BJP spend more on advertisement, than Amazon, Netflix, Colgate and Dettol

On Nov 24, 2018

NP NEWS 24 ONLINE – With assembly elections just around the corner in Maharashtra and other five states, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has once again gone all out flexing its money muscles. BJP is known from the advertisement which always fall in the crore bracket.

Broadcast Audience Research is a puzzle that has vexed broadcasters, advertisers, and advertising and media agencies in India for decades. A country with an estimated television audience of 183 million homes and growing, needed to have credible information about television viewing habits

The BJP emerged as the number one advertiser on television in India in the week ending 16 November, according to the latest BARC data.

According to the latest data provided by the Broadcast Audience Research Council, the Bharatiya Janata Party has become the number one brand advertising on television. In the run-up to the assembly elections in five states—Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Mizoram and Telangana—the BJP tops the list of television brand advertisers in the week ending November 16. The BJP had stood at No. 2 in the preceding week, while the Congress does not figure in the top list.

In the list BARC Top 10 Brands for the week spanning November 10-16 (Week 46 of 2018), the BJP had 22,099 insertions, or the number of times an advertisement is aired on television. The BJP was followed by Netflix with 12,951 insertions, Trivago with 12,795, Santoor Sandal with 11,222 and Dettol Liquid Soap with 9,487 insertions.

The BJP had apparently dislodged Vimal Pan Masala, said the ET report, to become the leader in the number of TV adverts. The party moved up a rank to claim the top position across TV channels from number two in the previous week.

The advertising overload obviously indicates how high the BJP deems its stakes to be in the assembly elections for Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Telangana and Mizoram — more so, given that the general elections 2019 are around the corner, likely six months away.

We all know how the BJP went overboard for its 2014 election campaign, which was managed mainly by Soho Square, a subsidiary of advertising giants O&M. And while the official figures with the Election Commission of India (ECI) say that BJP spent Rs 714.28 crore ($115 million) on the 2014 campaign, as per the party’s contribution report — it is anybody’s guess how modest the BJP is being in stating this figure.