Using mass media, reaching rural markets is easy - Zoya Mehani

The idea of using mass media is simple: allow your brand’s communication to reach the masses. On the first look, it may see that the mediums used for mass communication (such as TV, Radio, Newspapers, Magazines) will make communicating with people living in hinterlands of rural India easy. Obviously, these people do not have access to the more niche mediums of advertising such as Internet. But if you look more closely, problems such as lack of electricity and illiteracy render any traditional medium useless in rural India.

Around 26% of India’s rural households have TV. That is why when multinationals such as Coca-Cola Co. and Cadbury launched ad-campaigns targeted at the rural customer, the consumption levels didn’t see much surge. When 400mn households in rural India do not have electricity, radio also becomes a less-than-effective medium for a brand.

If you compare this to other media such as Internet which have not penetrated India as much, it still looks like the better choice. However, it definitely does not make the job of the marketer any easier.

Ironically, while rural India still lags in many technological innovations, mobile phone users are slowly growing in number. Traditionally, mobile marketing is not considered mass. Marketers would probably have to look at customizing their promotion mix to include this media for effective communication with rural customer.

In the words of Prasoon Joshi of McCann-Erickson, effectively pitching a global brand to a rural household requires more than just a catchy phrase or a Bollywood face. I couldn’t agree more. Other factors such as a strong distribution network, affordable pricing, and activation campaigns are likely to be more effective.