As the riots continue across France, the UMP party of prime minister interior minister Nicholas Sarkozy has created a stir by purchasing keywords like “riots” and “violence” on Google AdWords, and placing a political advertisement there. The ad is at the top of the paid search and leads to an _AcgBAQ&num=1&q=http://www.u-m-p.org/site/soutien.php”>online petition in support of M. Sarkozy, who is a candidate for the French presidency. Controversy has surrounded the fact that one of the words the agency has purchased is “racaille” - or scum - the contemptuous term Sarkozy used of the rioters.

The campaign is the work of French agency L’enchanteur des nouveaux médias. It will set a powerful precedent.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 9th, 2005 at 3:07 am and is filed under Advertising, Politics, Corporate communications, search engine marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.