Brand Congress: Indian national congress

Abstract

Political parties exert a similar influence in social life as that exerted by brands in the field of Marketing. Voters use information they know about the parties - like consumers use information about brands – to aid them in making voting decisions. This is because political parties offer voters, like brands offer consumers, bundles of meaning. This report aims to analyse the branding strategies used by political parties which themselves function as brands. By analysing models which help explain conformity of Political parties as Brands, the report goes on to apply this model to Indian National Congress (abbreviated INC, and commonly known as the Congress) which is one of the two major political parties in India and one of the oldest democratic political parties in the world. The Report analyses the party identity, party image, brand communication used by the Congress Party to examine whether there exists any dichotomy between them. Based on insights gained from interviews and surveys, the report examines the expectations of the people of India from the Congress party and their evaluation of its performance over its governing decade. The target group for interviews comprises of the Indian youth rather than all age-groups, so that going further the recommendations of the report shall remain valid for the coming period. Based on the insights gained from Identity-Image dichotomy analysis and Performance-Expectations gap analysis, problem statements are defined and recommendations are made for repositioning Brand Congress.