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RURAL MARKETING STRATEGIES: A CASE STUDY OF DABUR INDIA LIMITED

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 RURAL MARKETING STRATEGIES: A CASE STUDY OF DABUR INDIA LIMITED

Vandana Kumari
Research Scholar, Department of Business Administration, UCCMS, Mohanlal Sukhadia University, Udaipur.

Satyender Yadav
Research Scholar, Department of Banking and Business Economics, UCCMS, Mohanlal Sukhadia University,
Udaipur.

Abstract
India is the 2nd largest populated country in the world. India had 1.21 total populations as per the census report of
2011 and nearly 70% population is residing in rural areas. India’s rural market has great resources and
opportunities along with some challenges. Most of the population is illiterate and living in poor condition but due
to various efforts of governments, the status of rural India has improved which enhanced the standard of living of
rural people. Many multinational organizations recognized the chances, opportunities, and stepped into India to
tap the rural market. Rural areas have great potential which needs a proper analysis of consumer choices,
preferences, needs and tastes to produce the product and foster their needs and demands. There is also a need to
make some proper marketing strategies to attract rural consumers towards the brand. The study focuses on rural
marketing strategies adopted by Dabur India Limited based on market capitalization.. There are various
recommendations for the FMCG companies that want to enter the rural market. It is concluded that to grab or take
a position in the rural market there is a requirement of strong rural marketing strategy like Dabur.
Keywords: Dabur, Rural Marketing, SWOT

INTRODUCTION

CONCEPT
Rural marketing may be a combination of 2 words – Rural and marketing. Market means that an area wherever
shopping for and selling of products and services. Rural means that is not being urban. Rural marketing refers to
a social and managerial practice of developing promotion, pricing, distribution of goods and services to satisfy
the rural consumer needs and wants along with accomplishing organizational objectives.
A rural marketing strategy refers to making plans for a reasonable supply of goods and agricultural input to the
villages at a reasonable value to fulfil the requirements of the customers residing in these rural areas. Rural
markets have a high potential and may generate large sales volume for the businesses that manufacture an efficient
product and have active supply chain management

SCOPE OF RURAL MARKETING

There are following scope of rural marketing:
1. Large Population: The rural market is attractive due to its size and growth of the population. There is
68.85% of Indians live in rural areas of the total population according to census 2001 which create more
demand for consumable good (FMCG) in rural.
2. Rising Rural Prosperity: Technology is improving in agriculture equipment, contract farming, and
industrialization various schemes of development or employment run by the government is one of the
reasons that raise the rural income and standard of living.

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 3. Increase in consumption: The rural consumer purchasing power is growing which indirectly increases
the demand for the products and its consumption. The source of income is increasing due to various
employment opportunities rise by the government through various schemes.
4. Advantage of a life cycle: The products have a life cycle in which there are four stages like introduction,
growth, maturity, and decline. The rural market provides a great scope to that product that is at the
maturity stage and starts a decline in the urban market then company can start to sell these products in
the rural market due to which there is no need to get out that product from the market. E.g. soaps, personal
care, home care products, etc.
5. Rural marketing is economical: The rural marketing activities are less expensive in comparison to urban
marketing there are various cheaper sources of marketing to promote durable goods animal parades, fares,
folk program wall painting, etc.
6. Development in infrastructure facilities: Most of the rural areas are connected with urban areas through
roads and railways which increase the connectivity and easy to access the rural market. By the
development of infrastructure facilities likewarehouses, financial facilities, and communications systems
it makes easy to transport the good and services.
7. Rising literacy level: Due to the government’s efforts or various schemes education level of rural
children is rising because various schools and college or universities have opened in rural areas
which indirectly increase the demand choices of goods and services. The new technical knowledge is
helpful for a better lifestyle.

RURAL MARKETING STRATEGIES

Companies have to make some strategies to enter the rural market and to achieve their organizational goals. The
rural market environment has different related issues; it's attainable to evolve effective ways for rural marketing.
The characteristics which can facilitate in rural market segmentation are landholding pattern, irrigation
facilities, a mixture of enterprise, education levels, proximity to cities/towns, sociological factors, seasonal
demand during harvest occasions and festivals. All the factors have kept in mind to plan a strategy for rural
marketing. There are 4 A’s of rural marketing which plays an important role is the following:

1. Affordability: In rural areas, the income of the people is not so high. The rural consumer is mostly those
who earned daily wages and affordable low price products. The rural consumer would like to spend on
those necessary products which have core qualities at a low price. So that companies have to concerned
about the buying behaviour of rural consumers and make the plan of small packaging at affordable prices.

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 2. Availability: The Rural market comprises of 640,867 villages in India. Hence to available the products
in such a large spread market are not an easy task. The main challenge is the regular supply of the product
because the rural consumer usually earned daily wages and spend it on the necessary product every day.
If the product is not available then consumers shift on another brand product. So the company has to make
a strategy that the product available on time in the right place.
3. Acceptability: The product should design in a user-friendly manner that satisfies all the demands of rural
consumer-like product design, low price, durability, easy to use, large quantity, timely availability,
according to culture and traditions, etc. make the acceptability easy in rural areas.
4. Awareness: The rural area literacy rate is a low and different perspective in comparison to the urban
consumer. To create awareness companies can use audiovisual media like television but there is one
difficulty of the non-availability of proper electricity but now a day’s government makes various efforts
to reduce this problem. Rather than it, companies can use the various tool of awareness like village fairs,
showing short films, hoardings, wall paintings, etc.

DABUR INDIA LTD

Dabur is the largest company that deals with healthcare and Ayurvedic in the world. It is one of the leading FMCG
companies in India. It was incorporated in 1884 in Calcutta by Dr. S. K. Burman. It’s headquartered in Ghaziabad,
Uttar Pradesh. Dabur is the most trusted company in India for the last 132 years. It provides high-quality health
care products and Ayurvedic medicine and products. It has a wider distribution channel in the rural& urban
market. It covers 6 million retail outlets across over 100 countries. The company makes those products which are
the requirement and fulfill their daily needs and follow ethical practices.
VISION:
“HEALTH AND WELL BEING OF EVERY HOUSEHOLD”
MISSION:
To maximize shareholder’s value, by offering superior quality nature-based products, that contributes to
improving consumer’s life in Personal care, Health Care and foods.
The segment in which Dabur India limited deal:

(Source: scribd.com)

REVIEW OF LITERATURE
Ahmed (2013), this study mentioned rural marketing and its ways and conjointly specialize in problems and
challenges for selling products & services. The ways for rural markets ought to specialize in availability,

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accessibility, and affordability. He ended that if the corporate needs to confine the rural market, they have to 1st
continue the elaborate and analyse the goal of the market, features, and challenges of the rural market and make
proper promotional strategies to deal with the different situations in rural marketing. Kumar, S. et. at. (2013).
This paper study the role of rural market in the growth of Indian economy challenges faced in a competitive
environment by those companies who start dealing in the rural market after achieving saturation stage in the urban
market to grab the opportunities and the prospects of rural market development. It concluded that the future of
those companies is secure and promising of high growth who understand the dynamics of the rural market and
make the best strategies for it. Kalotra (2013), this study defined the rural market environment and analysed the
potential, strategies, and issues in India. During this study, primary and secondary information is employed. The
author ended that there is great potential within the rural market in India; however, there are massive variations
in the past and present situation of rural marketing. The study concluded that there is great potential and various
changes can see in the future in rural India. Rao, K. L. K., & Tagat, R. G. (1985), in the article title “Rural
marketing: A developmental approach” described the development and modernization in rural areas such as rising
in income, brand conciseness, increasing standard of living, preference, and choices, level of education improved,
good infrastructure like road connectivity, etc due to government schemes, corporation efforts, competition.
Siras, M. K. (2012). This paper studies the potential and unexploited condition of the rural market in India by
taking the Ghaziabad district as a sample. It discovered that initially when a company starts marketing and
distributing its product in rural areas becomes expensive and the company has to bear the loss. It concluded that
adopting effective promotional tools after spread awareness and education increases the buying power of the rural
consumer and it converts losses into profitability. Srivastava, D. (2010), this paper described the characteristics
of rural consumer and seasonal pattern of purchasing. It explores the impact of many corporate marketing
strategies on rural consumers. This study discussed the various efforts like ITC e-choupal, HUL project operation
harvest and project Shakti, Haryali Kissan Bazar and other projects and schemes of government bodies and private
companies on the development of the rural area. Sharma, D. A. (2013) this study is done to understand rural
market and analysis’ of growth of companies in rural areas by using effective promotional marketing strategies.
This study analyzed that before planning any strategy for the rural market there is a need to understand the
behavior, shopping pattern, product requirements, which media is used and language due to diversified rural India.
This study concluded that the age group of 31-40 is the main purchasing decision-maker in rural areas. Vaswani
et.at (2005) the research paper “Rural marketing in the Development Paradigm” discussed how rural marketing
reduces the difference between urban and rural economies in India. Its focus on two perspectives of strategic
marketing and the second one is producer empowerment in rural marketing. A rural area is an emerging place for
producers and a step ahead in the economic growth of India if it is utilized effectively.

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM:

Rural marketing is at the developing stage. It is very important in the current scenario to focus on rural marketing
by the companies. According to India’s population, more than 70% of prospective buyers are living in rural areas.
It is very effective to understand the rural marketing strategies and follow them to improve supply chain
management, product development, improvement in organization management who deal with the rural market
and grab the opportunities of the rural market along with the urban market.

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 OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY:
There are the following objectives of the research.
 To study rural marketing strategies of Dabur Indian Limited.
 To analyse the strength, weakness, threat and opportunities of Dabur.
 To suggest the measures for the new firms to enter into rural market.

NATURE OF THE STUDY:

The study was descriptive in nature and was carried out to identify the factors which form the rural marketing
strategies and to compare the rural marketing strategies of HUL and Dabur. This study was done to identify the
best rural marketing strategies for the companies of fast-moving consumer goods.

SAMPLE SIZE:
The sample size is of 100 respondents in all was spoken based on conveyance random sample from the vendor,
agents, distributor of Hindustan Unilever Limited and Dabur Indian Limited.

DATA COLLECTION:
The data is collected through primary and secondary sources.
 Primary source: interview of vendors, distributors, agents was conducted.
 Secondary source: the information was collected through company websites, annual reports, magazines, and
newspapers.

DABUR RURAL MARKETING STRATEGIES:

Dabur adopts various strategies and promotional tools to capture the rural market. Dabur distribution strategies
include dealers, wholesalers, agents, retailers, and Kirana stores in villages. Dabur promotional strategies to attract
more rural consumer it uses tools such as
 TV commercial
 Radio
 Newspapers
 Pop display
 Wall painting
 The contest in melas and haats
 Video vans
Dabur organised beauty contest for the promotion of skincare products in rural areas of India like Dabur amla
sunder, Dabur pratiyogita, and Dabur amlasusheel.

DABUR RURAL MARKETING INITIATIVES:

1. Project garuda: project garuda was related to supply chain management. It works on improving capital
effacing and reduces the working capital requirement for that it decreases the stock of raw material and
finished goods. Besides, it enabled to decrease the delivery cost and increase the efficiency of the supply
chain in 2005.
2. Tie up with IOC: Kisan Seva Kendra is called IOC's rural retail outlets. Dabur tie-up with IOC which sells
agriculture products like seeds, pesticides, farm inputs, financial services. It is the best option for Dabur to

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 sell its product through IOC because rural people engaged in agriculture activities and its easy to reach them
from this medium. This oil firm has more than 1000 retail outlets across India which fulfil 50% rural demand.
3. Reality shows: Dabur conducts many events from beauty contests in states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar,
Rajasthan Madhya Pradesh. Dabur organized the Dabur amlabankedikhao rani beauty contest for rural
women. It conducts mega model hunt Dabur gulabari fresh face. These events for household women for rural
areas and promoting activity of Dabur. Its main objective to develop a preference of Dabur amla products in
the mind or rural consumer.
4. Chemical-free baby products: Dabur produces Ayurvedic chemical-free products for the baby like Dabur
Laltel and Dabur Janamghuti. For the promotion of it, Dabur conducted a baby to show for the first in various
rural areas of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. This shows the goal was to spread awareness about chemical-free and
healthy products for baby care. 7000 babies were registered for the show, judged on various parameters like
health, photogenic quality, growth, etc.
5. Astra: Dabur objective to increase sales growth by 15% under Astra. Astra was a project which was
conducted to trained and educate the 2000 distributors about the complexities and challenges in rural
distribution and how to deal with them. Dabur had recruited 75 human resource managers across India who
educates them through audio and video medium and road plays. Astra training conducted in five languages
Bengali, Tamil, Kannada, Telugu, and Malayalam. Dabur divided its distribution and sales network into a
segment which are:
 Chemist
 Mass grocers
 Key grocers
 Wholesale
 Small outlet
 Modern trade
6. Project double: under this project company divided its products in the form of size, quality, price according
to the urban and rural consumer needs. It uses digitalization like maps and electronic data to manage and
estimate the cost to achieve target 353 districts. Its motive is to make strategies for maximum reach to the
rural consumer at minimum cost.
7. Others:
 To increase chavanparash and toothpaste sales and awareness Dabur organized health camp.
 It focuses on word of mouth publicity because rural people believe in those people who use or experienced
products itself.
 For rural branding strategies, it uses regional twist like launched Dabur red powder for north rural India
and Dabur Lal dant manjan for south India.
 Mobile phones are used to report the sales and coverage of rural areas by sales executives. These mobiles
have maps and demographic data to easy the work of sales force.
 To get information and feedback on consumer information technology is used.
Dabur exists in the market for more than 132 days and earned the trust and confidence of the consumer.
Dabur uses effectively the digitalization and technology to grab the attention of rural consumer towards its
products. It also established a Sundesh voluntary organization for the betterment of rural women, illiterate,
unemployed, children. In this awareness seminar and camp organized to maintain the health and hygiene
for good health provide training programs for skills and innovative ideas to generate income. Dabur

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 succeeds in its rural marketing strategies by increase its sales and turnover along with it doing for the
betterment of people.

SWOT ANALYSIS:

Strength: Weakness:
 A large no of variants  Image as a pharmaceutical industry
 Endorsements and certificates to in Ayurvedic
real juices  Low penetration in the rural market
 A better understanding of the
Indian market
 Own heritage

Opportunities: Threats:
 Recently tie-up with amazon  Intensive and increased
increases the distribution network. competition
 Tapping rural market  Availability of large options for the
 Increasing the purchasing power of consumer
the consumer.

MARKETING MIX ANALYSIS:

Product: It makes a different product Price: It follows a competitive

for a different segment which has a pricing strategy in the rural market. So
different size, quantity, quality, and it kept the low price for its product to
price. But to earn confidence and trust sustain itself in the long run.
of rural consumer it provides the goods
at good quality in low price.

Place: Dabur wants that its products Promotion: It uses technology for
reach each end-user for that product promoting its products like the internet,
transported and carrying through media, TV, radio, pop display, wall
agents, stockists, distributors, painting, contest, video vans, and
wholesalers, retailers, and Kirana famous personality who influences and
stores of rural villages. attract the rural consumer.

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS:

RECOMMENDATIONS:
 Companies should more focus on creating a brand image and marketing strategy proper implementation
because there are lots of substitutes are available in the market due to which consumer doesn’t take time
to shift on another brand.

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  AIDA (A- awareness, I- interest, D- desire, A – action) model is very effective for rural consumers among
the various model of marketing.
 Price and product differentiation strategy should be used for urban and rural consumers by the companies.
 Those products which are out of the urban market can easily be prompt and sell in rural consumer at
fewer prices.
 A different department makes by companies to handle the issues related to rural marketing and challenges
faced.
 Company product and marketing strategies should design in such a way that consumers repeatedly buy
the same brand and helps to create brand loyalty.
 A strong and wide distribution network to reach all rural consumers is beneficial for companies to get the
benefit of economies of scale.
 Time to time training and development session for its staff, distributors, and sellers is provided by the
company which improve the effectiveness and efficiency of them
 During the product production and promotion, the company relates these activities with the culture of the
consumer.
 The company should have regular and continuous monitoring on rural consumers and markets to analyse
the taste, preference, choice, and need for product development and changes in its strategies according to
market conditions.
 A specific rural marketing strategy is made by the company while entering in the rural market because
their income, living standard, choices, preferences, need is very different from urban people. The same
marketing strategies of the urban market have very chances to work out in the rural market.

CONCLUSION:
The fast-moving consumer goods sector is growing at a very fast speed in the rural market and contributing to the
gross domestic product in India. It is concluded from the study that DABUR INDIAN LIMITED rural marketing
strategies has properly implemented and the effective result comes from it in the form of an increase in their sales
and revenue. DABUR earns 40% of its revenue from the rural market every financial year. Various factors
motivate or attract FMCG companies towards a rural market like 70% of the population in a rural area, increased
literacy ratio, improved infrastructure facilities, government initiatives. DABUR use 4A’sand 4P’s of marketing
used in rural marketing strategies along with keeping all the factors such as occupation pattern, income,
preferences, choices, and needs of the rural consumer. By having lots of challenges in rural area DABUR perform
with efficiency and effectiveness to grab the opportunities of the rural market.

REFERENCES
 Ahmed, A. (2013). “Rural marketing strategies for selling products & services: Issues &
challenges.” Journal of Business Management & Social Sciences Research, 2(1), pp 55-60.
 Kalotra, A. (2013). “Rural marketing potential in India-An analytical study.” International journal of
advanced research in computer science and software engineering, 3(1).
 Kumar, S., Anjum, B., & NAYYAR, D. S. (2013). “Indian Rural Market: Challenges and Ways
Ahead.” GALAXY International Interdisciplinary Research Journal, 1(2).
 Rao, K. L. K., &Tagat, R. G. (1985). “Rural marketing: A developmental approach.” Vikalpa, 10(3), 315-
326.
Utkal Historical Research Journal, ISSN : 0976-2132 Vol.-XXXV, No-4 (I), April 2022 97
View publication stats

 Shrama, D. A. (2013). “An analytical study on the opportunities of rural marketing in India.” International
Journal of Management (IJM), 4(1), 183-189.
 Siras, M. K. (2012). Rural Marketing–Potentials and Strategies for Durables A Study in Ghaziabad
District. International journal of Trade and Commerce, 1(1), 60-69.
 Srivastava, D. (2010). “Marketing to rural India: A changing paradigm.” Asia Pacific Journal of Research
in Business Management, 1(3), 77-86.
 Vaswani, L. K., Aithal, R., Pradhan, D., & Sridhar, G. (2005). “Rural marketing in the development
paradigm.” International Journal of Rural Management, 1(2), 245-262.

WEBSITES:
 www.scribd.com
 www.dabur.com
 www.censusindia.gov.in
 www.ibef.org

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