Khadi-clad politicians queuing up on the world-wide-web, headcount of election rallies being replaced by hits on party dedicated sites, social networking forums are building opinion for candidates.....This is electioneering 2009, the signature impact of cyberage.
With over half of the country's five crore Internet users eligible for voting, politicians are using new age technologies like targeted advertising and marketing for "brand recall" via news and social networking sites.
In a bid to reach out to a large section of voters, two of the main political parties - Congress and BJP, are using Google's technologies, AdWords and AdSense, with accessibility to more than 30,000 websites and blogs.
"Organized around a range of themes, political parties are using Google's technologies - AdWords and AdSense, social networking site- Orkut and YouTube to catch the attention of young voters across the Google network," says Narasimha Jayakumar, Business Head, Google India.
Prodyut Bora, Head of BJP's IT cell, says, "Yes we are using Google Adsense to promote our party on the most visited websites in the country. Our ads can also be seen on some of the most famous foreign media sites like Guardian or even on some Pakistani news sites". However, he declines to discuss money involved in the promotion.
"National parties like BJP and Congress as well as a few regional parties are using Google's advertising platform," says Jayakumar.
"Apart from ads on Google's search engine, their text advertisements, image ads, and banners also appear alongside content on the Google network connected to the chosen themes and more through AdSense and on the popular social networking site-Orkut," says Jayakumar.
N Bhaskara Rao, Director, Center for Media Studies (CMS), says that this Lok Sabha election can be called a battle of e-democracy or electronic campaigning.
"Of the total Rs, 10,000 crore expenditure on this Lok Sabha poll, the spending on Internet campaigning should not be more than Rs 100 crores. But due to cheaper, quicker, easily availability and huge presence of eligible voters, parties are hogging on to Internet," he says.
Leaving no stone unturned, political parties are unveiling new websites or giving new look to the existing ones and many politicians even reaching out to Internet users with blogs.
Bhartiya Janata Party had launched a web campaign "Advani for PM" recently, spread over 2,000 websites worldwide. The Congress has also launched a revamped website showcasing the party's achievements in the service of the poor over the past five years in government.
