Marketing to Rural Consumers: Understanding and Tapping the Rural Market Potential

Rural markets are critical for marketers today because of the market size and the growth potential. The widely dispersed market and limited infrastructure to access the markets as also the diversity within the rural market have posed a serious challenge to marketers and aroused the intellectual curiosity among academics. Surge in the publications on rural marketing is an indicator of the interest in this emerging domain of knowledge. However, studies have been widely fragmented and time has come to consolidate the knowledge that has evolved over the past years. The conference on 'Marketing to Rural Consumers - Understanding and Tapping the Marketing Potential' attempted to addresses this need. This book contains 28 selected and edited papers presented in the conference. These papers are presented in six sections: Boundaries of Rural Market; Environment of the Rural Consumer: Agriculture, Development Issues and ICTs; The Rural Consumer; Factors influencing the Rural Consumer Behavior; Communication and Channels in Rural Markets; and, The Rural Consumer and Implications for Marketing Strategy.