Social media gets its due for pushing politics and politicians

Social media has changed the electoral landscape  with almost all political parties, including smaller regional outfits, embracing it for the ongoing general elections.

The three American social media giants – Google, Facebook and Twitter – hogged the limelight in the ongoing general elections, with political parties and candidates vying for space in the social media in addition to the traditional media.

With a substantial increases in their India traffic and usage, the three internet giants now expect a bigger slice in the country's Rs500 crore social media pie.

While Google provided candidates with platforms to reach out to their supporters through Hangouts, Facebook is seen as many as one of the best ways to employ intervention strategies, to influence the uninitiated.

Although the impact of the social media on the elections could be known only after 16 May when the results are declared, the three net giants have seen substantial increase in their India traffic and usage.

Facebook now has 100 million users in India – its largest outside the US - while the Twitter account has more than doubled since January this year.

Reports said there were 49 million conversations related to elections in India on Twitter after the 7th round of polling - more than double the 20 million election-related conversations on Twitter for all of 2013.

The influence of social media in the elections is so huge that Narendra Modi, the BJP's prime ministerial candidate with 3.89 million followers has overtaken Twitteretti Shashi Tharoor, who is now second on Twitter account with 2.16 million followers.

Modi also has nearly 14 million fans of Facebook, next only to Barack Obama.

With political parties and candidates reaching out to voters through advertisement on social media, Google, Facebook and Twitter are reported to have made substantial additions to their revenues.

All three social media majors have put in substantial efforts and resources to the elections, often working thousands of miles away from India, none of these companies are willing to discuss the advertisement revenue during the elections.

Lesser known social media platforms and technology companies in the country have also caught on the poll fever with many coming out urging youth to cast their vote in the country's biggest battle for the ballot.

The general election has also spurred India's home-grown personalised social media platform Vebbler to started 'the Ungli Campaign' aimed at engaging youth on conversations related to various topics surrounding the upcoming election and encouraging them to vote.

As the general election spread over nine phases ends on 12 May, more that 814 million voters, including over 23 million in the age group of 18-19 years, will exercise their franchise.

Many of them, especially the young, might have been influenced by Google's 'pledge to vote' campaign, Facebook's online political debates, Vebbler's 'the Ungli campaign' or telecom operator MTS' election tracker.

India, with has the third-largest internet users base globally of more than 238 million users with a majority comprising youth, is a major market for the online media.