Gujarat to Karnataka: How Congress upped social media game

NEW DELHI: If the Gujarat election, where Congress ran BJP close, was the opposition party's coming of age on social media, it appears to be doing better in Karnataka, according to a party document.


Not only has Congress upped its game, it has doubled it.


According to figures with the AICC social media cell, Congress registered 87 crore "impressions" on its tweets about Karnataka elections. In contrast, the "impressions" stood at 35 crore in Gujarat.

"Impressions" are the number of times a tweet is seen and "engagements" is the number of times subscribers interact on it - seen as the measure of a tweet's footprint.

Congress's 87.1 crore impressions have been notched up on 16 different hashtags covering campaign issues in Karnataka as against 35.1 crore impressions registered on 20 hashtags in Gujarat.

A comparison of the two Congress campaigns shows the impact activity on social media, with strategists concluding they have arrived in the virtual game despite their much-delayed entry in comparison to BJP.

Explaining the degree of success, AICC's social media chief Divya Spandana says the Karnataka campaign has managed to break the language barrier and engaged people even outside the state.

"We have got a good traction on our Karnataka campaign. In the Gujarat campaign, south India was completely ignorant because we used a lot of Hindi and Gujarati. But this time, our videos have gone viral even in Mumbai despite being in Kannada and English. And they have also done well on WhatsApp and Facebook," she told TOI.

In Gujarat, Congress ran 20 hashtags - ranging from highlighting the party #RahulinGujarat, #Navsarjan-GujaratManifesto, #IamGujaratIamCongress to mocking the BJP as in the megahit #VikasGandoThayoChe, #Dhanyavad-MotaSaheb.

The most impressions on a hashtag were 5.1 crore on #IamGujaratIamCongress. In contrast, Congress has actively run 16 hashtags with the biggest hit being #CongressMathomme with 14 crore impressions followed by #Modilollipops with 8.8 crore. There are others highlighting "ModifiedReddys", a jibe at tainted mining barons campaigning for BJP, and "ShahofLies," a snipe at the BJP chief.

According to Twitter feedback, Congress registered higher popularity than BJP during Gujarat elections.

The high response to Congress on social media is at odds with the multiple-times greater following BJP and PM Narendra Modi command on Twitter and Facebook. But Divya Spandana claimed, "We may be lagging in terms of followers but on engagement and interaction, we are much ahead."