Mr. Amit biswas, Dept. of Vegetable Science
Indira Gandhi Krishi Vishwavidyalaya, Raipur (C.G.)

Agriculture sector is the backbone of our country and influence each and every one directly or indirectly whether we are required food, cloths, house, furniture, or anything else, no one can deny its significance, this sector employs half of the population and come under essential service and nothing can halt the agriculture operations
    There are hundreds of nonprofit and profit earning organizations associated with agriculture and there are abundance of operations they have to perform to keep the organization running, like human resource management, accounting and finance, technical operations, and manufacturing business planning and marketing and sales, one of the most significant department of an organization is marketing.
    Marketing generates awareness among the customer and responsible for sales and revenue, marketing is not an easy job and that too in agriculture sector is quite a challenge.

Marketing in agriculture sector
Marketing in agriculture sector is quite challenging and distinguished in nature, some of the marketing techniques used from prominent agriculture based organizations are as follows:

1. Group meetings: Few marketing officer and executives plan and organize several group meeting in villages where they could meet as many potential customer as possible and create awareness about their products and services.

2. Event organizing: This is slightly different from group meeting , here some competition or entertainment oriented activities are organized and products and services are promoted along with it, and some prizes are distributed which can be or related to products or services offered by the organization.

3. Creating link with dealers and retailers: Agriculture products are extremely difficult to sell, and creating a healthy link and being in constant touch with dealers and retailers is beneficial symbiotically companies can know about what kind of products are in demand and how much is being sold at the area also they can suggest their products to farmers with help of dealers and retailers cause farmer generally trusts retailers for their need and himself is not much educated. On the other hand dealers can get new and existing products with good supply being in touch with organization.

4. Field visits: This is also one the most impactful strategy to sell products, representatives from organization visits field of the farmer and after observing farm and crops sown, they give essential information related to insect pest management or increasing yield and suggest some products and services provided from their organization.

5. Traditional approaches: The traditional approach to promotion involves spreading one message to multiple consumers through radio channels, TV advertisements, newspapers etc.

Challenges arises after coronavirus pandemic
Due to coronavirus pandemic agriculture marketing is suffering and on a downside because now

  • People avoid meeting each other’s.
  • No gathering is allowed
  • No contact with physical products
  • Lockdown of cities along with villages
  • Staying at home
All this challenges has affected the agricultural marketing without marketing the sales is influenced which further lowers the revenue of any organization.

Digital marketing
Digital marketing is type of marketing in which digital measure are used to create awareness of products and services among customers which is not only effective and more accurate due to various data available about customer and places but also inexpensive at the same time traditional marketing include requirement of huge funds for any marketing campaign where in digital marketing we can reach as many people that too spending very little comparatively.

There are various techniques used in digital marketing some of the most significant of them are

1. Application (Apps): developing an excellent app and using it as marketing tool has many utility in agricultural marketing customer can reach the organization directly and purchase products, they can send feedback about products used, they can send photos of insects and pest problem and ask for which product to use, they can share photos of fruits and vegetables to know if that is the true size of fruit from seed sold by your organization. And you can collect as much important data about customers.

2. Social media marketing: Social Media Marketing uses social media platforms (like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat and LinkedIn) to connect with your potential customer in order to promote your brand, product and services and also helps increasing sales manifold. You can use the social media platforms to display your products in creative and unique ways.

3. E-commerce website: Traditional markets are gradually transformed into e-commerce platforms. Developing an e-commerce website is progressive way to boost sales for your agribusiness as your customer can know about your business and offerings right from the comfort of their homes. You can display whole range of products and services for people to view and buy on the website. This can prove to be surprisingly beneficial for your business as there are not many agribusinesses with e-commerce websites. You can pick a good digital marketing agency that offers web development services like leading organization in agriculture marketing Leaderz walk Pvt. Ltd.

4. Web Analytics: With help of analytics your organization can target specific customers, there are abundance of data can be generated about which product is being sold most? At what price customer are buying more? Where are the customers from? And other demographic and geographic data, which is known for help designing marketing campaigns.

5. E-mail marketing: Each mobile phone user has an email nowadays, we can collect emails of potential customer which visits your website or register in app this will help in reaching out individual potential customer and influence them to buy your products.

6. Blogging: blogs are small articles about any topic or any physical product or any educational or entertainment things this blogs can help create awareness about company ,their products and services , it helps creating brand image and will bring several customers to your app and website.

7. Search engine marketing: search engine marketing helps your website to show on first page of search results, it’s been proven in many research paper that not more that 10% look beyond first page while searching something on Google.
    There has been many companies who have taken help of digital marketing in agriculture sector and have succeeded to attract abundance of customer more and digital marketing is comparatively inexpensive in reaching potential customers as well as save time and human resource.
    Digital marketing is not just an option, after coronavirus pandemic now it has become a need for organizations to reach their customers and perform marketing campaigns efficiently. One such organization working in digital market in agriculture sector is leaderz walkPvt.Ltd.
    This organization has passionate workforce with excellent technical expertise who are one of the best in industry and has been serving for last 10 years and served hundreds of organization and understand the essence of agricultural marketing. Heres the visit link