Compared to the rest of the world, the place of the Internet in the Middle East is still far from reaching its proper rank. A real effort in increasing the content in Arabic should be done, especially that the middle eastern market combines different countries, habits, cultures and traditions; all linked by one common language.
Everything is to play for in the Arabic speaking world of 280 million people which represents approximately 4.5 % of the world population and where Internet penetration is low. There are also large communities Arabic speakers internationally. Unfortunately, there are only 100 million WebPages right now in Arabic, and that's nothing. It is only 0.2% of what the global World Wide Web encompasses.
When we have made some research about produced Arabic content opposed to translated, over the Internet we came across some interesting results: “Research commissioned from Dubai-based Internet researcher Madar shows the number of Arabic speaking Internet users has jump to 43 million in 2008 from 16 million back in 2004. Moreover, according to Madar, 65% of Arabic Internet users in 2005 could not read English, which accounts for 70% of the material on the Internet”.
So our initiative at Wikeez was influenced by one factor: There is not enough Arabic content available on the Internet.
We are trying to build a social discovery and an entertaining network that allows people to review, share and read about their favorite movies, celebrities, music, TV series and Reality Shows that are growing in popularity in the Middle East the past few years.
For these reason our focus is 90% Arabic in terms of content and also in terms of information. We have studied what the user is looking for online, and what he/she wants are topics taken from a Middle Eastern aspect.
In order to have more and more successful businesses online, every entrepreneur in that field should provide all the tools and features that interest a Middle Eastern audience. We have to listen to them, so we can bring them what they are looking for, not only a “Me-too” from the western world, and with that, we can say that Wikeez is a pioneer in the field.
Monica Karam
Monica Karam is Marketing Manager at Wikeez.com
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