President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) surpassed Flávio Bolsonaro (PL-RJ) in digital popularity after the first round of elections, despite the senator's advantage at the polls. The data comes from the IPD (Digital Popularity Index), developed by the research and consultancy company Quaest, and was obtained exclusively by Folha.
The result measured shows a turnaround for the candidate for re-election against his rival – until then, the eldest son of former president Jair Bolsonaro (PL) was leading on social media.
Calculated by an algorithm that collects and processes 175 variables from the platforms Facebook, Instagram, X (formerly Twitter), TikTok, YouTube, Google and Wikipedia, the index provides results ranging from 0 to 100 points.
Monitoring carried out from October 4th to 15th shows that the PT party jumped from 70.7 points to 82.6 points. Flávio's performance followed the opposite path: he went from 80 points on Sunday of the first round to 76.4 points.
In IPD, there are five metrics monitored: presence on the main social networks; fame (visibility and reach of content); engagement; mobilization (spontaneous sharing and mentions); valence (ratio between positive and negative reactions); and interest (accesses and recent volume of searches).
The calculation algorithm also considers the "noise" of networks, mainly bots, to get as close as possible to the voter's real behavior.
According to Felipe Nunes, director of Quaest, since 2020, there has been a high level of correlation between what the IPD shows and what the ballot box shows.
For him, Lula's advancement on social media is explained by a combination of factors, starting with the shift in the PT member's communication with the entry of elected federal deputies Ana Elisa (PT-MG) and André Janones (Rede-MG) into the campaign. She, by introducing subtitled videos, vertical and in selfie format; he, through the "Lula's Army" channel on WhatsApp, with "missions" on other platforms.
Added to this are events that took place outside the digital environment, such as demonstrations on Avenida Paulista (SP) and Copacabana (RJ), in addition to the approval of the end of the 6x1 scale in the Senate.
"The indicator is a sign of a change in the situation. It suggests that Flávio has lost the status of favorite that he held in the first round, largely due to what we call a 'wake-up call', or awakening, of the PT campaign, after the results of the polls", says the director of Quaest.
On Flávio's side, the post-first round period was punctuated by declarations of support from defeated presidential candidates — Ronaldo Caiado (PSD), Romeu Zema (Novo) and Augusto Cury (Avante) — as well as former president Michel Temer (MDB). The senator was also allowed to visit his father, under house arrest since August last year.
The support, however, had little effect on the Planalto candidate's digital popularity. On the contrary: there was a disengagement from the PL campaign on social media, although it still remains close to the ceiling.
Nunes explains that, for voters, the endorsement of defeated presidential candidates has lost importance over time, and the electorate has opted for other mechanisms, other than traditional opinion makers, when deciding their vote.
Another factor that weighed on the senator's performance was the "already won" atmosphere among the Bolsonarist base. He scored 47.03% at the polls and Lula, 45.16% – in the history of Brazilian elections, never has a candidate who finished behind in the first round won the election. In the data, it was as if some of the campaign agents had "taken a vacation", says Nunes.
From now on, according to him, engagement and mobilization metrics should be the most decisive for the final result, especially when considering the record number of abstentions in the first round, of 33.4 million.
"In the IPD, there are signs that Lula is managing to mobilize voters in the second round and possibly increase his presence at the polls. Flávio, who has had a base engaged for a longer time, is stable. Lula's voters are more motivated, and it is possible that this will have an impact on the election, because it could cause a reduction, even if minimal, in abstentions, which would already favor Lula's campaign in such a tight scenario."
In the first Quaest of the second round, released on Wednesday (14), the senator scored 46%, against 44% for Lula – which constitutes a technical tie within the margin of error, which is two percentage points up and down.
