Designing the social media model and key success factors (KSF) in political marketing in the Iraqi parliamentary elections

Abstract

Anmar Sabti Mohammed, Morteza Movaghar*, Abolhasan Hosseini, Mohsen Alizadehsani

The domain of "political marketing" despite being relatively recent, has experienced rapid growth over the past decade. It currently draws interest from scholars across various disciplines beyond the traditional marketing sector. Many campaign analysts and social media experts highlight the growing significance of social media in political marketing. However, despite the agreement of researchers on the benefits of social media in political marketing, there is still no robust theory development within the field. In this regard, the present study aimed to provide a qualitative model of social media in political marketing in the Iraqi parliamentary elections. The research is applied in terms of purpose with an exploratory approach and is a qualitative study. The participants in the study were experts and specialists in the field of political social media marketing, 12 of whom were selected with theoretical saturation and using purposive sampling methods. The research data collection tool was semi-structured interviews, whose reliability and validity were confirmed. For the data coding, the TA (Thematic Analysis) technique and the GT (grounded theory) method and were used. The findings are presented in the form of a paradigmatic model including core phenomenon (Political campaign strategy and structure, Digitalization and professionalism), causal conditions (Voter media/digital literacy, Social media user-friendliness, Social media development, Social media richness, Satisfaction with social media),contextual conditions (Digital infrastructure, Economic factors, Cultural factors, Political-legal factors, Politician's digital capabilities), intervening conditions (Failure to manage false and misleading information, Ethical considerations, Lack of security on social media, Disregard for specific community issues, level of trust in social media), strategies (Negative Marketing, Market Orientation, Content Marketing Strategy, Integrated Marketing Management Strategy, Political Market Segmentation Strategy, Strategies for Future Trends) and consequences (Online and Offline participation, Increased voter loyalty, Increased voting intention, Political awareness)