Mobile marketing: Getting it right in rural India

Anil Thakraney
Source: WARC Exclusive, September 2017
Downloaded from WARC

This article outlines how some of Indias biggest brands - including Colgate, PepsiCo and Emami - are
using mobile marketing to access rural India.

According to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, there are nearly 500 million mobile
subscribers in rural India and as many as 20% of these use low-end smartphones or feature
phones.
With increasing infrastructure and connectivity between rural and urban areas, rural people are
able to buy similar products as their urban counterparts, however there are a few dissimilarities in
terms of their purchase decision making process and usage.
The rural consumers profile needs to be mapped out with two important aspects: ability to access
content on the mobile and the content relevance.
PepsiCo invested 48% of its campaign budget into Out Bound Diallers (OBD) to disseminate
audio stories, which push messaging to all types of phones and don't require data at all.

Mahatma Gandhi once famously said the future of India lies in its villages. Those words are proving prophetic,
as decades later marketers finally wake up to a new reality. Rural folk have been armed with a device that will
completely change the way business happens in the villages: their mobile phone.

In 2017, the rural media landscape has completely changed in India. While they continue to remain mainly media
dark for now, village folk are now transfixed by the small screen in their hands. And the mobile handset has
opened up a massive opportunity for marketers as well.

According to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, there are nearly 500 million mobile subscribers in rural
India and as many as 20% of these use low-end smartphones or feature phones. Feature phones on offer at a
very low cost, and the internet-enabled mobile penetration in the hinterland is poised to take a giant leap. With
more than 70% of Indians living in villages and 50% of the population employed in agricultural activities, there is
a massive market potential. Also, with income levels steadily rising in the rural areas, it is estimated that the
FMCG sector in rural and semi-urban markets is likely to cross US$20 billion by 2018 and US$100 billion by
2025.

Over the last five years many brands have been attempting to strengthen their presence in the rural markets
using the mobile phone. Four years ago Hindustan Unilever used mobile marketing very successfully with its
award winning 'Kan Khajura Tesan' (KKT) campaign.

The uniquely Indian 'missed call' approach has been used by other marketers as well, because it works
wonderfully on even a basic handset.

More recently, Colgate has been running its 'Pocket Dentist' campaign, joint with the Indian Dental Association
(IDA), to target rural districts in Uttar Pradesh. To participate, a caller needs to give a 'missed call' on a number
advertised through voice calls. Every such caller receives a call back with advice on their particular dental
problem. This is a valuable service because of the dearth of qualified dentists in rural areas, and because
Colgate are able to build tremendous goodwill and raise brand salience.

Mountain Dew, PepsiCo's citrus flavoured soft drink went a step further and used a 360-degree approach on
mobile to reach rural audiences. Their TVCs in India usually feature Bollywood stars indulging in heroic stunts,
and this has worked well in the urban markets.

However the approach faced serious credibility issues in the rural market, where villagers felt little connection
with movie stars. PepsiCo decided to feature heroic stories from within the rural areas. And to get the message
to audiences, spend on mobile advertising was ramped up with 48% of the budget going into this medium. They
used Out Bound Diallers (OBD) to disseminate audio stories, which push messaging to all types of phones, and
don't require data at all.

PepsiCo also used Rocketalk, a mobile-only open social networking solution that's hugely popular in the rural
areas of India, where audiences interact with each other around interests. They seeded stories on this platform
and geo-targeted the audience with video content. Facebook was also employed as consumers use it heavily in
the rural areas for its 'Click to Missed Call' function to disseminate audio stories.

With 4G-equipped feature phones poised to spread like wildfire in the Indian rural areas, the game itself is set to
change. India has 450 million internet users, and as many as 750 million people in rural India are set to get
netted in the near future. The potential for marketers simply boggles the mind. Earlier this year, Umang Bedi,
MD India & South Asia, Facebook, at the 13th Marketing Conclave in Mumbai (organised by the IAMAI) said, "In
the year 2024 we will have a billion Indians connected to the internet. And the revolution is going to come
through feature phones That is going to change data access, what happened to voice in the year 2005 will
now happen to data, it will become ubiquitous."

Understanding the rural consumer

Village folk are vastly different from those living in urban areas, in terms of their needs, aspirations and beliefs.
The example of Mountain Dew clearly highlights this. Khurram Askari, Director, Insight Outreach, South India's
leading rural marketing agency, agrees that understanding the rural consumer behaviour in terms of their
product preferences and needs is very important for a comparative study between the rural and urban
consumers.

"With increasing infrastructure and connectivity between rural and urban areas, rural people are able to buy
similar products as their urban counterparts. However, there are a few dissimilarities in terms of their purchase
decision making process and usage. For instance an urban consumer goes to a supermarket and swipes a
credit/debit card for his purchases, whereas rural consumers prefer cash as a convenient mode of payment," he
said.

"The Indian countryside customer is very conscious about 'value for money' and is not ready to go for cheap
products. He is also not ready to afford high priced fancy products which might not fulfil his needs."

Kunal Sinha, Executive Director Advisory at Kantar Insights, advocates 'rural immersion' for marketers:
"Nothing is more valuable than that. The more remote, the better," he said.

"Go with an open mind, to learn from those who have not had the privilege of education, travel, have to walk
miles for clean drinking water. Find out how they connect with the world, and how that has changed over the
years," he said.

Things could be changing in terms of awareness levels, says Anoop Agarwal, DGM Marketing, Emami. The
Emami Group is a leading Indian manufacturer of natural skin care and health care products and has a
significant presence in rural India.

"The gap between urban and rural purchase habits is narrowing at a very fast pace. The rural consumer is very
well informed of the new products available in urban markets. When you introduce a new product or an existing
product, you need to keep in mind that the consumer's consumption habits are not altered in a hurried manner.
Small packs or alternate options of products are introduced by marketers to test the rural consumer response."

Ravi Shankar Bose, Co-founder of Fugumobile, says what makes the rural consumer uniquely different is that
he is not really an individual consumer. Fugumobile is, is a very successful mobile marketing company that
straddles China and India."

"With mobile marketing in context, the rural consumer's profile needs to be mapped out with two important
aspects - his ability to access content on the mobile and the content relevance. The rural consumer's needs and
beliefs are vastly different from the city dwellers. While the city dwellers show significant individuality in their
behaviour, a rural consumer may not be perceived as an individual but part of a family and local community who
influence his aspirational needs. The consumer needs to be understood both as an individual and as part of the
rural community he belongs to."

A non-homogenous mass
Another factor that makes rural marketing complicated in India is that unlike urban consumers, rural consumers
cannot be clubbed together as one mass. There is diversity in rural areas - people from one State can be
entirely different from another State, in fact often there are huge dissimilarities among people as you travel just a
hundred kilometres.

Sinha believes rather than a challenge, the diversity should be treated as an opportunity for sharper
connections, and that marketers need to recognise that one size does not fit all in rural India, and should be
prepared to make the investment.

"There are huge cultural resources in rural areas: local fairs and festivals, performers in the local language
proficient in the regional art forms who are willing to communicate brand messages, iconography that goes back
hundreds of years, storytelling forms and storytellers who are wonderful communicators", he explained.

For example, the Maha Kumbh Mela was turned into the Maha Tech Mela by Colgate wherein it tagged three
cell towers around the Maha Kumbh Mela and created a virtual circle of 3-5 kilometres radius to enable precise
targeting. With a limited budget of Rs. 500,000, Colgate had to put its best foot forward by being extremely
strategic in its mobile marketing campaign. All those local Airtel subscribers or those roaming on Airtel
connection who entered the virtual circle set-up by Colgate were targeted instantly.

Furthermore, those devotees received a call personally from the legendary Indian radio personality Amin Sayani.
While on the call, Sayani would tell them to visit the Colgate booth and get a Rs. 10/- small pack of the
toothpaste. This concept worked really well for Colgate and pilgrims in huge number turned up at Colgate's
booth.

"Thus, the massive word of mouth publicity and personal calls to the devotees enabled an altogether new
avenue for the company to reach out to the consumers. Within the limited budget mount, Colgate successfully
managed to interact with new customers, only through mobile marketing," Sinha said.

Askari on the other hand opines that though the sensibilities, language and dialects change from village to
village or region to region in India, the needs and wants of the rural consumers are almost similar. "Hence simple
and straight communication will give good results while dealing with rural consumers. A farmer's son is no more
a farmer, with the increasing aspirational levels village youth are going to the city and kids are going to local
schools, and they influence the brand decision while buying personal care and durable goods. Thus using
different media and approaches for specific products/brands will help in overcoming the challenge of dealing
with diverse rural areas."

About the author

Anil Thakraney
Freelance writer

Anil Thakraney is a Mumbai-based freelance writer and consultant with two decades experience covering the
Indian advertising industry. He is WARC's reporter based in India.

Copyright WARC 2017

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