there is often the need for thinking out the advertising concepts and the brand image in the local language itself. Advertising in the local language in the absence of shortage of professionals, makes success of rural advertising campaigns difficult. It is a general assumption of advertising theory that advertising helps to create demand. It may be worth saying to what extent advertising creates demand, particularly in our rural society. A thorough understanding of the rural consumer is a crucial key to rural marketing success. Rural markets large diversity of customs and language into account. Ideas and techniques used in urban areas just won’t work for rural consumers Rural AD Agencies Major agencies dealing with rural marketing are Anugrah Madison, MART, Sampark, Rural Relations, OM Outreach, Linterland, RCM, etc. Madison Advertising Pvt Ltd: The company is 23 years old and is famous in this advertising sector. It deals in Advertising, Media, PR, Rural retail, entertainment, mobile and sports, business analytics. Browse the site for more information. Mudra Communication Pvt. Ltd: This is one of the renowned advertising company of India. This advertising organization was founded in the year 1980 at Mumbai. Recently the Ad company declared the addition of public relations,rural marketing,events etc. The head office of the company is in Bombay Area. Lintas India Pvt. Ltd: After the merge of Lintas India Ltd. with Lowe Lintas and Partners group of the UK, it is now known as Lowe Lintas. India Pvt. Ltd. The turnover of Lintas is Rs. 750 crore. The advertising agency inculcates advertising, media buying house, direct marketing, public relations, design consultancy, market research, events, rural communications and interactive communications. Enterprise Nexus, the agency partner of Lowe in India, continues to be a member and is known as the ‘Independent Brands’ division which is the only specialist in advertising and marketing communications. Lowe Lintas India is a successful agency which is inclined towards quality creative advertising and works for the benefit of its clients. Ogilvy and Mather Limited: The company was founded in 1928 and is based in Mumbai, India. Ogilvy Mather Pvt. , Ltd. operates as an advertising agency in India. The company in India operates with offices located in all the major cities. The company provides various marketing services through Web sites, Wed banners, email marketing, public relationships, radio, direct marketing, promotion, elemarketing, out door, packaging, rural communication, retail visibility and communication, television, and print ads sources. MART, the specialist rural marketing and rural development consultancy has found that 53 per cent of FMCG sales lie in the rural areas, as do 59 per cent of consumer durable sales, said its head Pradeep Kashyap at the seminar. Of two million BSNL mobile connections, 50 per cent went to small towns and villages, of 20 million Rediffmail subscriptions, 60 per cent came from small towns, so did half the transactions on Rediffs shopping site. Successful ADS: Hindustan Lever Limited (HLL) is a good example with successful rural marketing projects like ‘Project Shakti’ and ‘Operation Bharat’. The main emphasis of HLL’s strategy has been to focus on penetrating the market down the line and focusing on price point. Hindustan Lever relies heavily on its own company-organised media. These are promotional events organised by stockists. Coca Cola India entered the rural market by introducing bottles priced at Rs. 5. The campaign was backed with ads featuring well-known actor Aamir Khan. During the Aamir Khan ad-campaign, they also used local language in advertising. A combination of TV, cinema and radio was used to increase the reach to rural consumers. Coca Cola have also used banners and posters, and tapped many local forms of entertainment. Because of the common lack of electricity and refrigerators in rural areas, Coca Cola provides low-cost ice boxes — a tin box for new outlets and thermocool box for seasonal outlets. Guidelines of Rural Advertising Radio is one of the cheapest mass media to reach rural masses. Even where electricity is unreliable, transistor radios are very popular among the poorer sections of rural India. With the number of FM stations set to explode after expansion under Phase Three, it would be possible to reach even more remote areas through radio. Haats and melas tied to temple and religious festivals are great for promoting brands. While haats help in reaching a few thousand villagers from different villages in one place, melas attract lakhs of visitors across the State or across the country as in kumbh melas. They offer a variety of media opportunities in one place. However, it must be remembered that haats are gradually losing their importance in economically developed markets such as Tamil Nadu because of the tremendous progress made by small towns and their easy accessibility to villagers due to better and reliable transport facilities. Static media such as wall paintings, hoardings, shop fronts and point of sale continue to be useful as reminder media. So the messages are prominently displayed in bus stands, railway stations, on water tanks, wells and pump-sets in villages, as well as mobile media such as local buses, Visual Vans and auto-rickshaws etc. Conclusion In India, rural people’s wants, need and desires are changing rapidly, it is very important to know them and give them what they want. Now, rural market is geared for faster growth in the coming years and more sales potential. To attract rural target audience, corporate are developing different strategies. In this context rural advertising has become one of the important strategy in communicating message.