Liberals spend most on social media ads
It has spent $738,715 in advertising while Conservative party has spent $251,303
OTTAWA—Justin Trudeauand the Liberal party are outspending Andrew Scheer ’s Conservatives nearly three to one on social media advertising in the lead up to October’s federal election.
Data compiled by ad.watch, which comes from Facebook’s own ad library, shows that, since July 1, the Liberals have spent $738,715 in advertising on Facebook and Instagram. The total includes the official Liberal party account as well as Trudeau’s personal accounts.
By comparison, Scheer and the Conservative party have spent just $251,303 over the same period — despite having a larger campaign war chest.
“The cadence of the spend might be different; the Liberals might be going heavier early on and the Conservatives saving their money for the latter part of the campaign,” said Dennis Matthews, vice-president of Enterprise Canada and a former Conservative advertising strategist.
“But when you look at the Conservative voter coalition and compare it to the Liberal voter coalition, for the Liberals, getting younger voters and millennials … engaged was so key to their 2015 victory, and these are younger people who are cord-cutting and don’t watch a ton of traditional TV.”
The rest of Canada’s federal parties have spent comparatively little — and have comparatively little to spend. The NDP has spent $14,039 boosting leader Jagmeet Singh’s personal brand and $66,178 on the party’s Facebook page while Maxime Bernier’s People’s Party has spent $10,397.
The Green party and the Bloc Québécois have spent just over $2,000 since July 1.
The Liberals’ social advertising buy over the last three months translated into 48 million “impressions” — the number of times their advertisements appeared — on Facebook and Instagram, compared to the Conservatives’ 16.3 million impressions.
Ad.watch was created by Manuel Beltrán and Nayantara Ranganathan, both artists and activists, as a way to keep track of Facebook advertising data in bulk.
It compiles data using Facebook’s ad API for 32 countries, including Canada, and their major political parties.
Federal political campaigns are tightlipped about their advertising strategies — how much they’re spending, whom they’re targeting and where they’re placing their ads.
But tools like ad.watch and Facebook’s advertising registry are providing a largely unprecedented glimpse behind the curtain.
For instance, the ad.watch data shows parties are running the most ads in Ontario, Canada’s most populous province that’s crucial to forming government.
But the Liberals are running almost as many ads targeting Alberta residents, despite most political observers writing off the party’s chances in that province.
Scott Reid, a former adviser to Paul Martin and a principal at Feschuk.Reid, said that parties don’t target advertising at only seats they can win — ad campaigns can also be used to motivate existing voters to volunteer and donate money to the party.
But Reid said the Trudeau Liberals approached the 2015 election with a philosophy of not giving up on any ridings — including those that traditionally voted Conservative or where the Liberals had little chance.
Reid suspects Trudeau’s team has a similar strategy in this election.
“That philosophy produced and yielded wins in places where you might be surprised,” Reid said in an interview.
“Even when it didn’t produce outright wins … you actually cultivated local organization, local activists and local activism in ridings where the party may not have been active for years and years.”
The ad.watch data shows that parties are fairly uniform in whom they’re targeting — at least in their digital advertising.
The Conservatives targeted all age groups with a similar number of ads while the Liberals targeted more Canadians between the ages of 25 and 54.
Men and women were targeted roughly equally by the two parties.
A spokesperson for the Liberal campaign said the party is launching a new wave of digital advertising focusing on Canadians who have a “personal connection” to the changes the Trudeau government brought in.
“The Liberal Party of Canada is always working hard to reach more Canadians and involve them in our movement — including on Facebook and other online platforms,” wrote Braeden Caley in a statement.