Tasmania the most targeted state, as election ads focus on key locations

An analysis of online election ads has revealed what locations are being targeted by political parties as the election campaign continues.

Your frustration with election ads online may depend on where you live as political parties increasingly target specific parts of Australia to win votes.

An analysis of election ads on Google platforms, including YouTube, shows Tasmanians are among the most highly targeted Australians this campaign, as well as those who live in Perth.

Labor, the Liberals, and the United Australia Party have heavily targeted both locations with hundreds and thousands of dollars of ads launched this month.

Election ads just for Tasmanians even included a 31-minute video of the United Australia Party’s launch.

Clive Palmer’s political party also targeted ads at the New South Wales town of Byron Bay specifically, as well as South Australia and regional parts of Queensland, New South Wales, and Victoria, to the exclusion of the capital cities.

The Liberal Party has spent less than its rivals on election ads to date but is taking a much more targeted approach.

Its handful of election ads has appeared in the New South Wales bellwether seat of Eden-Monaro, at the top of Queensland in Leichhardt, as well as in Perth, Brisbane, the seat of Hotham in Melbourne, and Tasmania. Meanwhile, the Labor Party has targeted other parts of Australia with its larger ad spending, including the Northern Territory, the seat of Capricornia in Queensland, Bass in Tasmania, Hunter in New South Wales, and in Perth, Melbourne, and Sydney.

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ALBANESE SPENDS BIG ON SOCIAL MEDIA

One political leader is splashing a lot more cash on social media but missing free opportunities, while the other is going negative early and trailing in YouTube popularity.

Political marketing experts say the online battle between Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Labor Leader Anthony Albanese is heating up across social networks this election but the digital teams behind both have fumbled, with no clear winner online in the first week of the campaign.

And they warn the next fortnight could be a honeymoon period for voters, with the number and negativity of online posts set to escalate before polling day.

Just days into the election campaign, Mr Albanese has emerged as the biggest spender of the prime ministerial contenders online by a significant margin.

The Australian Labor Party has spent just short of $100,000 on ads to promote its leader across Google, YouTube and Facebook in just seven days.

By contrast, the Liberal Party spent less than a quarter of that sum, paying $11,700 for Google ads and just over $7400 to bolster Mr Morrison’s profile.

But Australian National University political marketing expert Dr Andrew Hughes said Labor’s big social media buy-in was necessary to boost the profile of its leader after running a “small-target campaign”.

“They’re trying to get the awareness factor up,” he said. “They’ve probably picked up in their research that Mr Albanese’s awareness factor isn’t as high as they’d like it to be.

“That’s bad when you hit an election campaign because you spend the first week running getting-to-know-you ads when Morrison doesn’t need to.”

The Prime Minister is also winning the race for followers across social platforms by a large margin, with more than 813,700 followers on Facebook, 651,700 on Twitter, 624,700 on LinkedIn, 302,300 on Instagram, and accounts on youth-focused networks Snapchat and TikTok.

Mr Albanese’s current social following is dwarfed by these figures, although he can claim a surprise lead on YouTube, with more than 10,000 subscribers to Mr Morrison’s 2600.

The Labor leader is absent from some platforms entirely, though, including TikTok and LinkedIn — a choice Dr Hughes called baffling.

“It doesn’t make sense to me,” he said. “It’s such a big part of how many small business owners in Australia communicate. I’m stunned he’s not on LinkedIn.”

University of Sydney associate professor Tom van Laer, who has been closely studying the leaders’ and parties’ posts on social media since January, said both were being drowned out by activity from minor parties, like the big-spending United Australia Party or One Nation’s cartoon videos.

But Mr van Laer said he noticed the Liberal Party had “gone negative” even before the campaign had officially begun — something that could set the tone for the rest of the Government’s campaign.

“The Liberal Party, with the exception of its ‘I love Australia’ launch video, has been very negative,” he said. “They’re attacking Albanese for everything they can find. Normally you see this anger and attacks towards the end. They seem to be losing the high ground early and it’s hard to come back from that.”

Mr van Laer said it was hard to pick whether Labor’s “slow start” or the Liberals’ “mud-slinging” would win out, but there was plenty of room for memes or sharp videos to cut through the efforts of both teams.

Dr Hughes said voters should brace for a wave of election ads and posts on social media before May 9, when pre-poll voting began.

“We’re not inundated with ads yet but we soon will be,” he said. “This is where people are more likely to remember mistakes or victories. They’ll switch off when the ad blitz starts.”

LIBERAL LEADER SCOTT MORRISON

Facebook: 813,700 followers

Twitter: 651,700 followers

Instagram: 302,300 followers

YouTube: 2600 subscribers

LinkedIn: 624,700 followers

TikTok: 59,200 followers

Snapchat: 17,500 subscribers

LABOR LEADER ANTHONY ALBANESE

Facebook: 185,000 followers

Twitter: 367,000 followers

Instagram: 93,000 followers

YouTube: 10,000 subscribers

LinkedIn: No account

TikTok: No account

Snapchat: No account

Originally published as Tasmania the most targeted state, as election ads focus on key locations