MUMBAI: Infotainment channel History TV18 is using social media media platforms Facebook and Twitter to push its local property, ‘The Greatest Indian‘. This allows viewers to vote for who they think is the greatest Indian since 1948 after Mahatma Gandhi.

History TV 18 GM marketing Sangeeta Aiyer notes that the plan was to go viral. "There are debates and discussions happening in the social media space. Our show will also stimulate discussions and debates. We launched TGI and TheGreatest Indian on the morning of 4 June before the show started airing in the night. This has helped us get three million votes so far in 10 days. By the time voting for the first phase closes on 25 June we expect to have gotten eight million votes".

Twitter is important as that is where the influencers are. The fan club for Dr. Ambhedkar, for instance, has participated in a big manner.

"Marketers are nervous about using Twitter. But Twitter can be a powerful tool for marketers, if used wisely. We recently did a quiz on Twitter and we got 50,000 votes as a result. On Facebook we did an innovation on Facebook Timeline. We went back to 1947 and put in achievements of Indians," Aiyer says.

The second phase will kick off in July. There will be a curtain raiser show where names will be revealed from where viewers can choose. The Greatest Indian winner will be revealed mid August to coincide with Independence Day.

Earlier, the channel kicked off a social media initiative on ‘History Har Din‘. People can upload photos and videos where they feel that they have made history on the site. So far 150 people have uploaded their photos.