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Cultural factors influencing consumer behavior

Cultural factors exert the broadest and deepest influence on

consumer behaviour. The marketer needs to understand the role
played by the buyers culture. Culture is the most basic element
that shapes a persons wants and behaviour. In India, there are so
many different cultures, which only goes on to make the
marketers job tougher. Some of the few cultural factors that
influence buyer behaviour are:
1. Product (colour, size, design, and shape): There are
many examples that support this point.
a. For example, the Tata Sumo, which was launched in
rural India in a white colour, was not well accepted. But
however, when the same Sumo was re-launched as
Spacio (a different name) and in a bright yellow colour,
with a larger seating capacity and ability to transport
good, the acceptance was higher.

b. Another good example would be Philips audio systems.

Urban India looks at technology with the viewpoint of
the smaller the better. However, in rural India, the
viewpoint is totally opposite. That is the main reason for
the large acceptance of big audio systems. Thus Philips

makes audio systems, which are big in size and get

accepted in rural India by their sheer size.
2. Social practices: There are so many different cultures,
and each culture exhibits different social practices.
For example, in a few villages they have common bath
areas. Villagers used to buy one Lifebuoy cake and cut
it into smaller bars. This helped lifebuoy to introduce
smaller 75-gram soap bars, which could be used
3. Decision-making by male head: The male in Indian
culture has always been given the designation of key
decision maker.
For example, the Mukhiyas opinion (Head of the
village), in most cases, is shared with the rest of the
village. Even in a house the male head is the final
decision maker. In rural areas, this trend is very

4. Changes in saving and investment patterns :

From gold, land, to tractors, VCRs, LCVs

4 As approach of Indian Rural Market

The rural market may be appealing but it is not without its
problems: Low per capita disposable incomes that is half the
urban disposable income; large number of daily wage earners,
acute dependence on the vagaries of the monsoon; seasonal








occasions; poor roads; power problems; and inaccessibility to

conventional advertising media.
However, the rural consumer is not unlike his urban counterpart
in many ways.

The more daring MNCs are meeting the consequent challenges of

availability, affordability, acceptability and awareness (the so-