It seems copying the west is a trend that works across segments as far as India is concerned. So whether its bollywood or politics India seems to be taking a leaf out of strategies played out by the western world. This is true in the case of LK Advani’s campaign for the upcoming elections. The 81 year old seasoned politician seems to be aping Obama’s strategy of leveraging online and social media for political campaigns.
LK Advani has not only launched an official website in lkadvani.in targetted at pitching him as the prime minister for the upcoming elections but also launched a blog on the website inorder to connect with the internet audience. He is also using aggressive Search engine marketing campaigns to promote the website. Even the ads are being targetted at causing a word of mouth effect as they are being placed at sites like technorati.com which is visited by bloggers like me.
Check the screenshots below:
Advani for Pm Ads
LK Advani Website
LK Advani’s blog
LK Advani Google ads
All in all this could be a growing trend and all you know this elections might be a good event for online marketers to grab a piece of the election campaigning budgets!
The site sucks! Although it is better than the sites of other politicians and political parties and most of the government websites, its nothing compared of the site of Gujarat Chief Minister Mr Narendra Modi.
Of course the blog is a new thing for any politician in India, lets see how far it goes in connecting Advani with net savvy younger generation of voters.
Only 9% of Youths who are eligible for voting in India actually voted in the last general elections!
Where are the rest 91% of eligible youth voters? And more importantly why are they not voting?
Politicians need to talk to the youth-wherever they are! And they need to address their concerns in their own turf.
Most of these youths are on the internet and have their own social networks. It’s important to start a dialogue with them and increase their participation- in that, launching lkadvani.in is a good initiative.
I would also say that the blog is a nice initiative (not as polished and sleek as one would want it to be but a decent start)
The challenge now is to start and engage youth through a social media strategy. Infact ‘Politicians in India going the Obama way’ was one of the Digital Trends to Observe in 2009 @ http://www.atomthought.com
I think Advani should take a cue from Omar Abdullah on how to use the web