We saw Advani becoming Ad -Vani with his aggressive adwords campaign targeting every indian site. At one point there were only his ads on every site we browsed.
The first and foremost reason it failed – We hate Ads.
Advani is not a new product on the market which needs to spend millions of dollars. We all know who that bugger is. He needs no branding.
What he could have done online is to try and connect to the people in a non intrusive manner. He could have mobilized the bloggers who thinks we need to drive out every Muslim and Christian out of this country.
He also could have addressed a few developmental issues rather than going behind the age old myth of Babari Masjid. Its an old cow, almost dead. You cant milk it again and again.
His blog was one of the worst blogs Ive ever read. Long posts with really small font. Somebody made some money out of it, but all wasted.
@Advani – Next time if you are alive and healthy enough to contest, hire someone with some common sense to manage your campaigns.
Check a few twitter responses about his ad campaign
surajkala: I am glad Congress won .. Atleast we wont be bombarded with AD-vani sucking ads for next 5 yrs ..
santoshp: FU BJP FU! what the fuck happend to your Adwords campaign which tortured us on every website.. ”Advani as PM”.. LMAO
ankurb: Advani must be repenting spending all his pension money on Google AdWords. Now he won’t be able to afford that retirement home in Kerala.
Nice read. Let me share something regarding the same.
My take on the matter:
http://aravind.posterous.com/adwords-and-bjp-why-it-failed
Comment by @AravindJose — May 19, 2009 @ 3:34 am
nice post…
u wudnt hav found AD-VANI ads in my blog. the very first time i saw it being displayd on my blog, i blocked it using adsense filter
i am really happy that UPA won. atleast v dont hav to stand the religious bullshit for the next 5 years
@ advani – do u think the www is interested in all the communal nonsense u say?? if u ask me, the answer is NO
Comment by Varun Anand — May 19, 2009 @ 3:56 am
There is one other major reason, which many might not agree. At this point in India, spending too much effort on online junta is stupid, cos we still are a very small percentage of the population. The key still lies in rural areas and other segments of population where the impact of the net is still negligible. Even if he had gone ahead with the things you think you should have done online instead of his irritating ads, I doubt he would have won. He was just desperate to do something different, and failed cos the target itself was too small.
And yeah, a side point, we all hate ads, but trust me, they work. Only in this case it just increased the intensity of the feelings readers have. For those who supported him already, it was super cool and they were proud he was going tech and all that jazz. For those who dint like him, they found it irritating.
Comment by Ram — May 19, 2009 @ 4:28 am
[...] UPA’s big win in potentially BJP, Left states cost NDA a lot. The win in TN, UP, AP, Rajasthan and West Bengal drove the nail through the coffin of the NDA and the third front. Thus BJP lost almost all their ploys and even their adwords campaign. [...]
Pingback by Varun Live » Blog Archive » Why Did UPA Win The Battle For India 2009?? — May 19, 2009 @ 4:47 am
The ads were annoying and kept showing up everywhere — and sometimes they were even out of context. The design looked cheap, Advani’s photographs looked cheaper.
They tried going the Obama way — making use of the ‘Internet’, but of course, they had no clue whatsoever. This is an epic fail! Using Google ads does NOT equal to using social media.
Advertising does NOT equal to engaging with your audience. Genuine engagement made Obama’s online campaign a success. Advani’s online campaign sent across one message effectively — insincere, far from genuine.
Comment by Arun J — May 19, 2009 @ 7:14 am
hey, i dont think he failed….
i was just checking cnn-ibn portal and they are running a poll about who will be the nxt PM…..guess who won the online poll and the margin;)
http://bayimg.com/image/fappiaabm.jpg
Comment by Vineethjose — May 19, 2009 @ 1:56 pm
Who did the stupid campaing??
http://www.ignitee.com/newsroom/bjp_advani_online.html
Comment by Jithin — May 20, 2009 @ 3:07 am
methinks
1. as u said in the blog, the initiative failed to escalate the party image to embrace new medium to communicate, rather was used more as a typical display ad on Newspapers, but thats not how the medium works.
2. more personally i think it was a good strategy, went wrong in the concept message. advani as PM could have been the party agenda, but when they say that explicitly – you need to be believable – i mean a proven candidate or a detailed road map to the party’s election manifesto.
Comment by raj — May 20, 2009 @ 7:41 am
@Kenny
I am sure you would take this discussion in the right spirit.
This is one among the innumerable posts that have dwelt upon the same topic . As someone said “Success has many friends and Failure has many Analysts.”
Everyone one is entitled to their opinions and posts and so are you , i dont refute the emotion but just the rationale and analysis.
Let me put in a disclaimer i am member of an organisation called “Friends of BJP”(FOB) because i believe truly that India deserves better and BJP is the best alternative as on today. FOB does not agree to all policies of BJP and is just a external pressure and lobby group.
1. On your assessment of the the adword campaign , before we term it as a failure lets try to see the objectives behind the campaign.
Only when we tally the goals vs results we could say the campaign was a success or not. The goal was to reach out to the tech savvy voters of india who may be a a minority by miles but still are a constituency (in congress terminology – a vote bank) . Another constituency was the NRI’s who could influence people back home. Did they succeed in that ? i think so …
Why do i believe so.
a. Im privy to the unofficial estimates of number of page visits to LKADVANI.in They have successfully managed more that 3 million page visits .
b. Lets look at the poll held by connect.in.com , LK Advani was way ahead of all other personality there by garnering 1 million + votes . Also have a look at the the MSN India article titled : Advani , a darling of the netizens . http://news.in.msn.com/national/indiaelections2009/article.aspx?cp-documentid=3006969
c. I am a registered user there and the communication and collaboration mechanism the campaign office had with the registered users was amazing , including getting campaign cadres , organising FOB meetings etc.
d. We hate AD’s .., Do we.. Would seem like a revelation for for ad agencies and marketeers in india. The Hive , the agency which handled BJP’s on;ine campaign is among the most reputed online marketing agencies and handles campaigns for reputed orgs like the MACY’s.
Well then question then arises , why did BJP not win. Ill discuss that at the end.
So if you look at what the goal was vs what was the achieved results for “That Goal” , the campaign was a success. The was you are looking at it is” goal displacement” – Adwords campaign was a contributor and facilitator to the total vote tally not THE ONLY factor.
Its like saying indian army should be discouraging football practice within its cadres since battles are not fought on basis of football matches. Playing football contributes to maybe physical fitness , which turn may contribute to the war.
Lets accept it BJP is apart which has a considerable number of intelligent men who have been in politics for long enough to know a election in india is not fought on the internet. Let us not try to trivialise things here.
2. The next reason for a online campaign was to correct the image of the BJP , very comfortably thrust on it by the media and fringe elements .
The the site has the agenda , manifesto and the vision for a new india. Kenny , you mentioned you had visited the site right ? by any chance did u keep your biases aside and read the BJP manifesto , or leave it just the IT vision document. believe me any Indian would be proud of it .
When i was a child i used to listen to lots of stories on monsters in the cupboard and was terrified of going near it. Its only when i went alone and opened it i knew there were no monsters there. Its important to break mental models and openly listen to point of views before we take a call.
LKadvani.in was supposed be such a platform.
The biggest charge against the BJP , the Sangh and Advani is that they are communal. let us see what do we mean by communalism and what does the BJP stand for.
BJP stands for Hindutva and not Hindu Theocracy as maintained by the opposition and the Media.
Hindutva as defined by the honourable supreme court itself is ”
Ordinarily, Hindutva is understood as a way of life or a state of mind and is not to be equated with or understood as religious Hindu fundamentalism. A Hindu may embrace a non-Hindu religion without ceasing to be a Hindu and since the Hindu is disposed to think synthetically and to regard other forms of worship, strange gods and divergent doctrines as inadequate rather than wrong or objectionable, he tends to believe that the highest divine powers complement each other for the well-being of the world and mankind.”
Hindutva for a the BJP and the sangh stands for Integral Humanism , Cultural Nationalism and Social Justice. For the BJP and the sangh , a hindu is as those who consider India (Bharat, भारत) to be their motherland (matrubhumi), fatherland (pitrubhumi, पितृभूमि) as well as their holy land (punyabhumi, पुण्यभूमि).
There is no talk of hating other religions or driving them out of the country , who gives people these ideas? If these were the primary ideas i know a majority of current BJP supporters would not be with them , we dont like the idea of a militant Hindu organisation and it is not so.
Me as an individual have business partners who are not followers of Hinduism , my best buddies are not Hindus , i visit the Velankanni church with the same spiritual love as that of that i visit Vaikom Temple , I ran up the malayattoor hills imbibing the way the cross message as i do at sabarimala . I have attended every major “Urus” at Malik Deenar Mosque when i doing my Engg. But i do believe in Hindutva – does that make me communal ? No i am proud to say i am religious , spiritual and a HINDU.
I do believe the need for a organisation to fight for the rights of the Majority community in India.YES very much…
India needs welfare and well being of all communities living in , there depends the success of the nation and that includes the majority. When even a section of the community feel they are being suppressed there would be automatic outbursts and “acts of anger”.
Secularism should mean equal opportunities to all and not appeasement of any community. Sadly thats what happens in out country. Because political parties take the minorities and steadfast vote banks and work hard on social engineering.
I think speaking in favour of any religion then should be communalism.
Then the congress is the most communal of the lot , we have a prime minister who says Muslims and other Minorities should have FIRST right on national resources- http://pmindia.nic.in/speech/content.asp?id=464.
That would mean i dont care about what situation a citizen in i would look at the religion tag and and allot resources . If any one should have first right on national resources it should be the poor and destitute of this country not X, Y , Z community. because of this kind of communal and caste alignments we have majority seats having reservation based on religion and caste ad not on economic conditions. Revolting!!!! and then these parties call themselves secular.
There any many other reasons why an ordinary hindu would feel angry.. and if these points are not address u would see many more spontaneous acts of anger.. and everyone wants to prevent that.
Do u think every organisation which speaks up for a community s communal ? In that case IUML and MIM- All India Majlis-e Ittihad al-Muslimin , who are both UPA allies should be communal right ? Making UPA communal ..
Do u know the word secular was not in the preamble of the constitution , it was inserted by Ms. Indira Gandhi by the controversial 42nd amendment in 1976 , when she had dictatorial powers during emergency .
No one wants to cause any harm to others or snatch their rights away , just want to ensure everyone has equal access to rights and resources .
The moment you say the word Hindu in India you are branded communal by everyone. And a very important part has been played by the media in it.
Every time they talk about communalism they talk about Gujarat Riots , no body talks about the godhra carnage.
Nobody talks about the 1984 sikh riots where congressmen hunted down Sikhs and murdered them . Why are Sikhs not human beings. When sikh riots happened our Great Rajiv Gandhi said ” when a tall tree falls , the earth shakes” Oh that sounds very secular to me.
Why does not congress and so called secular parties speak of Marad Massacres , Ethnic cleansing of Kashmiri pandits , 1998 Chamba massacre , 1998 Chapnari massacre , 1998 coimbatore bombings…Why because of fear of loosing their vote banks.
Hope u remember the Shah Bano case where the passing of the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act, 1986 by Rajiv Gandhi government to dilute the secular judgment of Supreme Court under pressure from the conservative Muslims. The new act, in tune with the Shariat, denied even utterly destitute Muslim divorcees the right to alimony from their former husbands. That was secular right…
So in india for the opposition and media secularism means anti hinduism .
3. Is the Mandir issue a non issue? Well so they why dont we go ahead a build a temple and mosque there. I would not like to go into the historical significance of Aydhoya and Ram Mandir here.
Why is there devasom boards for temples and not for other religious set ups.
The Point is for the deeply religious all these are symbols of faith. Didnt we have many fights of claim to churches in Kerala among peple of same community. The most recent being valiathura church issue. Well every place of religious worship holds significance lets not refute that
The other issue that BJP raises is Uniform Civil Code – what is communal in that . Same laws for all communities , how does that become communal. A country like the US has uniform civil code. Why does the congress oppose it?
Guys , every major country had parties with religious leanings like
a. The Christian Democratic Union of Germany , whose leader Angela Morkel is the current chancellor of germany
b. and The Republicans of the US who are more christain jewish leaning one.
That doesnt term them communal in their countries. During the last election campaign when evangelicals and catholics endorsed Ma Cain . it was not termed communal. When Republicans spoke out against abortion terming it anti christian no one said they were communal.
We need to throw these definitions we have invented back in india and think in perspective
3. Acts of Fringe outfits not related to the Sangh.
For example the media and congress very conveniently put the Mangalore Pub Attacks where attributed to the Sangh and BJP. While the Media hid the fact that Sri Ram Sene was not related to BJP and had contested against the BJP in many constituencies in the Karnataka Assembly elections.
The Sangh is a nationalist cadre based outfit and their contributions during national emergencies and calamities have been commendable. Infact Pandit Nehru had invited them for republic day parade in 1963 for their help in Indo China War.
Their role in helping victims of natural disaster has been exemplarily. One of their worst detractors India Today made this statement
“It is conceded by even their worst detractors that the RSS has been in the forefront of the non- official rescue and relief (operations). This has led to an upsurge of goodwill for the Sangh”
– India Today
RSS has adopted 100 children, most of them Muslims, from militancy affected areas of the region to provide them education at least up to Higher Secondary level.They have also taken care of many victims of the Kargil War of 1999
Many such instances can be stated. Please visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rashtriya_Swayamsevak_Sangh with an unbiased mind.
4. I have been hearing media reports on how india voted overwhelmingly for congress and how there was wave for Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi and how BJP was routed out. Well in that case Why did BJP do extremingly well in MP . Karnataka , Chatisgarh , Assam ,Gujarat and Bihar??
I would take no credit away from the congress for this win and i am happy for it , but let us not try to undermine the ground realties of each state wise and region wise politics. The media said the India voted in new way irrespective of Caste or Religion . Then how do you explain congress saying they could garner the majority Muslim votes in WB and UP and that made the difference. We still live in Vote Bank Era.
Kenny , you mentioned we all know who that Bugger Ad-Vani is , unfortunately in-spite of the ad words campaign we could not get people like you to click on those links with an open mind and read through.You still believed there were monsters in the cup board and hence didnt open the cup board. There was the real failure of the Ad- Words campaign. I believe know who that “bugger ” is , he was the best PM india never had.
Many of us suffers from Information Asymmetry , we need to change that.
Let noble thoughts come to us from all side – RigVeda
And what would i do to ensure this does not repeat i will work at the grass roots and with the professionals to spread the message. This has been a beginning thanks for the opportunity .
Jai Hind
Jayapradeep J
Comment by Jayapradeep Jiothis — May 23, 2009 @ 3:59 pm
i can never agree with kenney. first of which party is secular?? congress?? never they are trying to bring the minority votes muslims christians patraying BJP communal. congress allie Muslim league is that a secular party? i dnt even see a non muslim figure in that party but i can see many in BJP even they have muslim leaders like Mukhar Abbas Naqvi in there ranks. then how the hell can any one call BJP a non secular party and IUML a secular one. can any one name any party that dsnt make there candidate according to the cast and religion arithmetics of that constituency?? even the communist d that. can any one tell a leader who hasnt promised anything too get the caste based vote?? if in the name of minority politics the so called upper cast are beaten up or cornered, if no one is there to speak for the so called majorities then i dnt think if BJP spoke for them there is no fault in it. i am an indian who see fractions and split in the socity in the name of cast and religion which are sponserd by all political parties nt just the BJP every political party has its role. congress past and important allay lalu he was a peson who won elections just in the name of cast. he is secular bt nt nt BJP i cnt understand that.
then if its in the name of riots in gujrat and babri masjith then can i ask u something after the indra gandhi assasniation hw many sikhs were massacred by the congress loyalist?? no y did every one forget it as no one is to remind u that and many are there to remind us abt the gujrat. fuck it. there are many small purely factions and and parties in UPA also wo has done murders and riots for decades like NDF, Popular front etc whos combied killings and riots are much more than the gujrat riots.
no party or leader in india is fully secular for gods sake. BJP and advani can b accused for only one thing but other parties and leaders nothing?? hope all forgot Bofors case, emergency, anti-sikh riots, fooder scam, voe for cash scam.
i am nt a hard core BJP loyalist but i feel they are the better of the bucnh of jokers available in indian politics now. but i do accept the youth brigade comming up in congress which is absent in BJP and all other parties. i hope the new brigade like sindhia, sachin pilot may rahul too will not b like there predecessors in the party.
then BJP’s add camp. they have vision but dnt kw hw to reach people or how to popularize it and use that to their advantage. advani era is over and modi wnt cme in national politics. hope BJP wnt stuck into Hindvata agenda alone again and with numbers in hand hope congress can give a stable and good productive government nw
Comment by blackofficer — May 24, 2009 @ 10:55 am
@blackofficer
1.NDF and popular front are not allies of UPA…they declared support to some of the congress candidates in kerala thats all….
2.@ “i feel they are the better of the bucnh of jokers available in indian politics now.”
these better bunch of jokers where in big trouble when advani decided to resign from the post of opposition leaders…if this is the case in becoming opposition leader what will be the situaton if they need sme 1 as PM????
@JP
Hindutva may be a gr8 concept as explained by you but what we are seeing now a days is not that….
after the BJP govt assumed power in karnataka the communal organizations become very strong..one of ma frnd in mangalore who loved the city till the new govt assumed power told me that she dnt like the place now..they are afraid to talk to their classmate who belongs to a different relegion…
Comment by sujith — May 25, 2009 @ 8:05 pm
@Sujith
I do not want to convert kenny’s blog on a political debate platform. Neverthless , i hope kenny would excuse for this attempt also.
>>>>1.NDF and popular front are not allies of UPA…they declared support to some of the congress candidates in kerala thats all….
I accept that , but don’t you think the “secular” UPA should have issued a statement sayng we dont want communal forces to support us. Would they not issue such a statement if bajarang dal or sri ram sena issued a support to them.
Let’s accept for a moment in an election any party wouldn’t mind an unsolicited support. Lets take other allies of UPA , are , IUML & MIM- All India Majlis-e Ittihad al-Muslimin not communal.
As an icing on the cake congress this time around went and requested support from All India Ittihad-e-Millat Council , an organisation know for its extremist ideologies and had declared 25 crore for GW Bush head when he visited india.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/PoliticsNation/Losing-allies-Cong-counts-on-hardliners/articleshow/4321363.cms
>>>>>>2.@ “i feel they are the better of the bucnh of jokers available in indian politics now.”these better bunch of jokers where in big trouble when advani decided to resign from the post of opposition leaders…if this is the case in becoming opposition leader what will be the situaton if they need sme 1 as PM????
Leadership vacuum is something no one likes , the fault there was that BJP never anticipated this defeat and hence had no back up plans. They didnt want a sudden flux .
I have question for you.. The the grand old party of congress , which has been in exstance in for 150 years + , whom do they look upto if they had no gandhi family. Remember how sitaram kesari was thrown out as party president on a night and sonia assumed power.
Remember when Indira Gandhi was shot dead , the congres had to fall back on Mr. Rajiv Gandhi as PRIME MINISTER of a country , when he had no idea what was happening around?
>>>Hindutva may be a gr8 concept as explained by you but what we are seeing now a days is not that….
after the BJP govt assumed power in karnataka the communal organizations become very strong..one of ma frnd in mangalore who loved the city till the new govt assumed power told me that she dnt like the place now..they are afraid to talk to their classmate who belongs to a different relegion…
Oh,. thats news. Is it so. Do you mean Sri Ram Sena? Well i have mentioned in my comment above that these fringe outfits are not related to the BJP and they even have fought elections against them. Moreover what is the evidence that communal outfits have become more strong , just because your freind feels so. Well i feel Sonia Gandhi is a italian agent , so what.. perceptions dont matter facts do.
Would you attribute all the terrorism and islamic fundamentalists associations in india to congress , because they ruled india for most of the time. Would you say Congress and CPM are responsible for all communal tensions and riots that have happened in Kerala because only they have ruled.? If Managalore was so terrorised by the BJP , then come come they won Dakshin Kannada (mangalore) in the Lok Sabha elections and Swept karnataka. See things in perspetive and ask your friend not to be afraid .
I found a interesting Post by Ranjit Nair here .. http://renjithmn.wordpress.com/2009/05/27/muthalikram-sene-and-election-2009/
And ill leave you with few comments from RanjitsPost
“After all, girls going to Pub, consume drugs, liquor and then enjoy a bit of secret love is a crime in our free society?? Come on, it is not!!. It is the fundamental rights of those sections of girls and boys in our country. ”
“Good Luck! Keep enjoying Pubs. India is all for you! For India many millions still exist to uphold her traditional values, cultural identity and intellectual power ness. Your Media masters and social angels have hit the target (that was The General Election 2009). They achieved what they wanted, at least outside the Karnataka. Congratulations!”
Jai Hind
Comment by Jayapradeep Jiothis — May 27, 2009 @ 8:40 pm
@ Kenny , i am sorry to use your blog to air these views , but had to respond to comment.That will be last one. Thanks for understanding..
@ Sujith : Friend , we could argue over twitter.. or over email.
Comment by Jayapradeep Jiothis — May 27, 2009 @ 8:43 pm