Hemlata Foundation Launches Digital Marketing Academy for Rural Women

Hemlata Foundation has launched India's first dedicated Digital Marketing Academy for rural women entrepreneurs — a 3-month intensive program that teaches social media marketing, WhatsApp business tools, online marketplace selling, and digital payment systems to women running small businesses in rural Bihar.

The program emerged from a clear gap: many women had graduated from Hemlata's livelihood programs and were running successful local businesses, but were unable to reach customers beyond their village. Digital tools offered the bridge — if only they could learn to use them.

Curriculum covers creating a business identity online, taking professional product photos with a smartphone, writing compelling descriptions, navigating Meesho and Amazon Local Shops, understanding GST basics for online sales, and using Google My Business for local discovery.

The academy has partnered with Meta's Boost with Facebook program and Google's Grow with Google initiative to provide free platform credits and training resources. Smartphones are provided as loans during the program.

Early results from the pilot batch of 30 women: 23 have listed products on at least one online platform within 3 months, combined monthly online revenue of ₹2.4 lakh, and 4 women have surpassed ₹30,000 in monthly online sales.

"One of our graduates, Kamla Devi from Katihar, now earns ₹45,000 per month selling her pickle products on Meesho and Instagram," said Academy Director Rekha Singh. "She started with ₹3,000 and a borrowed smartphone."