Puppet Show Is A Proven Medium For Rural Marketing Campaign Giving Meaningful Engagement With Rural Audience

The life that people have in this era basically involves work and worry, there are issues that need to be dealt with at house, office and self. This amplifies in rural areas, contrary to popular belief life is complicated when you live without the resources that promise to make your life more convenient.

This adds to the stress that rural marketers are already in, imagine trying to sell a product to people who are easily agitated and already grieving the economy. This way the challenge extends to easing the audience into the marketing process before actually being able to sell the product.

People are not ready to accept the age old selling methods, to some extend they work but when creating a distinct name for a product or service that puts the brand in the headlines is considered, innovation is the key. Finding a way that not only makes the audiences want to stay but also listen and understand the features of the product.

Registration of the emotion and retention of the name is the key to succeeding through a rural marketing campaign but how to break through the monotony of life and create magic is the real question.

What is the problem?

Making rural marketing campaign interesting enough to attract and hold audience’s interest.

What can be the solution?

Three words, plain and simple-
Entertainment, Entertainment and Entertainment.

• If people want refreshment, give it to them and subtly combine your marketing objectives under the pretense of fun and rejuvenation

• One of the best ways to do that in rural areas is through, everyone’s favorite- Puppet shows.

• A dramatic performance delivered by a puppeteer with dialogues and background music using human looking dolls controlled through strings by the puppeteer.

Advantages of using puppet shows in rural marketing campaigns

Attendance and participation of audience

In rural areas, puppet shows are considered an attractive option for entertainment and thus attracts a lot of crowd easily. This also attracts some unlikely candidates who shy away from other promotional activities. This is best suited to draw out women out of the houses with the whole family as it is not considered a business activity but rather fun one. This way a diverse audience can be accumulated which can be useful while trying to market homely products or services.

At the same time, the crowd brings the promise of participation as they often enjoy responding to a puppet rather than a foreign looking salesman.

Keeping things interesting
The puppet show is designed to make the audience jump now and then, this dramatic value ups the excitement of the crowd. This energy brings a positive aura to the event and people wish to stay longer in such places.

Efficient branding activity

The puppet show is designed to make the audience jump now and then, this dramatic value ups the excitement of the crowd. This energy brings a positive aura to the event and people wish to stay longer in such places.

Sharing and caring

The thing about rural areas is that almost everyday people like to get together and share each other’s daily adventures. When a brand breaks through using a puppet show, it is sure to become the talk of the town during these discussions. This positive word of mouth and exposure goes a long way with the brand.

Cost benefit

It goes without saying that in comparison to its impact, the cost is utilized in an effective manner. Even the return on investment remains nearly impossible to be devised, no one can deny the impact.

Nukkad Show Has Been Proven Traditional Art Form For Dramatic And Effective Communication In Rural Markets

Why do we indulge in marketing?

The primary purpose of marketing and advertising, doesn’t matter through what medium executed is promotion of the product and improving awareness of the brand. This depends largely on communication of the information pertaining to the respective product or brand.

In case of rural marketing, this is where the hurdle appears, the transportation of this message is not as smooth as in urban areas. The fact that the target audience is so varied and so are their needs and preferences, has a substantial impact on the effectiveness of the rural marketing campaign.

The problem and the solution

Usually, the approach taken in urban areas prove to be ineffective in rural areas. As a result, the information is not successfully distributed among the target audience, rendering the branding activities futile.
The best way to remedy such situation is to bring in creative alternatives to the conventional mediums of rural marketing.

The birth of the art

“One fine day, a rural marketer left his office- tired and restless, when asked the reason; he shrugged and sank into thought. At this point, he decided to take a walk home. Suddenly, he found refuge in the serenity of age old entertainment of a street drama aka Nukkad natak. While the actors fiercely talking about issues such as domestic violence, environment etc and the audience sprang into applaud. It occurred to him, could this be a feasible way to get the attention of his rural audience? Could this work where other ways were failing?”
And we saw the edutainment change from there…

Use of Nukkad Natak for communication for rural marketing campaigns

Nukkad Natak is a form of art play whereas the actors perform on a street with live audience. Even though street plays have been around for centuries, their use in marketing has been established fairly recently.
The concept is rather simple and entails the use of a street play/ nukkad natak where the actors convey the information about the product or brand with the purposes of promotion. The same can be used as a prelude to other activities or individually with print support.

Advantages of using Nukkad Natak for communication in rural areas

·         Entertainment sells
Convincing a potential customer to attend an evening of dance and music is always easier than to convince them to attend a sit down information exchange.
Why?
because leisure is more attractive than work.
Therefore, it is easier to attract audience and ensure attendance through nukkad natak.

·         Effective communication
Retaining the initial interest of audience is a significant factor to the success of a rural marketing campaign and the refreshing pattern of giving necessary information assists in doing just that.

·         Higher brand recall
Answer a simple question, would you remember a brand that whose pamphlet you saw or the one who explained you their product or service through a performance of street plays?
The answer is enough to comprehend the relationship between use of nukkad natak and higher brand recall.

·         Support through word of mouth
It is human nature to appreciate something different than ordinary and it is only natural that such efforts are shared among groups. Nukkad Natak can make your brand topic of discussion for the evening in many different groups and increase reach as well as awareness.

·         Assists in social media marketing
If you believe in social media marketing or video marketing, think how much it would help associating nukkad natak to them?
A video made with the objective of selling might be ignored by many customers but simultaneously the one whose content is a entertaining street play may get their attention.

Rural Sports Should Be Planned For Creating Platform To Target Rural Youth

India is known to have the largest youth population in the world, as of 2014, 1.8 billion people in India were aged between 10 to 24 years, this comprises of 28% of the total Indian population. A simple calculation thus shows that 19.6 % of the Indian population is aged between 10 to 24 years and lives in rural areas.

Even though the United Nations defines youth as people belonging to the age group of 15-35 years, the adolescents consist of almost 10% of the rural population and thus should not be excluded from the above number.

Rural Youth is approximately 20 percent of the total population.

The statement makes it clear that rural youth is an important demographic categorization in India; they not only consist of significant number now but will become the majority 5 to 10 years down the line. This makes their consideration crucial while devising any marketing strategy for a long run in rural areas.

Why targeting rural youth is important?

Numbers speak volumes but at times they might not be sufficient for the rural marketing agency therefore let us list some other benefits as well.

• More exposure and reach for the brand as target audiences expand

• Brand loyalty increases if the relationship is established at a younger age which assists in retaining customers through tough business patches

• Communication is more effective as youth are more participating as an audience

How to target the youth?

Unlike urban youth, its rural counterpart cannot be effectively communicated with through social media channels or other electronic mediums due to lack of resources at their end. This poses a challenge in front of the rural marketing agency as to how to find a touch point where the large audience can be targeted. There are ways such as colleges and schools which can be adopted in this scenario but not all brands find them suitable or appropriate. Thus a fresh, fun and more effective way is required.

Search of the activity that combines attention and entertainment alike

One activity that rural youth can relate to easily is- Sports. In the light of lesser electronic and modern day sources of fitness and entertainment, most of them choose to utilize their time on the grounds.

The low cost and high impact appeal attracts many young people to the sport ground. As Wilfred Lemke said,

“Sport builds bridges between individuals and across communities, providing a fertile ground for sowing the seeds of development and peace.”
What rural advertising agencies need to do is use this bridge to get access to disciplined and attentive audiences to sow the grounds with seeds of brand development and communication.

How to use sports to create a platform to target rural youth?

The target audience can be approached by:-

• Holding interactive sessions at existing sports center and using the veil of entertainment and refreshments to convey the brand message and product information.

• Organizing a sports meet in association with local clubs to market the product through banners and presentations. This is the best suitable alternative if the target audience needs a diverse mix of adults too.

• Providing sponsorship to clubs in return of marketing the brand through merchandise, uniforms, hoardings etc.

Sports have proven to be the backbone of troubled youth in India and have time and again shown the capability of transforming lives. It is only a matter of time before it starts transforming rural branding process and marketing activities.

Baba Ramdev The Next "RURAL EMPEROR"

Once upon a time, there was a little boy named Ramkrishna Yadav who found sculptures interesting so he went on a long journey to old gurukuls in and around Haryana. There he learned the secret to a healthy life which he wanted to share with the good people of his village without any consideration. This secret was Yoga therapy and internal healing.In order to pursue this, he started training the villagers, this boy realized that this was the true purpose of his life and went on to find peace through meditation and self-learning. He opted for the well-known Sanyasi route and embraced the color saffron with proud.

This story might not sound familiar to you but the name born through these events may recapture your attention- Baba Ramdev. Every legend has a humble start and this was his, since then he has not looked back. The man who made Yoga the new and hip thing of this decade and converted it into a morning ritual for people of every age group and also co- founded one of the most successful consumer brands- Patanjali Ayurved Ltd.

Patanjali is known for its vast range of organic products, if you pick up any product in the market today, there is a good chance that an organic alternative for the same would be available with Patanjali stores.

The Absolute Homage

Patanjali is known to be the father of Yoga and Ramdev’s inspiration for creating a brand that is based on the power of nature. The brand derives its values from the elements that Mother Nature freely provides us, it uses them to create diverse product lines such as medicinal, cosmetic, food and beverages. The slogan of the FMCG giant sums it up perfectly- “Prakratikaashirwad”.

The company employs more than 2 lakh employees and is known to have earned an annual revenue of Rs.5000 crore in the previous year, it also racks in a growth rate of 150 % as far as sales are considered. They also have valuable collaborations with Future group, Pittie group, Reliance retail, Hyper Bazaar etc. which combined with its 4700 retail stores provides it with incredible exposure. The future even holds retail outlets at railway stations and airports for the brand.

However, very less people are aware that the first brick of the castle was put up back in 1995 with Divya Yog Mandir Trust and was solidified in 2003 when he started appearing on Aastha TV.

The King Rises

Ramdev Baba is rumored to have a net worth of Rs.1100 crore in property and cash, moreover his international acclaim as a Yog Guru is envy worthy. He has taught several sensations such as Amitabh Bachchan and Shilpa Shetty and seeks to influence the political scenario through endless protests against black money. It is safe to say that the name “Ramdev baba” is synonymous to Yoga therapy, physical fitness and Indian culture in other countries such as America, Canada etc. There are several reasons that Ramdev baba is called a king but further more factors that has thrown light at him as a rural emperor. Let us see why?

·         Roots
He was born in a small district in Haryana and has attended school around the same region and thus is influenced deeply by the village culture.

·         Living
A man who is worth that amount but still lives as a Sanyasi and eats organic food from the farm defines simplicity only a rural native can comprehend. The man is loved by many industrialists who would be happy to provide him with comfort and usher him with luxury at their expense but choses a simple lifestyle on a daily basis.

·         Products And Brand
Patanjali might have ventured into various product lines but its basic structure remains intact, for most parts these products use raw material derived from rural interiors to add authenticity to them.

·         Aspirations
As far as the public is considered, he has a loyal following devoted to his idea of simple living, he aspires not to live like a millionaire but to make real difference through empowering the villages of India. His constant struggle to achieve the same has earned him love and support from rural India.

Rural is next big market for Patanjali after a successful foray into urban landscape where you can find products across all the markets right from mom & pop store to modern trade. Next level growth can only come from rural expansion with wide distribution network and availability of product range in block/tehsil level villages.

Rural ride will not be as smooth as it has been in urban level as many challenges are there which are faced by rural marketers. We will only have to eagerly await his business acumen for rural penetration and how it turns out in his favour in times to come.