Question

Topic: Student Questions

To Prepare A Sales,distribution & Marketing Plan

Posted by Anonymous on 6/3/2005 at 8:55 AM ET 250 Points
how to prepare a business model of sales, distribution & marketing for a skin care company for its rural expansion? can anybody guide me plz. i think 1st ive to develop an entire new product portfolio for rural market.
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  • Posted on 6/3/2005 at 9:09 AM Author
    hi w.m.m.a
    thanx for ur suggestion.....ya that is the initial thing ive to do but apart frm this there needs to be specific supply & distribution channel that needs to be designed since the rural market conditons are quiet different from that of the urban.so i want to know what kind of supply & distribution channels can be suggested?
  • Posted by Mushfique Manzoor on 6/13/2005 at 4:45 AM Accepted
    hi ruchi

    i believe you are talking in the context of India. keeping that in mind, following are my 2 cents...

    1. if you dont have a product line, then, as your said yourself, you have to develop a range of products for the rural consumers. although i doubt whether developing an entire new product range has enough ROI in rural markets or not.

    2. if you have a range, then you can do some tinkering with the packaging. Usually rural markets have less disposable income interms of products like Skin care products (correct me if i am wrong). so develop a small pack, like sachets or low price, low content pack for the rural markets. this is what i suggest as this will just increase your SKUs without much incremental investment in Marketing/brand building.

    3. rural markets usually have a bazaar that sits on a fixed time and people mostly, do their shopping from there. so ensure that your products are available during that Bazaar time.

    4. there are some grocery/convenience grocery stores that are located in Bazaars as well as in neighborhoods. so tap into them to sell your brand.

    5. to ensure the distribution, you have to decide on the distributor/dealer network and retail distribution methods. Find out where is this rural market located. how far it is from the nearest company-owned depot or distributor/dealers depot.

    6. then plan how the rural market will be supplied. usually rural retailers have less cash in pocket to buy products. so you have to decide on the frequency of distribution service. again consider that the distribution frequency has to economically viable to serve that market. to get a middle way, find someone in the rural market who can be a wholeseller of your/distributor/dealer. so you will deliver/distribute the products to that wholeseller and he will do the DSD (direct store distribution)

    7. or you can do the DSD at the rural bazaar once a week (depends on market, on the day you are delivering to the wholeseller) and rest other days the wholeseller will do the DSD.

    i hope this helps. i have quite some experience in rural distribution set up. if you contact me (thru my profile) then i can help you further provided you divulge more information.

    cheers!!
  • Posted on 2/9/2006 at 7:11 AM Member
    As far as my idea is concerned, which I am following these days. When it comes to consumer there is no difference between mindset of a rural and urban consumer. Only thing which we as a marketier has to do is we have to make our product available at right place and at right price minimising the huge profits made by Wholesalers at taluka level and semi wholesalers at economy centre level. Its an interesting topic and can be dealt in detail.
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