The Bharatiya Janata Party has spent big bucks on internet advertisements, ahead of elections in the North East. Analysis of data over 30 days from January 26 to February 24 tells us that Narendra Modi’s party was the biggest spender on Meta and Google Ads in that period. Most of these advertisements were directed towards the people of Meghalaya.
Meghalaya elections were announced on January 18, and the North Eastern state, along with Nagaland went to polls on February 27. Ahead of the elections, BJP had quit its alliance with the incumbent Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad Sangma’s National People’s Party and had decided to go solo.
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File Photo: BJP leader and former CM Biplab Deb shows his inked finger after casting vote at a polling booth during the Tripura Assembly elections in Udaipur on February 16, 2023.
So how much did the party spend? Between Republic Day and February 24, BJP Meghalaya spent ₹34.73 lakh to run 750 advertisements. In that period, BJP Tripura spent ₹32.54 lakh on 372 advertisements. Tripura went to polls on February 16. And when it comes to Google, the BJP’s expenditure was ₹1.6 crore in that period. Almost all the ads that ran in that period were related to the Meghalaya elections.
Inching close, right behind the BJP, was the All India Trinamool Congress (AITC), the ads for which are being run by their political consultant, Indian Political Action Committee. In 2021, a group of Meghalaya MLAs led by former Chief Minister Mukul Sangma joined AITC, making it one of the prominent players in the State. The party ₹25.03 lakh to run 410 Meta ads between January 26 and February 24. I-PAC, in that period, spent ₹96.1 lakh on Google ads. A lot of them were for AITC. They also ran advertisements for YSR Congress in that period, for the 2024 Andhra Pradesh elections.
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There could be many reasons why political parties are spending big on online advertisements. According to statista.com, in 2022, close to 47 per cent of Indians had access to the internet. India also has the largest number of Facebook users in the world – 31.46 crore, according to the same source.
However, the platforms may be beneficial to some parties over others, in terms of quotes and reach. According to brand strategist Harish Bijoor, “The price for Facebook advertisements is decided based on the size of the landing page that a particular ad leads you to. That way, landing pages with a better reach can land a better quote.” This could be probably why, BJP Meghalaya was able to run more advertisements, compared to AITC Meghalaya. The former, at the moment, has close to 15,000 followers more than the latter.
