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Rural Marketing

Notes already have a public visitor’s center, consider opening a local-themed boutique that combines
the local-themed products mentioned above with localized information distribution.

Bring the World to the Town

Many residents of small towns enjoy big city offerings and exotic merchandise but have limited
means to explore exotic parts of the world. Some entrepreneurs choose to bring the world to the
small town by shopping for goods in big-city wholesale and discount markets, or picking up a
number of hand-crafted items in foreign lands to resell in a town shop. Locals often enjoy
discussing the origin of the merchandise, and will take pride in owning an item that is not
readily available locally.

Consider an Internet Cafe or Service Provider

Many small town residents are unable to take advantage of the very high bandwidth Internet
connections available in larger markets; many service providers simply do not extend their
premium offerings into small markets because they do not view small towns as profitable.
Small town entrepreneurs can bring high speed Internet access to locals, though, by subscribing
to a commercial-grade service like Gigabit Ethernet and reselling the bandwidth as a service
provider or an Internet cafe. The initial investment may be somewhat steep, but the costs can be
quickly recouped as locals sign up for the highest Internet speeds in town.

16.4 How to Create a Small Town Marketing Strategy

Keep in mind that a marketing strategy may be plural. If you have a variety of products and
services, you may need a variety of marketing strategies. If your strategy is to market your
name (For Example: Microsoft) then you will most likely concentrate on one major strategy.

Figure 16.1: Tata Nano Targets Small Town Consumers who aspire to Upgrade
from Two Wheelers to Four Wheelers

The first step in any strategy is to determine an objective. What do you expect this strategy to
accomplish? Name recognition? Product awareness? Increase in sales? Lower overhead? Reduced
Payroll? Lower Distribution Costs? The list could be endless for some companies.

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