FB, Google ads' share less than 1% of overall poll campaign outlay in India

India falls way behind US and UK, whose allocations to the two tech giants are 6.5% and 10.5%, respectively.

Business Standard : Indian political parties may have spent less than one per cent of their overall spending on Facebook and Google advertisements.

This is in contrast to elections elsewhere in the world. The United States of America saw allocations of around 6.5 per cent to the two tech giants. The United Kingdom saw around 10.5 per cent.

The analysis is based on Facebook and Google disclosures on electoral advertisements, and estimates from studies looking at political spending in various countries.

Indian political parties spent Rs 27.8 crore on Facebook advertisements during 2019. Google advertisements saw spends of Rs 27.4 crore, showed data as of May 22, the day before results were declared. New Delhi’s Centre for Media Studies estimated that Indian political parties’ 2019 election spends reached $8.7 billion (or around Rs 60,000 crore). This would mean allocations to the digital media works out to under one per cent in spends.

In comparison, the general election in the United Kingdom in 2017 saw around Rs 27 crore spent on Facebook. Google mopped up about Rs 8 crore. However, the UK elections saw significantly lower overall spending than India. The UK general elections had expenditure of only around 40 million pounds (around Rs 333 crore) across parties in the snap polls. This would mean that the two tech giants accounted for a tenth of spends.

A comparable figure to India’s spends may be the recently concluded midterm polls in America. The American midterms cost $5.7 billion (Rs 40,000 crore), according to the Centre for Responsive Politics, an organization which tracks political spending data in the US.

The total expenditure during the 2018 mid-term elections was Rs 1,976 crore on Facebook. Google spends were another Rs 626 crore. The sum works out to little over six per cent of overall spends.

The UK numbers are based on media reports and data released by that country's Electoral Commission. The US mid-term data is as of November 2018, based on a report by Tech For Campaigns, a group of volunteer technology workers who help the Americans’ Democratic campaign. The conversion into rupees for easier comparison are based on then prevalent exchange rates.