Digital campaign strategies in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls

The Hindu

3 hours ago

India's 2024 Lok Sabha election spanned seven phases from April 19 to June 1, with around 642 million voters casting ballots at 1.05 million polling stations. While traditional campaign methods such as rallies, motorcades, and door-to-door canvassing remained influential, many voters' primary engagement with political parties came through screens. Political content flooded digital spaces through short videos on social media, targeted ads following users across apps, meme pages, and influencers weaving political commentary into lifestyle content. The 2024 election was not just supported by digital media; it was fundamentally shaped by it.
The recently released report by Lokniti-CSDS provides a data-driven analysis of digital platforms' role in the 2024 elections, showing how they complemented traditional door-to-door efforts in mobilising voters. This study analysed the social media campaigns of eight political parties — the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), Congress, Janata Dal (United) (JD(U)), Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), Shiv Sena (Shinde), and Trinamool Congress (AITC)— on X and Facebook during the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Focusing on engagement metrics and thematic content, the study tracked all posts across both platforms, including those in regional languages translated into English. Metrics such as likes, shares, comments, and views on Facebook, and likes, reposts, replies, and views on X, were used to assess voter response and messaging effectiveness. This is Part 1 of the study.
To account for differences in follower counts, the Effective Engagement Rate (EER) was calculated by dividing total engagements by the total number of followers on each platform. Analysing engagement relative to follower count reveals the real impact of campaign messaging. A large following with low EER suggests weak content appeal, while a smaller following with high EER indicates stronger resonance with supporters. The engagement analysis revealed key platform-specific trends. On X, Congress recorded the highest engagement, followed by BJP and AAP, reflecting strong voter interaction (Table 1).
On Facebook, Trinamool Congress led in engagement, with JD(U) also performing notably well.
Advertising strategies
Beyond engagement metrics, thematic analysis revealed distinct campaign strategies during the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Posts were categorised into themes such as economic issues, policies, governance, vote appeals, and attacks on the opposition. The Thematic Average (TA) was calculated by averaging each party's thematic focus across both platforms. AAP (56%) and Trinamool (44%) focused heavily on attacking opponents, while BJP (36%) and Shiv Sena (32%) emphasised vote appeals. JD(U) centred its campaign on policy issues (60%), including reservations, youth employment, and women's empowerment (Table 2).
Religious content appeared primarily in BJP and Shiv Sena posts. Demographic targeting — addressing women, youth, and farmers —was visible in posts by the JD(U) (16%) and RJD (15%).
Digital advertising is now essential in electoral campaigns, shaping voter perceptions. Social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram, both owned by Meta, have become widely used in India, enabling political parties to reach and influence a diverse audience through posts and ads. The study analysed the digital strategies of Congress and BJP in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, with a focus on their extensive use of Facebook and Instagram ads. It examines ad spend, thematic messaging, user engagement, and content consumption through the Meta Ad Library.
BJP and Congress showed stark contrasts in their digital advertising. The BJP ran 41,127 ads on Meta during the period, compared to Congress's 1,041, reflecting BJP's aggressive saturation strategy versus Congress's more targeted approach. However, the sheer number of ads does not necessarily translate into messaging effectiveness or voter engagement (Table 3).
BJP's digital strategy was more diversified, placing 53% of its ads on Instagram, 45% on Facebook, and 1% on both platforms, allowing tailored messaging for each. In contrast, Congress concentrated 86% of its ads on both Instagram and Facebook simultaneously, with only 1% exclusive to Instagram and none solely on Facebook (Table 4).
The language distribution of Meta ads also reveals contrasting strategies. The Congress focused primarily on Hindi, using it for 92% of ads, with limited regional presence (2% each in Tamil and Kannada), suggesting a more centralised voter appeal. In contrast, the BJP adopted a more linguistically diverse strategy, with 72% of ads in Hindi, and the rest distributed across Bengali, Odia, Marathi, and Tamil, highlighting its regional outreach within a national campaign framework.
Moreover, spending patterns of the BJP and Congress reflect different campaign strategies. The BJP favoured cost-efficiency, with 65% of its ads costing between ₹0 and ₹999, allowing for high-volume dissemination and broader visibility. The Congress in contrast, allocated more to higher-cost ads, with 34% in the ₹1,00,000 to ₹4,99,999 range, emphasising quality over quantity. This indicates Congress's focus on fewer, high-impact ads, contrasted with BJP's saturation strategy of numerous low-cost ads (Table 5).
The BJP's ads were primarily focused on direct vote appeals, with significant emphasis on infrastructure, development, and the economy. Nationalist themes, such as India's global standing and the abrogation of Article 370, were also prominent (Table 6).
On the other hand, the Congress's digital ads featured a more aggressive approach, with a heavy focus on criticism of the BJP's handling of economic issues, especially unemployment and inflation. Interestingly, religious content was notably absent from Congress's ads (Table 7).
An analysis of ad impressions reveals contrasting strategies between the BJP and Congress. The BJP's negative ads consistently had more reach, with 23% appearing in the 1,00,000-4,99,999 impression range, compared to just 18% of its positive ads in a similar range. In contrast, Congress prioritised positive messaging, with over half (52%) of its positive ads surpassing one million impressions, while only 27% of its negative ads achieved the same (Table 8).
Outreach on Google
In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, digital platforms, particularly Google, played a pivotal role in political outreach. A comparative analysis of the BJP and Congress reveals distinct differences in their digital strategies. The data used has been derived from the Google Ads Transparency Centre. The BJP ran 2,25,695 ads across all seven election phases (excluding the silence period), while the Congress deployed only 9,251 ads. This disparity was further reflected in their respective expenditures, with the BJP spending ₹560 million and the Congress ₹210 million (Table 9).
Nearly all BJP Google ads ran for 20 days or fewer, reflecting a strategy of rapid content turnover. In contrast, most Congress ads lasted between 21 and 40 days, indicating a focus on sustained visibility. Very few ads from either party exceeded 40 days. In terms of format, both parties used image and video ads, though with different emphasis. The BJP leaned on image-based content for broad visual appeal, whereas the Congress allocated a larger share to video ads, favouring more dynamic and immersive storytelling (Table 10).
For the BJP, a majority of its ads (98%) fell within the ₹1,00,000 range, with only 2% of ads exceeding this amount. In contrast, the Congress displayed a more balanced spending distribution, with 73% of its ads falling within the ₹1,00,000 range, while 27% exceeded this threshold (Table 11).
The outcomes were visible in impressions: 61% of BJP ads had fewer than 10,000 views, and only 3% crossed one million. However, 21% of Congress ads surpassed the one million mark, and over half fell within the 10,001–one million range indicating stronger reach and engagement (Table 12).
Across seven election phases, the BJP used a highly localised micro-targeting strategy, focusing on specific regions while excluding others. In contrast, the Congress adopted a broader strategy, mainly targeting entire States or the country, with minimal exclusions, reflecting a less localised campaign focus (Table 13).
BJP's ads showed significant variation across phases, while Congress's remained mostly consistent, often repeating similar content. Nearly all BJP ads featured Prime Minister Narendra Modi with the slogan 'Fir Ek Baar Modi Sarkar' (Once again Modi Government). Congress ads mainly showcased the slogan 'Hath Badlega Halaat' (The Palm will change the condition). Unlike BJP, Congress ads did not include explicit vote appeals.
The silent period
The digital shift of political campaigns has made it easier for political parties to bypass election regulations, particularly during the 48-hour silence period meant to ensure free and fair voting. An analysis of Google Ads using the Transparency Centre data reveals potential violations of these rules by parties during the recent elections.
The Election Commission's (EC) Model Code of Conduct (MCC) requires a 48-hour silence period before polling, banning all campaigning including digital. Despite this, parties have been observed violating the silence period by running online ads.
During the 48-hour silence period, the BJP ran 179,070 ads on Google compared to Congress's 8,149 — a ratio of approximately 21:1. Yet the BJP's total spend was only about 25% higher, than the Congress's. These figures reflect all ads live at any point in the silence windows, not necessarily violations. To identify actual breaches of the MCC, researchers sampled ads to check if they targeted poll-bound constituencies during the restricted window. Only such ads were considered violations of the rules.
To assess compliance, a sample of ads from both parties was analysed in each phase. For the BJP, 2,996 ads were analysed, and 492 were found to be in violation of the MCC. In contrast, of the 958 Congress ads analysed, 698 (or 73%) were found to be in violation of the MCC (Table 14 and Table 15). These repeated violations reveal gaps in current election regulations concerning digital platforms.
The team comprised Sanjay Kumar (Professor and Co-director Lokniti-CSDS); Suhas Palshikar (Taught political science and is chief editor of Studies in Indian Politics), Sandeep Shastri (Director-Academics, NITTE Education Trust and the National Coordinator of the Lokniti Network), Aditi Singh (Assistant Professor, Jindal Global Law School, O.P. Jindal Global University) and Vibha Attri (Research Associate at Lokniti-CSDS).