Rural consumer behaviour

Gopal Thapa, Nepal Commerce Campus,
Baneshwor
Dr. Gopal Thapa
Tribhuvan University
Rural Consumer Behaviour

 Study about the behaviour shown by rural
consumer about acquisition, consumption
and disposition of various products.
 Consumers of rural markets are spread
throughout the country side with low income
levels, lack of education where income
comes in seasonal basis during harvesting
time.
 They are also scared to try out new or
innovative products.
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 For high tech products village buyer finds in
difficult to understand its usage, and buys
only after peers who have seen the product in
action buy the same
 Because of low income, price becomes
extremely important and rural demand is
highly price sensitive
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 TV has become a popular entertainment
media in villages and hence it is also an
appropriate vehicle for product advertising
 Radio, newspapers in local languages, wall
hoardings, pamphlets cover most advertising
media.
 Promotion of sales is done through gifts and
price discounts.
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 The consumer market in this case is Rural
India. About 70% of India’s population lives in
rural areas.
 There are more than 600,000 villages in the
country as against about 300 cities and 4600
towns.
 Consumers in this huge segment have
displayed vast differences in their purchase
decisions and the product use.
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 Villagers react differently to different products,
colours, sizes, etc. in different parts of India
 Thus utmost care in terms of understanding
consumer psyche needs to be taken while
marketing products to rural India.
 Thus, it is important to study the thought
process that goes into making a purchase
decision, so that marketers can reach this
huge untapped segment
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Factors Influencing Buying
Behaviour
 Environmental of the consumer
 Geographic influences
 Influence of occupation
 Place of purchase
 Brand preference and loyalty (80% of sale is branded items in
16 product categories).
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Cultural Factors Influencing Consumer
Behaviour
 Product (colour, size, design, shape):
 Social practices
 Decision-making by male head
 Changes in saving and investment patterns
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Buying Process
 . Problem recognition
 Information search
 Evaluation of alternatives
 Purchase decision
 Post purchase behavior
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Problems Recognition
 Problem recognition is defined by obvious or
inherent need of the consumer.
 The major aim of rural marketing research
rests upon in trying to find out which are the
key products of basic needs that the rural
consumers are willing to purchase but facing
problems to buy it.
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Information search
 The marketing information search process is
almost the same as for the urban markets as
for the rural markets. It includes:
 Personal sources: Family, friends, neighbours
 Commercial sources: Advertisements, Salespersons,
Dealers, Packages, Displays
 Public Sources: Mass media, Consumer rating
organizations
 Experiments self: Handling the product, experiments,
using samples of products like shampoo
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Evaluation of Alternatives
 Problem: purchase of a tractor
 The decision criteria could be identified as
follows:
 Price
 Manufacture/Model
 Support
 Repair record
 Warranties
 Reliability
 Multiple uses
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Purchase Decision
 Generally rests upon a number of factors
including motivation and nature of their
needs.
 The purchase decision of a consumer is also
affected by changing nature of his goals and
needs.
 When a particular goal or need cannot be
fulfilled, a substitute goal emerges.
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Purchase Behaviour of Customers
 Motivation is the inner urge, which propels
people to act.
 Seeing and smelling food gets people
motivated to eat even if they may not be
hungry.
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Post Purchase Behaviour
 Post purchase behaviour comes from satisfaction,
use and disposal after use.
 It may be based upon the consumer’s own
satisfaction arising due to his preference for a
particular more profitable option of the available
alternatives.
 Sometimes motivational research is conducted
psychoanalysis of the consumer’s mind to
understand, the sometimes not so apparent reasons
for their motives and post purchase behaviour.
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Personality
 Personality is the sum total of individual traits
of character, bearing and behaviour.
 It allows us to fine tune the differences among
various people.
 With effort people can change their
personality; from introverts they can become
extroverts, from careless types they can
become caring types.
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Personality
 Sigmund Freud developed the
psychoanalytical theory of personality
 He says that human
 personality consists of three overlapping
areas :
 Id, Super ego and ego.
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Personality
 Id is the primitive animal like instinct, which drive a
person’s hunger thrust and sex urges.
 A lot of advertising is based on using this animal
force to advantage, and that is why the female form is
used to attract the males and vice-versa.
 Super ego is the mind’s control on Id, the animal
instincts, so that people can live within social norms.
 Ego is the balancing force between Id and super ego
helping people to keep to the right path between Id’s
drive and societal norms.
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Brand Personality
 Freudian theory and brand/product
personality:
 Some products are best represented by a
celebrity;
 for instance Shah Rukh Khan can be called
Mr. SANTRO, the car he is successfully
advertising.
 He can also be named as Shah Rukh Mayur
Khan when he personifies Mayur Suiting.
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 Customers tend to associate the brands with
the brand personality.
 Hence marketers need to use a personality
who can be fully identified with the product.
 Hritik Roshan is promoting Coke, and yet as
there have been many coke promoters, it is
difficult to name Hritik as Mr. Coke.
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Personality theory of post-Freud
period
 Unlike Freud, other social scientists felt that
motives cannot be confined to basic and
sexual instincts.
 Social interaction and lifestyle too gives
motivation to people to act.
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There are four types of personalities as
follows:
 Thinking and sensing types are rational logical,
objective and quick decision-makers.
 Feeling and sensing types believe in their own
selves, are subjective and they consult others during
decision-making.
 Thinking and intuiting types take broad view, look for
wider range of options and take decisions for a long
range of time.
 Feeling and intuiting types are people oriented to
take broad view subjective decisions for long range of
time.
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Personality Types
 Karen Horney proposed that people can be
classified in three personality types.
 Compliant types who seek company, want
love and appreciation
 Aggressive types go against others and try to
excel to gain admiration
 Detached types who remain away, want
independence from interference and are keen
to be solo winners
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 Let us discuss consumer materialism and
compulsive buying.
 Materialistic people enjoy buying valuable
goods and showing them off, which makes
them egocentric and self centered
 They believe that their possessions would
project their lifestyle and yet no possession
gives them real satisfaction because the
more you have the more you want and there
is no end to wanting.
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 “My Swiss villa proves that I am a successful
person”, is the thinking of a materialistic
consumer.
 Pepsi has been positioned as a drink for the
youth and to counter it.
 Coke is positioned there too.
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 Maruti 800 is positioned as the common
man’s car while Honda City has the slot of
upper class car.
 Raymond Suiting is in the top position for the
elite while Mayur Suiting is for the middle
class.
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Factors Affecting the Purchase Decision of the
Rural Consumer
 The rural consumer enquiries more about the
price and quality of a product before taking a
final decision to buy it.
 He also takes into account the prospective
use and utility out of the transaction he would
make.
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Price and Quality
 There may be rural consumers with unique
personalities.
 But mostly rural consumers prefer to experiment and
than buy a particular product, especially, the products
like Computer note pads, palm top computers
electronic goods, etc.
 Some rural customers may be of dogmatic type with
rigid behaviour pattern.
 They will remain stick to their special choice of brand.
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 It is difficult to canvass on persuade then to buy new
product.
 Open-minded consumers in the villages take to new
products easily.
 Social “typesets”: Self centered persons look for
answers within themselves while extroverts are ready
and at times eager to find out what their peers and
seniors have to say,
 (who says what becomes important and a significant
purchase decision tool).
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Stimulation
 Stimulation levels are important guides for
consumer behaviour study.
 Some rural consumers lead a sedate life and
minimum level of curiosity arousal is enough
for them to become interested in the product.
 There are hard-core consumers who look for
being shaken out of their slumber and for
them heavy dosage of stimulation is needed.
 These persons can practically psyche
themselves into the purchase mood.
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Attitudes
 Attitudes are predisposition levels that people
have towards a product or an idea.
 These positive or negative attitudes are
based on, earlier experience, or odd remarks
heard from known or even unknown persons,
or from persons like salesmen connected to
the product, and the environment or mood in
which the message about the product was
given to the consumer.
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 Attitudes are normally consistent for a
particular product.
 If a thing is not liked then it is not to be
purchased.
 Housewives may not even think of
purchasing a twin drum-washing machine
with the known benefits of single drum
machine
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 At times attitudes change for reasons like, “let
 us economize” or non-availability of favourite brand in
the shop visited and imminence of need.
 “Let us buy Godrej soap as Lux is not in stock.”
 Such decisions for FMCG purchases are taken easily
as the cost of replacement/ or repurchase is not
heavy, unlike a consumer durable product like a car
or TV, which cannot be purchased, everyday.
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Communication Process
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Rural consumer behaviour

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