24th International Scientific Conference on Economic and Social Development –

"Managerial Issues in Modern Business" – Warsaw, 13-14 October 2017

INFLUENCE OF POLITICAL MARKETING CAMPAIGNS THROUGH

SOCIAL MEDIA ON POLITICAL ACTIVISM: SPECIAL EMPHASIS
ON YOUTH OF PAKISTAN

Sayyed Muhammad Irfan Raza Naqvi

MS Scholar at Institute of Business and Management
University of Engineering and Technology, Lahore, Pakistan
irfanrazanaqvi@[Link], Phone: +92 334 9744885

Nafiseh Karimian Khouzani

Scholars at Institute of Business and Management, University of Engineering and
Technology, Lahore, Pakistan & Imam Khomeini International University Qazvin, Iran

ABSTRACT
The objective of this study was to analyze the possible relationship of online political marketing
campaigns and offline political mobility of the Facebook user. Online political marketing on
Facebook was analyzed and check the effect of this marketing effort on offline political activity
of the Facebook users. The targeted population was youth of Pakistan between the ages of 18-
35 (registered voters). Data on the study variables has been collected through structured
questionnaire from 607 comprised of youth who have Facebook account and were interested in
seeking online political information. Participants have recorded their responses through online
questionnaire. Statistical analysis included reliability test and correlation. The results of the
study reveal that the study variables have significant relationship with each other. The findings
of the study provide deep insight of the relationship, and magnitude of two data sub sets on the
basis of active and passive use of Facebook, and their relationship with real world political
activism. Surprisingly, passive users of Facebook were found more active in offline political
activities as compared to the active user. The possible reasons, limitations, and
recommendation are discussed in the conclusive chapter.
Keywords: Political activism, Political participation, Online & Offline activism, Youth,
Pakistan

1. INTRODUCTION
This dominating, influential and dynamic class comprises of young adults, male and females,
who are educated, aware and want to seek political information. This study will investigate their
participative role in real time politics, which will resultantly contribute in facilitating the
political marketing planners and executors of different political party. The importance of
understanding the profile of this young online user becomes more significant in the next
election, to devise a comprehensive political marketing campaign by the political parties.
Because this huge number of user will not stop here and it will continue to increase in its
number, they will not only have a great impact on election result, but they will also contribute
in making opinion about a particular party. They will impact more rigorously in the next
election by influencing ‘Offline’ political process contributors and stakeholders. Facebook is
open for all, free of cost and welcome all level of participants. For this particular study, clear
categories are necessary on the basis of usage, frequency and time spent on Social Media
website like Facebook. The categorization of Social Media was done by Kaplan & Haenlein, in
2010. This classification or bifurcation of social media is based on social presence, media
richness and self-disclosure/self-expression (Kaplan, A. M., & Haenlein, M. 2010). On the basis
of this, following categories can be divided:

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i. Active User: In this category, those users are included who are initiators, posting
different videos, images, news and blogs on the Facebook. They act as ‘online opinion
leaders’ and contributes a lot in making views of masses related to any issue, personality
or news.
ii. Passive User: They are on receiving end, contributing by sharing, commenting and show
their intentions on existing available information uploaded by active users. They don’t
initiate any string on the Facebook, but wait for someone else to initiate on a particular
issue.

Political parties may use Facebook to communicate with public who are eager to listen. Active
and passive users may contribute and they are contributing in dissemination of particular
information to their local virtual groups and communities. They play as the frontline
spokesperson for political parties and spread the word of mouth more affectively as compared
to the official representative of any political party. Facebook become the true predictor of the
public opinion and sentiments.

Research Rationale
All kind of efforts by the political parties are to engage online user in seeking information and
influence, so that this online user may contribute in offline political activities and real time
politics. Parties’ online marketing campaigns focus on bringing that online user on the roads
and motivate them to contribute. In this study this phenomenon will be explored that is it really
happening or not. As we already has the firm believe from the above discussion that social
media (like Facebook) is most remarkable thing of this era which not make impossible things
possible but also provide a ground for future actions. No precedential evidence exists for the
support or against this proposition. This area is still grey and this research will provide a
substantial support for the future strategic marketing campaigns and decisions.

Problem Statement
Social Media marketing is the recent induction in the modern marketing techniques, and has
significant contribution in devising Integrated marketing Communications. It is dynamic and
wide spreading tool of the modern era. In the traditional marketing communication model, the
content, timing, frequency and the medium of communication by the organization is in the
collaboration of the external agents like advertising agency, marketing research firms, and
public relation firms. However the impact of social media is huge and enormous on the
conventional way of communication (Anjum, A. H. 2011). Now this situation converges to the
more specific way of hitting the target audience, so the political parties are focusing. So the
affectivity of social media need to be judged and evaluated through sophisticated research
process, so that contributing factor towards the established proposition can be analyzed in more
systematic way. The coherence between the conventional media campaigns and new media
campaigns is s of great importance, because the message / information transmission becomes
different and delivery routes are different. But the strategic objective of the organizations is the
same for both. Now learning organizations have to explore the limitation and delimitations of
the new media campaign requirements and pitfalls. Any constraint in the way of communication
can only bridge by highlighting the possible dimension of the stated issue. This transition from
the conventional way of doing marketing communication is changing rapidly. So the key to
success is to change marketing strategy at each level (Strategic, tactical and operational). There
is a gap exist between the conventional mode of launching IMC (Integrated Marketing
Communication) campaign and the new media (Social Media) marketing campaign. It is
important to fill this gap by investigating that how much social media political campaign has
the impact on real time / offline political activism.

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If there is a relationship exists, then further research will explore the dimensions and factor that
affect new media political marketing campaign. The purpose of the study is to highlight the
political participation of online user in main stream politics, also find out the possibility of
relationship of online activism with the offline political activities of the same user.

2. LITERATURE REVIEW
Public is a dissimilar group of people that have an actual or a potential interest and/or impact
on organization. (Kotler, P., & Murray, M. 1975). Another school stated this concept in
different dimension and stated that Public generally refers to a situational group of individuals
who appear and establish in response to a problem. (Wu, M. Y., Taylor, M., & Chen, M. J.
2001). In context with the active group and public opinion, social scientists recognize this
activism in more delicate way. The situational theory of publics: non-publics, aware publics,
latent publics, and active publics (Grunig, J. E. 1983). According to Grunig, the respond
towards a particular situation can be characterized by the classification of Public into smaller
segments or classes. In this study, my focus is on ‘active public’, which is considered as the
most dominating segment of general public. The impact of this segment can be clearly
observable in online activism. The image inside the minds of people, the pictures of their own,
of others, of their wishes, drives, and affiliation, are their public sentiments. Those beliefs which
are acted upon by clusters of people, or by individuals acting under the name of groups, are
‘Public Opinion’. (Lippmann, W. 1946). According to some scientist, Social media is a
collection of Internet-based applications that build on the moral and hi-tech foundations of Web
2.0 and that allow the formation and exchange of User Generated Content (Kaplan, et al., 2010).
Some scientist like Aula, professor at University of Helsinki said that Social media is
characterized by interactivity – partakers freely send, receive, and share content, which is
contributed by other (Aula, P. 2010). It not only gives leverage to seek information but also
create opportunities to participate. As increasing numbers of young people interested in
becoming expert in use of media tools to express themselves, explore their individualities, and
connect with others—to be active makers as well as users of social culture—experts have a
chance to inspire young media creators to practice active citizenship (Boyd, D. 2007). The keen
acceptance of Web publication, digital video making and online video circulation, social
networking facilities, immediate messaging, multiplayer enacting games, online societies,
virtual spheres, and other Internet-based media by masses of young people around the world
establishes the strength of their aspiration—uninterrupted by adults—to learn digital creation
and communication abilities (Rheingold, H. 2008). Researchers like Ryan,Y. (2011), Al-
Atraqchi, F. (2011) and Diamond, L. (2010) have detailed work on Egyptian and Tunisian
movements and cover the role of social media in these revolts. Blogs, Facebook and Twitter
have a significant role in mobilizing youth of such a massive move. Also the political mobility
was observable on roads. Public participation is actually the involvement of public in the
process of decision-making (Stewart, J., & Clarke, M. 1987). Kathryn Montgomery has worked
on network neutrality in reference with the youth digital democracy. She highlighted whether
the democratic media does play a vital role in democratizing the youth to express their feelings,
consent and expression about any particular issue, while considering the policy, practices and
marketplace (Montgomery, 2008). The Internet played a significant role in all these efforts, not
only facilitating each initiative with an objective of reaching its target audience but also
enabling cooperation among the virtual groups, supporting virtual alliances through linkages
and cross-promotion settings, and creating a “youth engagement Web sphere” on the Internet
that was enormous in magnitude and more urbane than any before (Bennett, L., & Xenos, M.
2005) The exclusive style of individual expression that differentiates one’s opinion from those
of others can be called upon to help link young people’s active participation in ‘identity-
formation’ with their prospective commitment with society as citizens.

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Moving from a private to a public, opinion can help young people to turn their ‘self-expression’
into a form of public participation (Agre, P. 1998). Public voice is learnable, a matter of
deliberately involving in an active public rather than dissemination to a passive audience. This
urge and motivation compels youth to be more expressive and passionate (Rheingold, H. 2008).
The public opinion of individuals, combined and in discourse with the consent of other
individuals, is the basic part of “public opinion.” When public opinion has the influence and
liberty to effect policy and grows from the open, lucid, critical deliberation among peers
postulated by Jürgen Habermas and others, it can be a vital tool of democratic self-governance
(Kellner, D. 2000). James Fishkin at Stanford, Peter Levine at the University of Maryland and
John Gastil at the University of Washington have been exploring whether better premeditated
practice can help in making better publics (Fishkin, J.S. 2006)

Hypothesis
On the basis of preliminary data gathering and analysis, following hypothesis can be
established, in order to find out the relationship between online political activism with offline
main stream politics in response to the political marketing campaign on social media.
H1: If youth is more politically active on social media then they are more likely to take interest
in seeking and sharing political information on this medium than those less politically active on
social media.
H2: If youth is more politically active on social media then they are more likely to participate
in offline political activities than those less politically active on social media.

Theoretical Framework
Following figure shows the relationship of independent variable of online activism through
online political marketing campaign and dependent variable of offline political activism which
could possibly depicted by political affiliation and offline political participation.
Figure 5

3. RESEARCH DESIGN
Population, Sample and Sampling Technique
The population of this study composed of young voters who are actively participating in the
online political activities on social media and involve in civic engagement in different vicinities
of Pakistan. According to the official statistics of Election Commission of Pakistan, the total
number of electoral roll in December 2011 was 80,724,009, which includes all verified and
unverified voters. As per rough estimate, youth comprises of 56.4% of total population. When
having such a huge population, non-probability sampling is used by adopting convenience
sampling technique. In this technique the survey form was shared with the masses to collect
data from maximum number of respondent within specified span of time.
The sample size was 609, from more than 700 respondents. After omitting invalid
questionnaire, 609 were left for analysis.

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Measurement and Instrumentation

Demographic section of the questionnaire has close ended questions, providing range of figures
in few questions and multiple choices in other questions. One multiple choice questions provide
the right to the respondent to select more than one option, to explore the number of mediums
used by the subject for information seeking. Other two sections of the questionnaire have 6
level bipolar scales for the analysis of active use of social media and political activism by the
same respondent. The 6 point scale ranges from ‘very often’ to ‘very rarely’. Respondents can
give feedback on the basis of their level of engagement in the political activities. Questions
were based on the reserve words for Facebook and direct questions for the offline political
participation including public processions, rallies, donations, etc.

Data Collection Procedure

Data was collected through online survey form, and the link of that form was shared on social
media and also through personal links to collect responses. For convenience, public and private
universities were selected to have access of targeted population.

4. RESULT AND DISCUSSION

Validity & Reliability Testing
Validity refers to the degree to which a test measures what it supposed to measure (Babbie,
1979; Punch, 1998; Maxwell & Loomis, 2003). Valid research is reasonable, reliable, and
therefore, defendable. (Johnson & Christensen, 2000, p.207). Construct validity is used because
this study focuses on hypothetical construct in which online activism is considered linked with
the offline political activism. This assumption can be validating by asking questions with the
reserved word for that construct. These reserved words serve as the fundamental predictor to
analyze the major domain of the construct i.e. political activism.
Nunnally (1978, p. 245) recommends that tools used in basic research must have reliability of
about .70 or better. Instruments used in applied settings; reliability should be at least .80 or
better (Nunnally, J. C., & Bernstein, I. 1978). Reliability is analyzed by using Cronbach's
alpha; the coefficient of this test shows the consistency in data. The value of alpha for online
political activism was 0.897 and for offline political participation 0.931.

Hypotheses Testing
Following results shows that there is a strong relationship exists between both variables in each
group (data subsets). The value of coefficient is also significant in both cases and shows a strong
association between the observed variables
H1: If youth is more politically active on social media then they are more likely to take interest
in seeking and sharing political information on this medium than those less politically active on
social media.
H2: If youth is more politically active on social media then they are more likely to participate
in offline political activities than those less politically active on social media.

Table following on the next pge

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Table 9
Correlations
FB Group FB PP
.00 FB Pearson Correlation 1 .743**
Sig. (2-tailed) .000
Sum of Squares and Cross-products 171.327 149.057
Covariance .362 .315
N 474 474
1.00 FB Pearson Correlation 1 .529**
Sig. (2-tailed) .000
Sum of Squares and Cross-products 56.399 45.445
Covariance .421 .339
N 135 135
**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).

There is a significant relationship exist between these two variables, which means that online
political activism or the influence of online political marketing is as significant as the offline
political marketing campaign, because sample response is significant in both cases. The results
of 2 tails level of significance, shows that the value is less than 0.01 (0.000<0.01) which means
that there is a significant relationship exists between the observed variables. In case of passive
user of group, the relationship between online and offline political mobilization / participation
is statistically strong. In case of passive user group, the relation between online and offline
political activism is also statistically significant (0.000<0.01). So the active and passive user’s
data sets show significant relationship between the offline and online political participation.
The result can be derived that there is a strong impact of online political marketing campaign
on Facebook users and they shows the same behavior in real politics. No matter they are
‘Active’ or ‘Passive’ in the use of Facebook or their active or passive involvement in offline
political activities, their relationship does exist and the influence of online political marketing
campaign has the significant impact on the user, which is visible in real time politics.
In comparison of these data subsets (0.00 and 1.00, i.e. Passive and Active users respectively),
the passive users has strong relationship as compared to the Active group. From these results it
can be generalized that online political marketing campaign have strong relationship in passive
group (value of coefficient is 0.743) as compared to the Active group, which has 0.529
coefficient value. These statistics depicts that political activism in offline politics is influenced
by the online political marketing campaign, but it is not the only key motivator for the political
mobilization in real politics.

5. CONCLUSION
The quantitative analysis of the research presented in the preceding chapters show that there is
a significant relationship between online political marketing and offline political participation.
This relationship is of two ways that mean it is observed that Facebook users are taking part in
offline political activities and also political actors contributing in online marketing of a
particular political party. This two way participation serves the basic purpose of any marketing
campaign i.e. information sharing. In the participatory media channels like social media website
does plays a dominating role in making public opinion about a particular issue. This collective
sentiment results in sustainable and long term association with the manifesto of any political
party.

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6. RECOMMENDATIONS
Impact of Online Political Marketing Campaigns
There is a significant role of social media in the expression of political affiliation and its relation
with the real world politics, the mere importance is to make social media more reliable, viable,
accessible and practical source of political mobility and political participation tool for voters.
The prospects are of high importance but the time and other resource are creating hurdle in the
way of seeking political information on social networking websites. These constraints and other
hurdles should be address. One of the most significant hurdles is the span of time which a user
spent on social networking site for seeking political information, which plays a decisive role
for the user and determines the time and effort he/she is allocating for the real time political
activity. Moreover the participatory role of user is negatively affecting the real world political
activism, as it is explored that passive users are more active in real world politics as compared
to the online active users. This proposition helps in creating those activities which required
relatively lesser time to engage a person online, and provide only relevant information in short
time. For this purpose those campaigns would be successful which are based on graphics,
written news, tweets, and clip of short time. Also that information would be more beneficial
which is related with the real world political activity, like information regarding government
policy, rally, political summon, and procession. Also, information about participating in some
volunteer activity, social work, and representing political party in some vicinity around would
be of great significance. ‘Civic engagement’ is most appropriate word to describe this
recommendation. More the online user is engage in civic activities, more would be the
participation in politics.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT: The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest in the
research.

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