Research On Characteristics Of Mobile Users And Market Strategies Of Mobile Operators In Rural Areas

The number of mobile phone users in China was still growing rapidly since 2007 with a speed of seven million new users plus per month. According to the data published by China Mobile, the rapid growth owed to the exploitation of rural market. The network of China Mobile in rural areas had been improved and many marketing strategies aiming at rural customers were brought into effect. The rural market was developing very fast and over half of the new users came form rural areas in 2007. Therefore, rural mobile communication market became a hot point of China's two mobile operators. However, there were many differences between rural and urban areas because of different geographical environment and characteristics of mobile users, so special strategies should be developed aiming at rural mobile market.This paper was based on survey of rural residents to research the different demand characteristics of mobile informationalization in rural areas and to classify the mobile communication customers by gender, age and occupation.This paper also brought forward many problems which were encountered when mobile operators served their customers and gave some solutions to the problems. Based on these solutions, corresponding marketing strategies were provided to help mobile operators to exploit the rural market better.