Pangilinan appeals to voters: ‘Turn Google searches into votes’ (Sabong News)

Vice-presidential candidate Senator Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan appealed to voters to turn their Google clicks into actual votes on May 9 as he and presidential aspirant Vice President Leni Robredo became the most-searched candidates on the popular search engine. This is the second time that Pangilinan topped the search engine result that’s a predictor for social engagement and probability of actual conversion. Pangilinan emerged the most searched vice-presidential candidate with 46 percent while Robredo topped the presidential category with 57 percent in the Google Trend report as of April 29, 2022, heading into the last week of the campaign season. “Nagpapasalamat tayo sa interes na pinapakita ng ating mga kababayan sa kampanya namin ni VP Leni. Salamin ito ng sigla at pagpupursigi na nakikita natin sa mga rally, house-to-house campaign at pakikipag-usap natin sa iba’t ibang sektor sa buong bansa (We are thankful for the interest our countrymen showed in my and VP Leni’s campaign. This mirrors the energy and passion we see in our rallies, house-to-house campaign, and our talks with different sectors of our country),” Pangilinan said. “Ang pinakamahalaga nating hiling sa ating mga kababayan na nagse-search sa atin sa Google — sana sa halalan sa Mayo 9 (Our most important appeal to our countrymen who search for us on Google—on May 9, hopefully), the search is over, Leni at Kiko na ang isulat sa balota (write Leni and Kiko on the ballot),” he added. Launched on March 9 this year, Google’s Search Trends page for Philippine elections aims to provide a tool to allow users to bring up “the top queries, topics and most-searched presidential and vice-presidential candidates running in the elections.” The page also has data on the top policy issues searched in each part of the country. These issues include education, drugs, poverty, and justice, among others. In the ADDS Sentiment Analysis report as of April 24, 2022, Pangilinan has scored the highest social engagement, the metric which is the most important predictor per ADDS and related studies, because this has the highest correlation to vote generation or conversion prediction. Analysts said that Google searches became a power predictor of political behavior because the data generated by the search engine is free from posturing. Doctor of Social Psychology of the University of California Christine Ma-Kellams stressed that Google search can reflect the people’s true intentions. It has, so far, succeeded in predicting the election results in the United States since 2004, including the win of former President Donald Trump. It also predicted the victories of Canadian Prime Ministers Paul Martin in 2003, Stephen Harper in 2006, 2008, and 2011 and Justin Trudeau in 2015, 2019, and 2021. It also succeeded in predicting the election results in Greece, Spain, Germany, and Brazil. In the Philippines, it saw the win of President Duterte in 2016. Despite Robredo’s and Pangilinan’s mammoth rallies, they have yet to crack the top spot in ground surveys, with the Vice President trailing former Senator Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and Pangilinan a far third placer to Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte and Senate President Vicente “Tito” Sotto III. Nonetheless, Pangilinan promised not to waste the public’s trust if he’s voted to office on May 9. “Parami na nang parami ang naliliwanagan kung sino ang karapat-dapat iboto. Hindi natin sasayangin ang tiwalang ito. Magdodoble-sikap tayo sa huling linggo ng kampanya, (More people are being enlightened about who they should vote. We are not going to waste this trust. We are going to work doubly hard this last week of the campaign),” he added.