UNDERSTANDING THE NEEDS TO BUY MOBILES PHONES – A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF RURAL AND URBAN CONSUMERS IN SAURASHTRA REGION

Abstract

Today’s market throws continues challenges to marketers. In response successful marketers face these challenges with innovative solutions. India is one of the fastest growing telecommunications market. It is the second largest in number of telephone subscribers in the world (222 countries) indicated by the available international comparisons till 2010. India accounts for 12 per cent of the world’s total telephone subscribers (TRAI Report, 2012, p. 6). Need recognition is the first stage of buying decision process. It is very essential for the marketers to understand why consumers buy mobile phone, which different needs motivate them to purchase a mobile phone. Present study attempted to understand different needs of rural consumers for mobile phone and compare them with the needs of urban consumers. The survey was undertaken in Saurashtra region of Gujarat state in India. The population for the survey includes rural and urban mobile phone consumers of Saurashtra region. Sampling unit for the survey is rural and urban mobile phone consumers of Saurashtra region. It is descriptive research and mainly based on primary data. Survey approach was used to collect the primary data and the questionnaire was developed both in English and Gujarati language for collection of primary data from mobile phone users of Saurashtra region. It has used number of toolsfor statistical analysis like frequency distribution, descriptive statistics, two – sample hypothesis tests (t test). At the end of the survey after eliminating the incomplete questionnaires the effective sample size was 1481 respondents. It included 712 rural respondents and 769 urban respondents from Saurashtra region.Keywords: Rural marketing, mobile phones, consumer needs.