Sunday, December 23, 2007

Points to note from the Gujarat election

Post the Gujarat election results, one of the TV channels had an interview with Shashiranjan Yadav, who is looking after the BJP's hi-tech campaign. He made some interesting points about how they leveraged the Internet to their benefit:

  1. BJP gathered a database of 1,00,000 e-mail IDs of Gujaratis who were pro-BJP/BJP symathizers. Over the last 1 year, they sent fortnightly e-mails to this database which Shashiranjan Yadav believes were then circulated to 5,00,000 others.
  2. The BJP managed to attract 50 workers through this e-mail initiative and these workers actively participated in BJP's election campaign in Gujarat.
  3. Several rallies were held by these workers by asking people to participate through e-mail notifications.
  4. The exchange of e-mails resulted in several election slogans that were employed by the BJP.
Also, one must see the number of Gujaratis who have come out in support of Narendra Modi and the BJP by trashing the media in the comments section of major online news publications (Rediff, IBN Live, etc.). Every online article that was anti-Modi had dozens of comments which refuted the content of the article and spoke about Gujarat's development under Modi. Am sure most of it was due to a well-orchestrated online strategy by the BJP.

Another important role that the Internet played for the BJP was the mobilization of NRGs (Non-Resident Gujaratis) in favour of Modi. After all, they are the ones who fund the campaign.

Surely, there's a lesson or two that we can take from the e-electioneering.

Also Read: Guj Polls: It’s BJP vs Cong on YouTube and Orkut

3 comments:

G Praveen Kumar said...

Modi has proved how anyone can kick out competition, if you grab the attention of the people by hitting on their emotional parts....nice strategy..

Nimish V Adani said...

IMHO, the development plank laid the foundation for him to fight the elections with such confidence.

jitu said...

its a effective way of campaign in the new scenario. its lesson for the opposition. by this mode of campaign modi proves that gujrat is no more lack of technology. other state should adobt this policy for their forth coming election.