1 on 1 with Mishaal AlGergawi UAE’s Social Media Expert (Part 1 of 2):
This article is sponsored by the Government Social Media Conference (@govsmc) taking place in Dubai on June 7th – 8th. I had the pleasure of speaking with Mishaal AlGergawi for those who don’t Know Mishaal he’s twitter and social media advocate that goes by the handle @Algergawi if you’re in the UAE or follow news from the UAE on Twitter you most probably read one of his tweets or even follow him. Mishaal didn’t always like Twitter... Read More
Middle Eastern countries growth on Facebook last month
A new article released on Inside Facebook today gives an interesting look about the traffic on Facebook from the Middle Eastern countries. And although there were upto 7 countries which have gained 100,000 users in the past month there is a bit of surprising and unexpected loss of users in a couple of the major countries of the region. Below is the chart prepared by Inside Facebook, as you can see Egypt is leading the pack with 500K users as previously... Read More
Hsoub new startup Focusing on the MENA
I recently found out about a startup called Hsoub founded by group of students studying in the United Kingdom. It is an internet-advertising solution that focuses on the Middle East and North Africa, aiming to connect advertisers with publishers from the MENA. Hsoub Ads works in similar way to Google Adsense and is very simple to use with a clean user interface, it is built to help businesses to enter the MENA market by advertising in high-quality... Read More
5 free entries to attend the Government Social Media Conference
Yesterday the organizers of the Government Social Media Conference announced that they will providing 5 free entries to the conference by applying on the website here, all the request in return is for you to tell them why they should choose you. For those who aren’t aware about the prices for registering to the conference you can find that information here. There are two types of passes: One day pass for USD 999 Two Day pass to attend the... Read More
Mark your calendar for the Government Social Media Conference
On June 7-8 for the first time in the MENA a Government Social Media Conference will take place in Dubai, UAE at the Al Murooj Rotana Hotel. The conference is organized by The Business Council and after speaking with the conference manager Mr. Hijazi Natsheh he confirmed to us that this event will be the first of many with the possibility of it being occurring in different locations and not just in the UAE. When we asked Mr. Hijazi why Government... Read More
Democamp Amman Tomorrow
Democamp Amman will be held at 7pm (8pm UAE time) tomorrow, and according to a press release there will be around 400 people attending the event from techies, investors and startup enthusiast. The six finalists that will be demoing were chosen from a total of over 35+ submissions so hopefully people who will attend will get a chance to see some innovative demos. For the people who will not be able to travel to Amman to attend the democamp a post on... Read More
Q&A with Taqwa.me CEO Kerim Nu’man
A while ago I tweeted asking if users liked our new redesign and if they had any comments or feedback, and Kerim Nu’man from taqwa.me replied giving a few suggestions (which we are currently working on), however after that we got in touch with him and wanted to know how taqwa.me is doing and what his plans are for the future. For those of you who are not familiar with Taqwa.me it is a search engine that lets the public decide for themselves... Read More
The rise of the social customer in the MENA region!!
Social media has changed the way customers interact with brands, forever! Customers have evolved with the growth of social media, one-way-messages through traditional media channels and the interruptive method is at its lowest point in history. Customers now are engaging with different social platforms every day that are constantly influencing their behaviors and decisions, people are not putting their trust neither conviction on the so glamorous... Read More
Dubizzle bigger than Twitter in the UAE!
I read a tweet today that was quite interesting, according to alexa Dubizzle ranks higher than Twitter in the UAE. Dubizzle which is a classifieds website that was launched from Dubai quickly gained popularity in the past years and has now expanded all over the MENA region. So if this could be done within 5-6 years, I think with the right marketing strategies they can obtain the same level of success across the region. Check it out: Read More
Blackberry Playbook Review
A couple of days ago we got our hands on the new Blackberry Playbook here in the UAE. The device looks sleek without any buttons on surface everything is controlled via hand gestures. It does however have a small on/off button above the screen on the edge along with a increase/decrease volume and pause play button. When I started to fiddle with it I was lost and very unimpressed I opened an application and couldn’t figure out how to go back... Read More
Demo Camp Dubai Review
Yesterday we attended DemoCampDubai for those of you who followed the tweets the event had its ups and downs, but that’s not what I’m going to write about in this article I will focus on giving a summary on all the demo’s and scoring them on the basis of their presentation, demo, idea originality and usefulness from 1 – 5 (1 being the lowest and 5 being the highest). Of course these will be my own interpretation and not official... Read More
Are you a fan of new ideas? Then don’t miss Democamp Dubai
We previously mentioned here Democamp Dubai an event happening tomorrow between 5 p.m – 8p.m at The American University in Dubai, School of Engineering Bld. 3rd floor. According to the organizers there is a number of great submissions which should make the event very interesting, so for all the people in Dubai interested in finding out what the next venture coming out of the region will be should definitely attend. For the people from the MENA... Read More
Social media marketing is the gold rush of the MENA region
Last week I bumped into Amer Massimi, a Communication manager at Leo Burnett MENA & social media enthusiast working from the KSA. So we got to talk about social media and see how it was fairing in KSA so I thought I would share some of his insights into the Saudi market, and how marketers are using social media over there and what are the challenges facing them. How do you feel the MENA region and KSA are handling online and social media? In... Read More
App dev days summary (Day 2) iPhone development basics
Day two of the event at twofour54 in Abu Dhabi, which held 3 different sessions running in parallel. The first session covered Blackberry development the other was covering development for Symbian and the last (the one we attended) was the iPhone iOS basics. The key speaker was Amir Jahanlou from SAE Institute Dubai, he specializes in developing apps and 3D games. Amir started off with explaining the advantages of developing for mobile which include... Read More
The Internet Show Middle East Survey Report 2011
A report released by The Internet Show Middle East reveals important information about online and social marketing in the MENA region. The aim of the survey is to gain insight into how Middle Eastern businesses are currently dealing with internet business issues and the challenges they face now and in the future. The event which will take place on September 27 – 28 in Abu Dhabi will cover the major issues that the report raised. Background... Read More
Are you attending Democamp Dubai? We are!
On April 27th a Democamp session will be held at the Dubai Internet City, to encourage entrepreneurship and innovation in the MENA region. The event will take place between 5 – 8 pm at the American University in Dubai, School of Engineering Bld. 3rd floor. The event doesn’t focus on any specific subject, demo’s can be in English or Arabic, can be made for a specific country or universal the important thing is that it is developed... Read More
Blackberry in the UAE not secure anymore, almost!
You may recall a while back the UAE government threatened to suspend he Blackberry services due to security issues. They had requested Blackberry maker Research In Motion (RIM) to locate their encrypted computer servers in the country so that they can access user information. Well it seems that the problem has been solved. On May 1st, individuals and small businesses (under 20 subscriptions) will no longer be able to access the private data services... Read More
Etisalat and Nokia to partner up for OVI store payments
Nokia and Etisalat are looking forward to start a collaboration where users can download applications from the Nokia Ovi Store and get billed directly from through their mobile phone accounts. This collaboration will be available in all countries that Etisalat operates in i.e. UAE, Saudi Arabia and Egypt by this year. The good thing is that any Etisalat customer can use this service post and/or prepaid accounts. However I’m not sure how Nokia... Read More
Why Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Stopped Using Social Media?
Haven’t you noticed that High Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Ruler of Dubai and Prime Minister of UAE, has stopped using social media? HH Shiekh Mohammed has around 450,000 fans on facebook and around 380,000 on twitter and suddenly, boom, both pages stopped updating fans and it has been since January 20th, 2011. Previously the accounts were very active and used to share updates, news articles, and photos of the meetings,... Read More
Events happening in the MENA region
There are a couple events going on in the coming weeks in the region which present a good channel to network with professionals and experts in the industry from the MENA region. Below is a list of what’s going of what’s going on soon: TECOM SME Builder Event When: Feb. 24, 2011 from 8:00 am to 1:00 pm Country: Dubai, UAE Venue: The Dubai Knowledge Village Conference Center Benefits: A great number of experts from the leading corporations... Read More
