A decade ago, the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) knew marketing mainly through traditional advertising and public relations, industry events and trade shows. No one imagined it could be done differently.
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most frequently logs on) to enable a value-for-money, person-
alized, time-effective online advertising campaign.
A large number of organizations have already started inte-
grating fully-fledged new media campaigns into their market-
ing budgets. Others are catching on slowly, and marketing
experts can help fill this gap and educate businesses on the
importance of this new and exciting age of unprecedented
marketing initiatives.
Editor’s note: Tamara Deprez is founder and managing partner of
Dubai-based marketing consulting firm The360mix. She can be
reached at tamara@the360mix.com. Maha Ahmad is partner of The
360mix and can be reached at maha@the360mix.com.
number of new Internet users every year and the number of
local market research firms adopting this innovative method.
For example, MENA Opinion recently launched Re-
searchii, an online community that rewards members for tak-
ing part in surveys and polls. Targeted at the general public,
Researchii aims to create a community of consumers who
participate in online surveys and polls on topics that concern
their specific areas of interest.
The growth of Internet penetration means that online re-
search is more important than ever for regional advertisers.
With sufficient online research, advertising companies will
now be able to effectively target the correct demographic,
gender, age range, interests and habits (such as when a user
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