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If you happen to search for the Congress president, Sonia Gandhi, on Google, the landing page with results on Sonia Gandhi will also display a message by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – “Do You Know Why Advaniji is a better leader, BJP a better party? If you don't, visit Lkadvani.in.”
This message is a part of the search marketing technique adopted by the BJP for many political leaders. The political party has used search marketing and contextual advertising tools on Google (AdWords and AdSense) so that whenever anyone searches for Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, Manmohan Singh or even Mayawati, the landing page will have sponsored links from the BJP.
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For instance, when you search for Manmohan Singh, the sponsored link on the landing page says, “Do you share the dream? 21st Century India's Century, Advani for PM – Lkadvani.in.”
This strategy is also called brand-jacking on Google.com. The BJP has actually bought 850 keywords, including the names of its rivals such as Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, Manmohan Singh, Mayawati, Congress and Samajwadi Party to run search ads on Google.com.
“Already 619,695,254 ad impressions promoting the LKAdvani website have been served on Google.com and its network of sites since the inception of the campaign on January 2,” Prodyut Bora, chief, IT, BJP, tells afaqs!.
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Speaking to afaqs!, Ansoo Gupta, head, global business, Pinstorm, says that the practice of purchasing keywords related to the competition is not new in the world of search marketing.
A Google search for ‘Taj Hotel’ results in sponsored links of ‘Oberoi Hotels’. Similarly, a search on Go Air leads to sponsored links related to Jetlite.com and SpiceJet.com, the rival airline brands.
However, a Google search on Jet Airways only generates sponsored links for JetAirways.com. JetaAirways.com is registered as a trademark. If an advertiser owns a trademark on its name or brand, it can ask Google.com to block the usage of its trademark keywords by its competitors. A complaint can also be filed with Google in case any advertiser uses a particular keyword owned as a trademark by its competitor.
“Usage of keywords such as ‘Sonia Gandhi’, ‘Rahul Gandhi’ and ‘Congress’ implies that these words are not registered as trademarks and that’s why the BJP is exploiting and capitalising these keywords in their SEM campaign,” says an industry observer.
Interestingly, the US President, Barack Obama, owns copyrights on his name.
It seems that search marketing strategy will work for BJP, as the search volume patterns derived via Google Insights for Search, clearly indicates that ‘Sonia Gandhi’ and ‘Rahul Gandhi’ keywords received 1.5 times more searches than LK Advani.
This means higher number of searches for Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi can help BJP to drive traffic to the LK Advani’s website. Bora claims that on an average basis, LKAdvani.in receives 20,000 unique visitors daily.
Google.com is managing the SEM campaign of BJP.
© 2010 afaqs!From Sanjay, Tue 24 Mar 2009 12:08:29 PM Its a very very good strategy. It will work more for them (then it did fo Obama) since they have made road travel a nightmare many will depend on the net.
From Akash, Mon 23 Mar 2009 11:31:40 AM Great strategy. Poll campaigns are getting hi-fi these days. But how about doing something for the people instead of wasting money in pulling each other's leg?
From Benedict, Mon 23 Mar 2009 11:03:27 AM There is a mismatch between Advani's personality and the pop ups. It would have worked very well if BJP had a younger person for the PM post. Even Jaitley or Sushma Swaraj would have been better. He should gracefully give way to a younger person especially if BJP claims to be a youngster's party. With a younger PM candidate, BJP could have captured the imagination of young India.
From Radhika, Sun 22 Mar 2009 08:20:36 PM Tech-savvy BJP!
From neetu, Sat 21 Mar 2009 05:02:28 PM BJP `s veterain leader are not able to create their party image at india platform,so they just want grab the popularity of other party leader..ifor bjp it itself is immorial
From Priyasudhan, Mon 16 Mar 2009 10:59:04 PM BJP thinks modern to woo the young Electorate but their ways to wins election is the very old Obnoxious way of Instigating communalism. This shows they are NOT confident of thier Strategies may be they really do not have any.
From james, Mon 16 Mar 2009 06:20:52 PM Whats great in it? Every agency target competitor keywords/names for SEM campaign.
Afaq! is this news?
From mehernosh malia, Mon 16 Mar 2009 04:50:05 PM this reminds me of the "india shining" campaign by BJP .... which was extremely visible and heard by all but did not result in a BJP victory ... the voting masses exist in slums and villages so this one seems to be quite a waste of money
From AS Raghunath, Mon 16 Mar 2009 03:37:01 PM All said and done, this story also exposes the fact that how less inclined Congress is in cyberspace. It could also be said that its war-room handled by the likes of Jairam Ramesh, Digvijay Singh et al do not realize the potenitals of net and therefore think that cyberspace is a no battle field when it comes to election.
Worse, they also discount the fact that some of the best recent battles were won through cyberspace. Pink Chaddi campaign is just a small war successfully fought in cyberspace in a shortest period of time, leading to quick action against Muthalik.
Elections are no longer fought on Maidaans and street corners. But this war is waged on the space and time slots of media. And internet is the best option to door deliver your message, provided the political parties that deploy it, know how to make best use of these means. BJP may have pitched its tents wide on the cyberspace, but is it making the best use of it, is the question.
Be that as it may, the TG that Congress has in focus is Kalavathies and not netizens.
From umananda, Mon 16 Mar 2009 02:07:02 PM Good strategy untill and unless it's not overimposing the brand Advani! As it's always noticeable that those who scream for attention are often neglected, those who come-up with a genuine mission owns the appreciation. Rather than Brand awareness, Brand preference helps achieving the objective...
From theoutcast, Mon 16 Mar 2009 12:35:08 PM using ads to promote a candidate and on top of that hiring an ad agency to influence the perception of voters towards a particular candidate amounts to commercialization of politics, like corporate houses using ads to attract customers. I think if politicians can be more true to their work these types of hypes may not be required, whichever party he belongs to.
From sriram, Mon 16 Mar 2009 11:18:10 AM That's a very good strategy, but at the end of the day, the product (elections) comes once in 5 yrs and you can do nothing if you chose the wrong one. BJP is over-doing the internet campaign, its advani everywhere, on the other hand I have not seen any Congress ones.
From Denny Joseph, Mon 16 Mar 2009 11:05:41 AM I think this move is not called for as BJP should ride on it's own wave & not piggy back on the equity of names such as Sonia or Rahul Gandhi. Specially as the party in question is an arch rival of the BJP of sorts.
I liked what Mr. Advani has done with his website & also his recorded voice clip detailing his vision of India to come. That is a bold attempt to capture the youth votebank & should carry on with these tactics.
From Dasmeet, Mon 16 Mar 2009 09:35:03 AM Well, I guess if it was some small unknown politician, this strategy would have worked well... But in this case, I guess Advani is playing with his brand image by openly accepting that his popularity is lagging behind Sonia or for that matter Mayawati.. oops..
From Taral Prakash Bhatt, Mon 16 Mar 2009 08:16:37 AM Very clever of BJP.
