SELLING TO HINTERLAND
Selling is an art and selling to rural folk is job of a maestro. People are the biggest assets of any marketing company and they are the source of competitive advantage. Ask HLL or Coca Cola what is their biggest nightmare and answer will be to lose its best salespersons. Selling is an art that is acquired over the time and there are no shortcuts. Most of the big corporate honchos started their career with sales. Is it a coincidence? May be no. Sales provide an excellent opportunity to get a first hand feel of any industry. Sales people of the company are the customer touch points. Thus it does not come as surprise that Sales people are the first one to identify any change in customer behaviour or upcoming industry trends. As Andrew S Grove rightly mentions in his book- “Only Paranoids Survive”, that any major change is first felt by the grass root level employees. And these early receivers are none but sales people. Thus sales is one of the most important functions of any company as it is the only function that materializes all strategic and tactical moves of a company.
High accolades come with high responsibility too. Job of a salesperson is that of a most dynamic, hardworking person. Challenges are abundant and competition is tough. Evaluation is immediate. Successes are generally shared by the whole marketing team and failures are bestowed upon the sales department. Above factors make the sales a high pressure job where they always need to stay on their toes. Companies recent foray into rural markets have made the scenario worse. There are new opportunities but of course along with new challenges only.
Selling to rural folk is tough thanks to erratic behviour of rural consumer that in turn comes because of irregularity of income patterns, dependence on monsoon and high influence of local retailers. Given the fact that very few companies have products exclusively designed to serve rural customer’s needs, it becomes a challenge for a rural salesperson to sell urban aspirations to a resistant rural household. In addition to above facts, high illiteracy level, need for credit and media darkness of the hinterland makes it even tough.
To break the monopoly of a rural shopkeeper and to compensate for the lower media reach, many companies have adopted direct marketing. Objective is to catch the customer at his home, demonstrate the product, convey the functional benefits and materialize the sale. Benefits of catching a customer at its home are manifold. Firstly, company is stopping the customer to go to village shopkeeper which has the tendency to push his favorite brands. Secondly, it is stopping the customer from going to urban retailer where he will be exposed to the complete set of consideration set. Thirdly, in addition to sales, targeting door-to-door by the salesperson involved, acts as an excellent promotional medium. Moreover, it also generates strong word-of-mouth publicity from the satisfied customer. Last but not the least is building of long term trust based relationship with the customer.
Channel is very promising but going for direct selling requires thorough knowledge of village culture, specialized training and above all dedication to soil your hand in rural sand storm. Below are some of the challenges those are faced during the journey.
Timing
Timing plays a major role in success of any rural sales activity. Most of the village households are involved in agricultural activities. Thus they leave their homes early in the morning and comeback late in the evening. Thus salespersons need to reach the village early in the morning or late in the evening. This becomes virtually unfeasible for the sales person staying in the city.
Dialect
If they don’t understand you they will not trust you and there is no sale. Thus the local dialect is the most important thing a rural salesperson should know. Dialect helps in building the trust that is prerequisite for selling to villagers.
Culture
Culture is set of all the traditions values and beliefs a particular village has. There may exist a huge cultural variation between even two adjoining villages. In fact cultural boundaries and not the geographical lines demarcate one village from the other. Culture in a Muslim dominated village of Madhya Pradesh is totally different from its Hindu dominated counterpart. Understanding of village culture is a must have to avoid any taboos in the marketplace.
Uncertainty
One word that universally defines rural India is uncertainty. It can be in rural income patterns, condition of roads or consumption patterns of rural customer. Thus a marketer needs to understand this uncertainty factor while estimating demand or designing a distribution channel.
Retailer’s Resistance
As I mentioned earlier village shopkeeper is the king. It is his territory. He knows and has a strong relationship with residents of that village. He provides them with the credit and advice on brands too. Thus going for direct sales route is bound to attract resistance from him. Understanding the retailer psyche and specific problems faced by him will lessen the resistance. Taking retailer into confidence will help in new demand creation along with increasing company’s sales.
Many companies have gained success by custom tailoring the direct selling route to overcome the above mentioned challenges. These are the companies those are writing their success story in rural India by taking the villagers along with them and sharing the reward. HLL eg has made the process more participatory by taking help from poor women from Self Help Groups who have the knowledge of dialect, culture and consumption pattern of people in their village. Even timing is no more a problem with these women staying in the village itself. Similarly Emami has started using mobile traders commonly known as “Pheri Waalas” to reach to the rural customers. These companies are building a platform for sustainable competitive advantage in these markets.
As I mentioned earlier success in hinterland requires a long term focus, dedication and openness to change. Theses markets offer completely new challenges that sometimes require radical changes in the strategy. Thus companies should be ready to change track once in a while to have a share of the rural pie.
High accolades come with high responsibility too. Job of a salesperson is that of a most dynamic, hardworking person. Challenges are abundant and competition is tough. Evaluation is immediate. Successes are generally shared by the whole marketing team and failures are bestowed upon the sales department. Above factors make the sales a high pressure job where they always need to stay on their toes. Companies recent foray into rural markets have made the scenario worse. There are new opportunities but of course along with new challenges only.
Selling to rural folk is tough thanks to erratic behviour of rural consumer that in turn comes because of irregularity of income patterns, dependence on monsoon and high influence of local retailers. Given the fact that very few companies have products exclusively designed to serve rural customer’s needs, it becomes a challenge for a rural salesperson to sell urban aspirations to a resistant rural household. In addition to above facts, high illiteracy level, need for credit and media darkness of the hinterland makes it even tough.
To break the monopoly of a rural shopkeeper and to compensate for the lower media reach, many companies have adopted direct marketing. Objective is to catch the customer at his home, demonstrate the product, convey the functional benefits and materialize the sale. Benefits of catching a customer at its home are manifold. Firstly, company is stopping the customer to go to village shopkeeper which has the tendency to push his favorite brands. Secondly, it is stopping the customer from going to urban retailer where he will be exposed to the complete set of consideration set. Thirdly, in addition to sales, targeting door-to-door by the salesperson involved, acts as an excellent promotional medium. Moreover, it also generates strong word-of-mouth publicity from the satisfied customer. Last but not the least is building of long term trust based relationship with the customer.
Channel is very promising but going for direct selling requires thorough knowledge of village culture, specialized training and above all dedication to soil your hand in rural sand storm. Below are some of the challenges those are faced during the journey.
Timing
Timing plays a major role in success of any rural sales activity. Most of the village households are involved in agricultural activities. Thus they leave their homes early in the morning and comeback late in the evening. Thus salespersons need to reach the village early in the morning or late in the evening. This becomes virtually unfeasible for the sales person staying in the city.
Dialect
If they don’t understand you they will not trust you and there is no sale. Thus the local dialect is the most important thing a rural salesperson should know. Dialect helps in building the trust that is prerequisite for selling to villagers.
Culture
Culture is set of all the traditions values and beliefs a particular village has. There may exist a huge cultural variation between even two adjoining villages. In fact cultural boundaries and not the geographical lines demarcate one village from the other. Culture in a Muslim dominated village of Madhya Pradesh is totally different from its Hindu dominated counterpart. Understanding of village culture is a must have to avoid any taboos in the marketplace.
Uncertainty
One word that universally defines rural India is uncertainty. It can be in rural income patterns, condition of roads or consumption patterns of rural customer. Thus a marketer needs to understand this uncertainty factor while estimating demand or designing a distribution channel.
Retailer’s Resistance
As I mentioned earlier village shopkeeper is the king. It is his territory. He knows and has a strong relationship with residents of that village. He provides them with the credit and advice on brands too. Thus going for direct sales route is bound to attract resistance from him. Understanding the retailer psyche and specific problems faced by him will lessen the resistance. Taking retailer into confidence will help in new demand creation along with increasing company’s sales.
Many companies have gained success by custom tailoring the direct selling route to overcome the above mentioned challenges. These are the companies those are writing their success story in rural India by taking the villagers along with them and sharing the reward. HLL eg has made the process more participatory by taking help from poor women from Self Help Groups who have the knowledge of dialect, culture and consumption pattern of people in their village. Even timing is no more a problem with these women staying in the village itself. Similarly Emami has started using mobile traders commonly known as “Pheri Waalas” to reach to the rural customers. These companies are building a platform for sustainable competitive advantage in these markets.
As I mentioned earlier success in hinterland requires a long term focus, dedication and openness to change. Theses markets offer completely new challenges that sometimes require radical changes in the strategy. Thus companies should be ready to change track once in a while to have a share of the rural pie.
posted by Ravinder Grover @ 6:27 PM
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