Connecting rural India

Rural India is not a downgraded version of urban India. It is a different market. Creative marketing is needed to gain access to this untapped market

With urban India, the world's largest middle-class population, now deciphered and more or less conquered, it is time to tap into what could be the world's last and the largest untapped markets - 'emerging India'. While urban India was a difficult market to crack, rural India will be nothing short of an enigma. On one side is the allure of a large virgin market and on the other side is more than 10 per cent of the world's population struggling to have access to basic amenities like water, power and sanitation. And both those issues are inter-related. So how does one cater to this extremely heterogeneous market, which speaks in three dozen languages and with social and cultural diversity unrivalled in the world?

As rural India starts connecting with the online world, coupled with policy frameworks like digital India and concerted industry effort, things are slowly changing. With India aiming to building digital infrastructure to cover entire rural India by 2019, the country will see a spurt in digital information in the coming years. How this information is leveraged and used to reach India's hinterlands will be the biggest challenge for marketers. It will not be easy but cracking it will be critical to gain access to this untapped market. Marketers will have to make sense of the madness and drive creative marketing solutions that can be far reaching. Here's how:

Respect differences: Rural India is not a downgraded version of urban India. It is not only a different market but a completely different socio-cultural entity. So a slightly tweaked urban marketing plan, dubbed into the local language won't work. Rural India needs a completely different ground-up plan. And maybe several plans, suited to different regions. Companies like HUL and LG electronics have done this successfully and reaped the benefits of the extra work.

Make the right investments: This is a long-term game not suited for instant gratification seekers. The market in most cases needs to be built from ground up as there are no existing infrastructure capabilities. When Lenovo started looking at Tier-II cities and beyond, it realised that there is no existing infrastructure to sell PC in these markets. Lenovo created a dedicated exclusive retail model called LES Lite to sell its PCs. The substantial investment in building fresh retail route resulted in increased penetration and market share through its 1,200-plus stores in these cities and towns.

Think glocal: Tackling India's non-urban and rural markets will need extreme customisation, without losing the core brand value proposition. How does the marketer map a global brand to a remote village? While the Cola brands have done this well, it is more from a push point of view. To create brand recognition and pull, it is critical to identify specific rural consumer needs. The pioneering work done by brands like HUL and ITC (e-Choupal) are classic examples of out-of-the-box thinking and localising the brand's inherent strengths. If this seems to be a daunting task, there is a new tool in the arsenal of the marketer that can swing the tide in his favour- data. With increasing internet penetration and data usage, the amount of information available from these markets is growing exponentially. How marketers use this data will decide the propensity to succeed.

Managing data: The issue with rural data is that it is fresh with no preceding information to compare with. Also most data might not be in a readily usable format, language being just one of the impediments. Local nuances, regional disparities, cultural diversity, distribution issues, terrain, all will play a huge role. In rural India too, the youth have started evolving as the main force of change. At a fundamental level, the key is about connecting with their aspiration. Data will be central to make this happen. Brands need to drive rich and deeper conversations, and as a result build loyalty as well as advocacy. The key is to involve them in a non-intrusive way, in some ways even letting go of the 'brand' somewhat so it may emerge as an expression of the consumer sentiment.

By Ajit Sivadasan, vice-president & general manager, Lenovo.com