Rural Marketing Insights 21/04/2010 Dr.

Chandan Chavadi Presidency College, Bangalore

Welcome to WASS of Presidency College, Bangalore

Rural Initiatives

 Watch this movie from HUL and reinforce your perception on rural India??

Project Shakti
Changing lives in rural India

 Shakti Entrepreneurs i-Shakti Shakti vani

 Project Shakti has already been extended to other markets such as Sri Lanka, where it is called Joyeeta, Bangladesh (Saubhagya) and Vietnam.
Innovations like Pureit have been taken to other markets like Brazil, China, Vietnam and Indonesia.

Mr Deveshwar said: ITC e-Choupal demonstrates that the private sector can achieve synergy between creating shareholder value and rendering service to society.

ITC e-Choupal is playing a transformational role in turning rural communities into vibrant economic organizations by fostering inclusive growth and enhancing their wealth creation capability.

Today, ITCs e-choupal network has reached over 3.5 million farmers and is expanding into 30 villages a day, making it one of rural Indias most ambitious horizon-widening initiatives. There are 6,500 e-Choupal kiosks in over 38,000 villages in nine States

Marketers flock to rural India for global innovations

Tata Chemicals Ltd is test marketing a low-cost water purifier, Tata Swach, for the rural market. Godrej Appliances Ltd is also test marketing its batterypowered Chotukool refrigerator developed for people who dont have access to regular electricity. Nokia Life Tools, a mobile phone application that was launched in June 2009 for rural consumers in India to access agricultural, educational and entertainment content, was introduced in Indonesia six months later.

 Hindustan Unilever Ltd (HUL) developed the Pureit home water purifier system for the rural market before launching it in Indian cities and other markets.

 Amul collects, processes and distributes over a million liters of milk and milk products per day, during the peak, on behalf of more than a ten thousand village. Every morning 26 lac women across 13,000 villages bringing in milk worth Rs. 1500 lacs.

It has 30 dairy plants and spread across 500,000 retail outlets in India.

Some more rural initiatives

Pepsi plans softdrink to fight anaemia in India. The product expected to be launched as early as next year may cost just Re1 or 2 for a drink, aim is to reduce incidence of anaemia among women in rural India by 20% by 2020. Reliance Media's new rural marketing initiative - With the support of our network of 45 FM stations, Big Rural through radio amplification would offer an edge to its clients with better reach to over 52,000 villages across the country, accounting for over 10 per cent of the country's rural population,. Reliance is all set to launch the cheapest mobile+Interenet phone( priced @ Rs. 480). Reliance will target the 600 million rural population and targets to sell around 1 million pieces a year in the rural and semi-urban areas.

 Central Bank plans to use postmen to reach rural areas -Till date, public sector banks have appointed 85 BCs, who have opened about 80 lakh accounts. Hyundai Motors India has launched a new marketing initiative Ghar Ghar Ki Pehchaan aims at tapping the rural market for Hyundais compact offering, The Santro. In the sewing machine category, a straight stitch machine, Umang, has been launched. In fans, Usha has launched a subbrand, Racer, to cater to the specific demands of the rural sector.

 Nokia has tied up with SKS Microfinance, which has 653 branches across 15 states. Nokia tries to reach into rural areas with 'showrooms on wheels' and 'rural care on the go'marketing and servicing vehicles, respectively. The company will also soon launch 'Nokia life tools, which it describes as ''a range of agriculture, education and entertainment services designed especially for the consumers in small towns and rural areas of the emerging markets.''

 IOCs rural retail outlets, called Kisan Seva Kendras, sell a host of products including financial services, agricultural implements, farm inputs such as seeds and pesticides as well as vegetables and stationery. The firm also offers money transfer facilities at select outlets through Western Union. Recently it has gone for tie-up with Dabur to spur sales. Mahindra offers laptops to tractor buyers in AP. This initiative addresses the desire of a better life with more choices and more information with convenience among the rural population. Mahindra Swasth Tractor' inspects not just the health of her son's tractors but also acts as a mobile health service for rural denizens.

 Max New York Life has established a third-party relationship with Indian Oil Corporation to use their Kisan Seva Kendras for selling policies. It plans to start with tailor-made microinsurance policies for smaller towns such as Max Vijay for which a pilot project is being implemented in Agra.

 MittiCool The Cool Refrigerator made out of Clay . It weighs 20 kg (height:18.5 and width of 11) and the way it works is very simple Water from the upper chambers drips down the side, taking heat from the inside gets evaporated, leaving the chambers cool. Conceptualized in 1997, Mitticool is developed by Gujarat based Manshuk Lal (who earlier worked as as a supervisor in roof tiles Manufacturer), and the product works on the basic principle of evaporation.

 Millee, i.e. Mobile and Immersive Learning for Literacy in Emerging Economies is a project started by Dr. Matthew Kam from UC Berkley. Millee is an inspiring project that uses mobile gaming technology to enhance access to literacy among children of school-going age in the developing world. Currently, the games work only with few phone models (Motorola Razr V3m) and the team has received 450 cell phones from Nokia in order to reach out to rural children.

Eco system for mobile

IdeaForge, Mumbai based startup has launched Roto Charger, a hand powered mobile charger that works by simply rotating a handle on the charger. 1 min of rotating the handle gives about 3 min of talk time and about 30 min of stand-by time. Multi-brand charger with small adaptor tips in convenient plug-in pad for storage. Users can charge the mobile phone either by rotating the handle or by rolling the device on any surface. It cost Rs. 350.

 QuestionBox is an interesting initiative that is attempting to bring search engine to rural India. Essentially, QuestionBox is a simple telephone intercomwhich works by pressing a button, which connects to the operator sitting in front of a computer with internet access. Users ask the operator questions in their local language. The operator goes online and finds their answers, translating English results back into the local language. The physical Question Box units have gone through several design cycles. They now can run completely off the grid, using mobile phone and solar technologies.

Gaon Ki Awaaz project echoes in London hall

The Gaon Ki Awaaz project has found an echo far beyond Rampur-Mathura, the dusty Uttar Pradesh village, where it was launched in December last year. Couple of people in each village, chosen as reporters, gather the stories. They may be thefts, fires, holes in the road, floods, births, deaths, prayer meetings. They record the stories in the local dialect and send them to an editor, who can filter and perhaps add in region-wide information on crop prices, weather forecasts or even advice on sanitation or childcare. A company in Hyderabad then sends the news back as a voice call. Thanks to speakers on phones, the twice-daily bulletins have become a social event.

Access Internet via any display device @Box from Ichip

Hyderabad based IChip has allows access to broadband internet without having a typical PC around. The product allows the user to access the net through any display device, a TV for instance, or a projector etc. @Box costs Rs. 6,990/ (standard package includes keyboard, track ball, power adaptor and a cable to connect to the television) and the company has partnered with BSNL Broadband to supply @Box to its rural subscribers at a subisdised cost of Rs 2,500 per set.

 Google has launched shopping tool that enables you to search for product information [like gadgets, washing machine, TV etc] online in a more structured fashion. The system scans millions of Indian Web pages and extracts product names, prices and images. With the help of this new technology, Google users will receive information from more than 30 thousand Indian Internet sites and be able to research a variety of products online. UID Project plans to introduce micro-payment platform for Rural India . The platform will enable Business Correspondents (who could be a local kirana shop owner and will act as micro atm) to conduct instant transactions.

 The micro platform will enable function through low cost devices (micro ATMs) that will be connected to banks across the country. This would enable a person to instantly deposit or withdraw funds regardless of the bank associated with a particular BC. Village Calling Rural BPOs in India. Drishtee boasts of successfully transforming the rural landscape of Saurath village which few years back was just another under developed village of Bihar. In a place where employment within the village was something unheard of and per capita income was hardly Rs. 1000, a rural BPO like Drishtee has not only given them an employment opportunity of Rs. 35004000 per month but has also empowered certain class of the society esp. the women with a sense of independence and selfsufficiency.

Email Via Post- Indian Post Office Launches ePost Corporate Service

Department of Posts will offer complete solution right from printing, packaging, post printing and delivery; and has setup two printing facilities in Delhi and Kolkata. The companies would need to provide data for their business mails. The postal department would do the programming and prepare the layout, print, package and deliver the product (postal department will charge Rs 6 per page of email). The mails could include credit card statements, mobile phone bills and other marketing related information.

Airtel to launch Virtual Phone Numbers You can have 10 numbers on a single SIM!
The technology enables upto 10 users to share the same mobile phone and at the same time have their own numbers. The technology requires the user to dial a given number from the specific mobile phone and activate the SIM though a password. Once that is done, the user can receive and make calls and even recharge the account through a pre-paid coupon The technology, developed by Comviva Technologies (erstwhile Bharti Telesoft) is currently undergoing field trials and is expected to be launched in another 2 months . The software will be embedded in SIM card itself and the trial is being done along with MTN, the South African GSM telecom operator.

 The virtual number technology is as good as a community based phone service that can drastically cut down the TCO, i.e. total cost of ownership of the phone, and hence a perfect fit for Rural India. Nokia has announced Nokia Money, a mobile financial service that enables financial management and payments from/to a mobile phone. In association with Obopay (Nokia has invested in obopay), Nokia enable consumers to send money to another person just by using the persons mobile phone number, as well as to pay merchants for goods and services, pay their utility bills, or recharge their prepaid SIM cards (SIM top-up).

 Atom Technologies, part of FTIL group (Financial Technologies India Ltd) has launched atom Cards, a mobile wallet/card product that enables one to swipe the mobile phone to make payments, much like a credit card. Rural India gets a lifesaving cookstove. Envirofit plans to introduce stoves below Rs500 for the 30 million below poverty line households in India. This stove needs less wood and produces little smoke. Star India is also getting a study done on the rural market and collecting data on the STD / ISD booths in rural India to ascertain the feasibility of the marketing initiative

 Until now, only not-for-profit organizations, microfinance institutions, post offices, non-banking finance companies and retired banker as well as government employees and exservicemen have been allowed to channel banking services, acting as proxies for banks in rural and semi-urban India. If the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) accepts the recommendations of an internal panel, owners of petrol pumps and fair price shops; grocers and chemists; public call office operators; insurance agents; jobless rural youth; retired teachers and even existing bank borrowers with a good track record will be allowed to spread banking services.

 GE to push low-cost healthcare systems in rural markets. GE has developed a mobile ECG (electrocardiogram) device for less than $1,000, against the existing cost of $15,000, which means that a patient in rural India can avail of an ECG for less than Rs50 against the several thousand rupees he will need to spend for an ECG in a big city. The consumer electronics and appliances division of Godrej and Boyce Manufacturing Co. Ltd is developing a water purifier for the rural markets, following in the footsteps of the Tata group and Hindustan Unilever Ltd (HUL). The company also intends to sell solar-powered products and other appliances. One of these is ChotuKool, a Rs3,200 refrigerator thats being tested in Maharashtra.

 Sanofi-Aventis plans to tap rural markets for boosting its presence. The firm may introduce its blood glucose monitors next year in India. Through an overhaul of the website www.ExploreRuralIndia.org, the ministry of tourism and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) are focusing on rural tourism as a means to generate employment and promote sustainable livelihoods in Indias villages. Reliance Money bets big on villages; plans 10,000 rural outlets . Customers will have to pay an annual premium of as low as Rs25 for insurance policies, while investment opportunities will be available for Rs50 per month.

 GM drives into rural markets to SPARK sales -as sales of automobiles shrink in the cities amid a slowdown, car makers are tapping markets in the hinterland. Godrej recently introduced 3 brands (Cinthol, Fair Glow and Godrej) in 50gm packs priced at Rs.5 meant specially for Bihar, MP and UP. Videocon introduced a washing machine named the Washer priced at Rs. 3000 and without a dryer. The rural people were more than willing to purchase a branded product over locally manufactured ones.

 LGs Sampoorna was one product that really worked wonders selling 100,000 TVs in the first year itself in rural India. Cadbury launched ChocoBix, a chocolate flavored biscuit, based on consumer insight that rural mothers opt for biscuits as they are less expensive than chocolates. Philips came with an innovative radio that neither consumed power through battery nor electricity. It used a one-minute winding spring (like mechanical watches) which would give enough power for 30 minutes listening time.

 Max gas cylinder private player - came up with auto cut-off regulator, double sealed cylinder that assures the correct weight, special steel branded noise pipe, wider base of cylinder, top ring open from one side for easy handling. HPCL 5-kg gas cylinder which can be used for cooking and lighting. The initial and recurring cost has been brought down from Rs. 1600 and Rs 270 to Rs 800 and Rs. 99 DCM Shriram came out with a low cost water purifier. They introduced twin pack consisting of two 30 ml bottles( one contains chemicals to reduce the turbidity of floating solids and the other contains a disinfectant) sufficient for needs of a family of five people for one month.

 A concept of low-cost dry toilet promoted by UNICEF (requiring less water) was appreciated in water-scarce regions of Rajasthan. Dalmia consumer care developed a tobacco free bidi, Vardaan. Tata Steel branded its sheets as Tata Shaktee to create an identity of strength, durability, toughness.

Some of the consumption numbers that will blow your mind..

6% of the soft drinks sales happen in the rural areas. Rural India accounts for 49% of motorcycle sales. Rural India accounts for 59% of Cigarettes sales. 53% of FMCG sales happen at Rural India. Talcum powder is used by more than 25% of rural India. Lipsticks are used by more than 11% of the rural women and less than 22% of the urban women. Close to 10% of Maruti Suzukis sales come from the rural market. Hero Honda, on its part, had 50% of its sales coming from rural market in FY09.