Inside 2024 Digital Campaigns: How BJP Outsmarted Congress

On 7th August, the Lokniti–Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) released a report titled Advertisement, Trends, and Targeting Tactics: Digital Campaign Strategies in the 2024 Lok Sabha Election, analysing how parties deployed digital platforms to shape their campaigns.

This article dwells on the report's chapter on Google Ads, comparing the contrasting approaches of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Indian National Congress (INC): The BJP ran nearly 225,700 ads on Google against the INC’s 9,250, spending ₹ 560 million to Congress’s ₹ 210 million.

At first glance, this appears to be a straightforward case of “more money, more ads, better performance.” But the real story lies in how these ads were planned, distributed, and targeted.

In other words, if the advertisements were the eggs, the strategies deciding where and how to place them were the baskets. And in 2024, the BJP’s ability to spread its eggs smartly across many baskets proved decisive.

Scale of the Outreach

According to the study, the BJP’s ad count was roughly 25 times that of the INC, but the amount spent by the BJP on the corresponding ads was less than 3 times that of the INC.

Over 98% of the BJP’s ads on Google had modest budgets (under ₹ 100,000 each), with only 2% exceeding that threshold. In contrast, 27% of INC’s ads cost over ₹ 100,000 each, and the Congress even invested in approximately 45 ultra-expensive ads exceeding ₹ 1 million each.

This stark contrast suggests two divergent strategies: the BJP blanketed the platform with numerous small ads to maximise reach, whereas Congress relied on a limited number of big-ticket ads to achieve a deeper impact per ad.

Such spending patterns highlight BJP’s pragmatic use of funds. By spreading its budget across thousands of micro-ads, the BJP ensured its messaging reached myriad audiences without over-investing in any single advertisement.

The Congress’s approach, fewer ads with big spends, meant it spent heavily online, undermining any argument that it lacked the money for digital campaigning.

Instead, the data indicates a strategic difference: BJP was intent on carpet-bombing the internet with targeted messages, while Congress put larger eggs in a few baskets. The outcome was that BJP’s messages must have achieved far broader visibility, as evidenced by the volume of ads and their ubiquity.

Diversity and Inclusivity

The other area where the BJP’s digital campaign outshone Congress’ was the diversity of themes in its advertising.

The BJP’s Google ads touched on a remarkably wide spectrum of issues where the party ran ads covering 29 distinct themes, consolidated into 14 broad thematic categories for analysis. These ranged from appeals for votes and showcases of welfare schemes, to infrastructure development, jobs, education, technology, healthcare, national security and more.

In essence, the BJP leveraged its digital ads to highlight its governance record (new highways, digital payments, Article 370 abrogation, etc.) and to appeal to virtually every segment of voters.

By contrast, the INC’s Google ads were far more limited in scope. Congress focused on just 8 themes (6 broad categories) in its ads, indicating a narrower campaign strategy. The INC’s messaging centred overwhelmingly on employment and jobs (their largest category), youth, and women’s welfare, which together constituted the bulk of its ad content.

In fact, there was not a single major theme in Congress’s ads that the BJP didn’t also cover; if the INC discussed it, the BJP discussed it too, and then some. Meanwhile, significant topics like infrastructure development, education, and digital innovation were prominently featured in the BJP’s campaign but virtually absent from Congress’s Google ads.

This contrast in thematic diversity highlights how the BJP’s digital outreach sought to be inclusive of a broad range of voter interests, whereas the INC’s approach was comparatively one-dimensional.

The BJP’s expansive thematic palette gave its campaign a wider appeal. By addressing everything from farmers’ income support to national defence production in its ads, the BJP attempted to connect with diverse voter concerns across regions. Congress’s focus on youth jobs and women's issues, though important, meant its messaging might have missed other voter groups or pressing issues.

In a national election as vast as India’s, the BJP’s “something for everyone” content strategy arguably offered a strategic edge in audience connection.

Regional, Linguistic, and  Micro Targeting

Crucially, the party’s Google ads appeared in 12 languages, reflecting a conscious effort to communicate in regional tongues from Odia and Bengali to Kannada and Gujarati. 

Hindi did dominate the BJP’s ad language mix (around 70% of its ads), but the remaining 30% were spread across a dozen other languages, aligning with the BJP’s broad base and inclusive targeting approach. Whether a voter was in Odisha, Tamil Nadu, or Assam, chances are the BJP served them an ad in their own language, often highlighting local issues or region-specific achievements.

The Congress, on the other hand, had a far more limited regional focus. INC’s Google ads targeted only 20 states/UTs, leaving nearly half the country’s states outside its direct digital outreach. Linguistically, about 92% of Congress’s ads were in Hindi alone. Aside from Hindi, the party used just 5 other languages in its Google ads, mainly a few southern languages (like Tamil).

This expansive reach was coupled with micro-targeting savvy. BJP’s Google ads frequently drilled down to specific locales, even targeting individual cities, districts or pin codes within states.

The CSDS report notes that the BJP extensively employed hyper-localised targeting, pinpointing remote areas and tailoring messages to local issues, whereas the INC mostly aimed at broader state-level or nationwide audiences. In fact, only a negligible fraction of BJP’s ads were generic all-India appeals (the party targeted “India as a whole” in just 3 ads), preferring to customise messaging locality by locality.

By contrast, 66% of Congress’s Google ads were blanket nationwide campaigns, with far less granularity. The BJP’s hyper-local strategy, targeting 35 states vs. Congress’s 20, often down to sub-regions, reflects a more granular and intelligent campaign design, aiming to engage voters at the neighbourhood level.