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Dubai-based data intelligence provider and social media listening platform, Crowd Analyzer releases the fourth edition of its State of Social Media report. The report targets brands and industry professionals that are eager to have meaningful engagement with audiences on social media. The annual report covers the countries of Egypt, Saudi Arabia (KSA), the UAE, and […]

“As a digital-first brand, Emirates NBD is an early adopter of social platforms and digital marketing strategies to drive customer targeting and acquisition. Our approach has helped us create effective campaigns and, more importantly, rewarding engagements for our customers.” – Vikram Krishna, Executive Vice President and Head of Group Marketing & Customer Experience at Emirates NBD.

The fourth edition of Communiciate’s Virtual Events Series explores the strategies to consider while marketing a virtual event. With the increase in virtual conferences and webinars, it’s important to consider an effective strategy to stand out from the clutter and help drive awareness and registrations to the event. Read our best practices to set up a […]

The impact of social distancing as a result of the COVID-19 crisis has been felt across industries and sectors, with technology and social media playing a critical role in connecting people, communities, and businesses – this is even more pertinent given the imminent start of Ramadan. Amid this difficult period, it has become even more […]

Kunal Gupta, CEO of digital media technology provider Polar, shares five reflections for the advertising industry in the age of coronavirus. 1. Spend decreases in obvious advertising categories will be offset by overall digital growth. Travel represents 9% of digital ad spend and in the past day alone, three of my clients have shared they’ve […]

WhatsApp launches two initiatives to support the global fight against the Coronavirus pandemic: the global launch of the WhatsApp Coronavirus Information Hub in partnership with the World Health Organization, UNICEF, and UNDP, and a $1m donation to the Poynter Institute’s International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN). The WhatsApp coronavirus information hub which can be found on whatsapp.com/coronavirus,  provides […]

International women’s day takes place on March 8th every year to celebrate women’s rights and inspire people to act in the ongoing fight for gender equality. The theme for this year is #EachforEqual which is to remind everyone that it’s on each and every individual to help create a gender-equal world. History cites the origins of international […]

According to the report released by the international marketing intelligence service, global advertising spend is set to rise by 7.1% to $660bn this year, guided by a 13.2% growth in internet investment. Quadrennial events such as the US presidential elections and the Summer Olympic games in Tokyo are expected to help TV spend to rise by […]

As the demand for Arabic content is on the rise, Communicate looks at understanding how this content is created and catered to the diverse community of Arabic speakers today. Karim Daoud, CEO of Webedia Arabia, one of the largest digital Arab networks which curate content under the various pillars of; fashion and beauty, pop culture, food, parenting, and gaming/e-sports, […]

Derya Matras is appointed as the new regional director of Facebook in the Middle East, Africa, and Turkey. She will lead the company’s operations and help grow its economic and social impact across the region. Matras spent most of her career in emerging markets and was previously the Facebook country director for Turkey. Prior to joining Facebook, […]

Patrick Harris, VP-global agency development at Facebook, sat in an exclusive interview with Communicate to discuss how the social media giant is adapting to these challenging times. How did your system of agency partners develop? [Early on] we hadn’t yet figured out the role the ecosystem would play, how Facebook would invest to make sure […]

By Elie Aoun, CEO of Ipsos Connect I have been working in research, media research in particular, for the last 27 years. That’s the only thing that I’ve done. Throughout these years, I witnessed many changes and transformations, always – or at least most of the time – for the better. I used to see […]

Embrace, an awareness support network based in Lebanon, has partnered with the social media giant Facebook to support the ongoing campaign “Talking Saves Lives.”  The campaign  has been developed to mark the Embrace Lifeline (1564)- which is the first suicide prevention helpline in Lebanon and the Middle East. “A lot of people resort to social […]

“We were able to fully realize the potential Facebook holds in delivering incremental reach and driving effective performance. This campaign was a true testament to the benefits one can derive from marrying the right proposition with the right audience.” - Saba Omaish, Head of Marketing at OSN

By Max Alawwad Facebook has come under scrutiny, on multiple occasions,  for its handling of the user’s data. One of the recent events was Facebook paying hundreds of contractors to transcribe audio clips of users from its Messenger app. The social media giant, alongside other tech companies, have been accused and fined on multiple events of mishandling […]

Facebook Inc. just completed a massive fine of $5 billion settlement with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission following the probe on its privacy practices. However, the social networking giant came under scrutiny over its privacy concerns as another violation by the company has been reported a few hours ago.  According to a report by Bloomberg […]

“We live in an era of disruption; the speed and frequency with which brands connect with customers every day have been transformed dramatically, as consumers are more digitally connected. The key to success for brands is agility; that’s why at McDonald’s we are seeking progress over perfection. As marketers we need to have a high tolerance for risk, we recognized that we need to test new things, fail fast, spot the successes, and scale fast. We collaborated with Facebook because we knew that we could leverage data analytics and insights to help point us in the right direction, supporting our move from mass marketing to mass personalization. This is key to making our customers’ journey more memorable and providing an exceptional personal experience.” - Tarek El Kady, Senior Director, Marketing – McDonald’s MEA

By Adam Kleinberg Direct-to-consumer (DTC) business models have been heralded as the antidote to disruption. From the moment Unilever wrote a billion-dollar check to a unicorn, virtually every brand that sells a product in a store has been tripping over themselves to figure out their DTC strategy before they get Dollar-Shave-Clubbed upside the head. The […]

By Anne Connelly We’re at the edge of one of the greatest societal shifts since the separation of church and state. Ten years ago, with the creation of bitcoin, people were given the ability to digitally transact value without the need for a government to manage the system. Bitcoin marked the beginning of the separation […]

By Nicola Mendelsohn The Cannes Lions Festival has never been more important. This gathering of the great and the good from the creative industries on the sun-drenched Croisette, has always been an opportunity to celebrate outstanding work from the past year and look forward to the emerging themes in advertising. I’m sure this will always be true […]

By Faris Sibai  Augmented Reality (AR) is propelling the e-commerce industry into the future with a model that makes advertising not only personalized but fun for the user.  Augmented reality revenues are estimated to reach a staggering $14 billion in 2021, according to ARtillery Intelligence. This growth presents an exciting opportunity for marketers, as consumers […]

According to Facebook IQ, brands have 57.6 million more hours to capture attention during Ramadan due to the additional time spent on Facebook during that month. Hence, they say that “SHARED by Facebook” offers brands and people an easy-to-navigate platform to help them make the most out of these moments. So what is Shared by Facebook?   […]

By Ahmed Hafez Younis “There’s no recipe for creativity.” If you walk around Facebook’s offices chances are you’re going to come across this poster. It truly reflects what we at Creative Shop believe. We also believe that to connect with today’s consumers in this mobile world, we must build for where they are and not where […]

By Justin Choi The world wide web celebrated its 30th birthday this past spring. That’s three decades’ worth of growth and evolution for an experiment whose entire purpose was to encourage freedom and decentralization of information and communication. Unfortunately, this open, free global information network has never worn heavier shackles than it does today. Today’s web […]

Speaking at the Ai Everything conference in Dubai, Amy Webb, Futurist and Founder of Future Today Institute said that Artificial Intelligence (AI) is not about robots but about the future of humanity. She added that businesses need to think about AI holistically. The AI expert and bestselling author of ‘The Big Nine: How the Tech Titans […]

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg rolled out a redesign of his social networking app with a focus on communities known as Groups, and a layout that loses the blue. On Tuesday, Zuckerberg opened Facebook’s F8 developer conference by announcing an overhaul of the apps, including the new look for the main property. Zuckerberg also laid out […]

By Rishi Saxena Measuring impact is the big challenge. An average person in the Middle East is served over 1,500 online impressions a month and can see up to 600 marketing messages across different media channels within a day according to the results of a 2018 Nielsen benchmark study on MENA media trends. This does not […]

By Alex Malouf Is there any company more ubiquitous than Google? The company is everywhere, serving up billions of search engine results every day, powering our phones, helping us with our emails, providing even the directions for us to take. You know you’ve made it when your brand name becomes a verb. Google hasn’t been […]

Facebook has asked Amazon to take down the data bases, in response to millions of user information being exposed. Researchers at a cybersecurity firm, UpGuard, found user information, posted publicly on Amazon.com Inc.’s cloud computing servers. The data that was exposed has been used by a Mexican social media firm, Cultura Colectiva. The firm said in an […]

by Volkan Çağsal, CEO of Adphorus Digital advertising was almost half of all advertising spend in 2018, and it keeps growing, with two in three travel marketers planning to spend more this year. The second biggest chunk of that advertising spend is going towards social media. According to Sojern’s State of the Industry Report which surveyed […]

Facebook Inc. disclosed a flaw on its social network that made passwords of hundreds of millions of users visible to employees. However, the company says the issue has now been fixed. During a security review in January, Facebook found that the passwords were stored in a readable format, against its security procedures, but that they […]

It’s not just Facebook and Instagram that were down for the count; the social network’s ads also ere offline. Facebook Ads Manager, the lifeblood of advertising, was out of order, along with the rest of the platform. Ads Manager is the self-serve advertising website that millions of marketers use to schedule their campaigns across Facebook, […]

Facebook and its family of apps such as Whatsapp and Instagram all suffered an outage yesterday for several hours across multiple countries in the world, including the UAE, the US, Brazil, Lebanon, among others. It’s safe to say that for a few hours, people across the world were transported back to the 90s. Just the […]

YouTube is trying to stamp out its second major brand revolt in as many years, putting executives on an emergency call with top marketers and agencies, and sending a memo to Madison Avenue to let advertisers know it’s working on a fix. The problem: Pedophiles are viewing videos of children, leave disturbing comments and then […]

Facebook and Apple are in another fight over privacy and data after reports surfaced last week that Facebook built a consumer research app that opened a backdoor to iPhones. The phonemaker, which disabled the app, has accused the social network of violating its app rules. Apple and Facebook have had a contentious relationship since Apple […]

Facebook Watch receives 75 million viewers a day, according to new statistics shared by the company. But despite its growth, the platform is still a fraction the size of its most important rival, YouTube, and some media companies are concerned by the platform’s ever-changing character. Making sense of the numbers The longer-form video platform launched […]

Today, Facebook is launching “Ad Breaks” in the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Jordan. An Ad Break is a video advertising format that can either be a pre-roll before the video, a midroll during the video or an image ad in the player directly below the video. The feature allows publishers and creators to monetize their […]

Two weeks back, Facebook said it had discovered a data breach affecting 50 million users and had informed local law enforcement. Here’s a recap: There was a loophole in Facebook’s code for a feature called “View As” that lets people see what their account looks like to someone else. This allowed the hackers to steal […]

Facebook says it discovered a security breach earlier this week that affected almost 50 million accounts – out of the over two billion accounts on Facebook. The company says it has fixed the breach, which allowed hackers to take over people’s accounts. In a statement on Friday, Facebook said that it has informed law enforcement […]

(Image: Jack Dorsey and Sheryl Sandberg testify before the Senate Intelligence Committee. Credit: Bloomberg) Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey received praise from lawmakers for just showing up to hearings in the Senate on Wednesday, while Google’s refusal to send someone sufficiently senior to please the Senate Intelligence Committee was represented […]

Twitter, Facebook and Google have all been developing new ways of handling political ads since the 2016 election, when all the platforms were abused by bad actors spreading disinformation, including through paid posts. The platforms are all changing the rules on who gets to place political ads and what information the public gets to see about them. […]

The rise of the Internet and smartphones – and their prevalence especially among the younger generation – has led to a multitude of consequences ranging from data privacy, election tampering to mental health disorders. The push to address the first two issues began much before the third but this year the momentum seems to be […]

Advertisers are worried that Facebook is about to become a data desert as it deliberately dries up a once easy source of rich data on its users. On August 15, Facebook will shut down a program called “partner categories,” which gave its advertisers a way to tap directly into the largest consumer data brokers within […]

Facebook is investigating a social analytics company called Crimson Hexagon because of its potential dealings with a Russian organization and other concerns over how it handled private data. Crimson Hexagon, based in the US, provides social data analysis for brands by monitoring platforms including Facebook and Twitter. The brands it has worked with include Adidas, Samsung, […]

We recently reported that Snapchat is testing new Shoppable Snap Ads, a format it is first using to promote its Spectacles camera sunglasses. Also, Snapchat is working with more brands on what it calls Sponsored Snappable ads, which are augmented reality games created by brands with the same technology used in games like Pokémon Go. Snapchat […]

Powered by Meltwater Middle East Since the introduction of Live Video on Facebook last year, brands, influencers and individual users alike have been using the feature to connect with their followers in an authentic, real-time setting. As with any new feature, it’s important for social media pros to consider how it fits into their content […]

TBWA has partnered with Facebook for a custom training program that will be rolled out across its offices in Africa, Middle East, Turkey, Central and Eastern Europe. Called TBWA Facebook Foundry, the program focuses on “inspiration, learning, and creativity,” according to a statement by the agency. It is based on Facebook’s existing ‘Blueprint’ program, which […]

The social media giant just can’t seem to catch a break ever since news of Cambridge Analytica broke. Two days in front of the Senate, one in front of EU officials, an FTC investigation, and hundreds of assurances later, Facebook has messed up yet again. On Thursday, it was revealed that the privacy of 14 […]

Facebook has been under fire for a multitude of issues ranging from data privacy to fake news. Now, after multiple complaints, hearings and GDPR, it has to fix at least some of them. But, first… Facebook has been saying for a long time that it has tied up with external fact-checkers but its stringent control […]

Ramadan is a time of togetherness, celebration, and spirituality for many Muslims around the world. Reduced working hours and a change in lifestyle lead to varying media consumption habits and purchase behaviors. On Facebook, for instance, activity across the MENA region peaks by 15 percent as 86 percent of Facebook users celebrate Ramadan. Its users, […]

Following issues of brand safety, measurability, data privacy and transparency, tech giants – mostly Facebook – have got themselves in hot water. Just last month Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg appeared in front of the US Senate over the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Around the same time, users started a #DeleteFacebook movement with users deleting their account. […]

There’s one word that saw a 365 percent increase in usage since 2016 making it Collins Dictionary’s Word of the Year 2017. That word is ‘fake news’. Although popularized in 2016 during the US elections – and since then by the US President – fake news is not exclusive to either; it is an all-pervasive […]

By Alex Malouf, IABC Chair for Europe, Middle East and North Africa I was glued to my screen twice in the last month. The first video was of Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg apologizing for the Cambridge Analytica scandal, which is continuing to engulf the social media giant. The second also made for compelling viewing. A […]

On April 4, Facebook updates or rather clarified its data use policy On April 10, it launched the Data Abuse Bounty program rewarding users with $500 minimum for reporting data abuse On April 17, Facebook announced compliances with EU’s GDPR to start with, which will be rolled out to everyone   It all started with […]

‘Studios’ or training programs for creators on social media platforms have been all the rage with YouTube and Facebook setting up physical and online studios and trainings to help creators with equipment, advice, etc. Now, Snap has extended the capabilities of its ‘Lens Studio,’ which was launched last year. The Lens Studio and its extended […]

Following the Cambridge Analytica controversy and Mark Zuckerberg’s consequent Congress testimony, Facebook is putting – or at least trying to put – measures in place to reduce data abuse through its platform. On March 21, Facebook announced the following developments as part of its crackdown on platform abuse: Investigate all apps that had access to […]

Last week, Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, appeared in front of the US Senate following the controversy brewed by reports that data firm Cambridge Analytica had improperly gained data on up to 87 million Facebook users. Since the Cambridge Analytica, users – and brands – have been abandoning the platform, even starting a movement, #DeleteFacebook. Now, according […]

Mark Zuckerberg faced House lawmakers for the second day in a testimony that lasted, touching on everything from how President Trump’s supporters are treated on Facebook to the way the company gathers data on people who don’t even use its service. Zuckerberg was on Capitol Hill for the second consecutive day to answer questions from […]

Image credit: Al Drago/Bloomberg Mark Zuckerberg sat with a joint Senate committee of more than 40 senators in the first of two congressional hearings planned this week. He was called to answer questions about data analytics company Cambridge Analytica making off with data on up to 87 million Facebook users. Cambridge Analytica is being investigated in the US and […]

Facebook has been in hot water over data privacy concerns over the last few weeks. And now, it seems as though Facebook is indeed reading – or at least, scanning – users’ messages. Basically, the company scans the text and images that people send each other on Facebook Messenger, making sure it all abides by […]

Though marketers such as Mozilla and Pep Boys have said they’re pulling spending on Facebook ads at least for now, advertisers across the board are more likely to keep buying there. They’re giving the social network the benefit of the doubt, calculating that its problems won’t taint them or both. “We at Clorox stand by […]

Brad Stulberg gets constant messages from Facebook to come back. It asks him to check in and see what he’s been missing since he stopped visiting in January. “Facebook texts me five days a week,” says Stulberg, 31, a writer from Oakland, California. “I get emails from them daily. It’s supremely annoying.” Stulberg is trying to […]

Carolyn Everson, vice-president of global marketing solutions at Facebook, says she actually started her fix-it tour (our words) days before CEO Mark Zuckerberg ventured out to speak on the Cambridge Analytica affair. She called the company’s top advertisers on Saturday, the day after the company first acknowledged the harvesting of data from some 50 million Facebook users […]

Image credit: Guillermo Gutierrez/Bloomberg Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg finally broke his silence about the abuse of data on the platform by Cambridge Analytica, promising to redouble efforts to safeguard user privacy after the exposure of the massive data breach. Since Friday, Facebook has been on the defensive over reports that Cambridge Analytica improperly obtained data […]

Image credit: Christophe Morin, Bloomberg Facebook has suspended Cambridge Analytica, a data company that helped President Donald Trump win the 2016 presidential election and which may have collected data from 50 million Facebook profiles without their owners’ permission. The social-networking company said in a blog post Friday that Cambridge Analytica received some user data through […]

In October 2017, Facebook announced that it is testing an “Explore Feed” for brands based on feedback that users would like to see more of family and friends. The test was carried out in six countries: Sri Lanka, Bolivia, Slovakia, Serbia, Guatemala, and Cambodia. At the time, Adam Mosseri, Facebook’s head of news feed, said […]

Image Credit: The Ad Council The Ad Council’s Lisa Sherman discusses pro-social initiatives with Facebook’s David Fischer in this first interview in a new series, “The Purpose of Purpose”. Lisa Sherman: There is a growing public expectation for private sector businesses to do their part in addressing social issues. How do you see this expectation playing […]

Facebook is not just losing its audience, it’s losing its youth. The social network is expected to shed 18-to-24-year-old users this year for the first time, according to a new report from eMarketer, which predicts a 5.6 decline for the age group on Facebook. The analytics and data firm had already predicted a decline in usage of kids […]

On Thursday, Facebook opened its new office as a testament to its growth in the region – 264 percent growth in the past five years in MENA, to be precise. When the office first launched five years ago, it was basically two people and a couple of chairs, said Jonathan Labin, managing director, MENAP, Facebook. The […]

The struggle for screen time evolved into that for eyeballs and then attention. In today’s Facebook-dominated age, the struggle is now about appearing on the news feed. The platform’s organic reach has been dropping every year with industry experts citing two percent as the average. This, of course, varies by publisher, fan base, content style, […]

Smartly.io, a Facebook advertising optimization and automation tool, is now opening its first Middle East office in Dubai. The company, headquartered in Helsinki, is a Facebook marketing partner managing over $1 billion of Facebook advertising spend globally. Smartly.io has grown at an average of 5x year-over-year globally, and recently closed a $20 million secondary funding […]

With one year to go until the final of the 2018 FIFA World Cup, Facebook’s head of brand advertising at Facebook Middle East, North Africa and Pakistan, Naureen Mohammed, looks at how marketers can get tactical with mobile and video when it comes to planning their strategies.  With just one year to go until the […]

Facebook selected 3 winners from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) from 60 finalists as part of the first-ever Bots for Messenger Developer Challenge. The Bots for Messenger Challenge was launched on February 15th this year, in 64 countries across the wider Middle East and Africa to recognize and reward developers who were able […]

By Tamara Habib, business director, Netizency They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. And imitation is something that Facebook has been doing a lot of lately: stories, lenses, filters… it seems there’s no stop that Facebook won’t pull to clone Snapchat’s features. But is Facebook’s attempt at imitating all things Snapchat beginning to […]

By Michaela Branova, lead data analyst at Socialbakers Over the past two years, Facebook has introduced new ways of delivering content with video being brought to another level with FB Live as well as 360° spherical videos. Spherical content is not only available for videos but, since June, also for photos. In this article, we’ll […]

Facebook is challenging developers across the Middle East and Africa to create innovative bots in the Bots for Messenger Developer Challenge. The company says that this challenge is in tune with its commitment to promote innovation by providing developers and start-ups with the tools they need to “build, grow, monetize, and measure products and services.” […]

Facebook is refining its ad measurement offerings to give marketers more information about their campaigns on its ad platform. On Tuesday, the social network announced an expansion of partnerships with third-party ad tech companies, promising better quality data. Facebook said it was trying to give marketers a more accurate grasp of how ads on the social network […]

Facebook has announced new updates for business metrics and reporting and launched a new inbox app to allow businesses to link their Facebook, Messenger, and Instagram accounts. The new metrics updates will allow partners and agencies to have a clearer picture of the statistics provided on their campaigns. It’s also why Facebook is increasing third-party verification […]

UAE residents spend an average of approximately five hours of their day on social media, a new YouGov survey finds.   Through surveying over 5,000 UAE residents, it was revealed that the time spent on social media varied among different age groups. Younger users, aged 18-35, spend between two to six hours of their day […]

Facebook opened its first business office in Johannesburg, South Africa last week, which will serve businesses across the continent in a bid to help businesses grow locally and regionally and to create further value for African advertisers and people. This new office is Facebook’s first step in furthering its investment in Africa and its people. […]

Today, Facebook announced that it has now reached more than two million active advertisers, up from 1.5 million roughly half a year ago and 1 million a year-and-a-half ago. In addition, it is also announcing a new Ads Manager App to help businesses manage their ad campaigns on the go, through their mobile devices. Roughly 35 […]

  Facebook is giving people more control over whose content occupies their news feed on the social network, arguably the web’s most prized real estate. People will be able to see which of their friends or the brands they follow accounted for the most posts in their news feeds each week, Facebook said Friday. What’s […]

  Robert Kyncl, global head of content and business operations at YouTube (YT), is not particularly keen on tying the platform with just user-generated content (UGC) anymore. Communicate learns that, at some point, “they’re [users] probably making more money than you are. When you call them users, it makes them sound like they are amateurs, […]

  Facebook rolled out an update this May releasing video metrics, wherein users will get information on total video views, unique video views, the average duration of the video view and audience retention. Indeed, this was a great update for marketers. Some brands still love listening to the term ‘GRPs’ and it seems like Facebook is […]

  Facebook has launched a new feature enabling advertisers to reach people based on the network connection — 2G, 3G or 4G — they most often use when accessing the social network. Facebook already offers the option to reach people based on the type of device they use (smart phones, feature phones and tablets), as well as […]

“You can’t be what you can’t see,” says Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook COO, author of Lean In and founder of LeanIn.Org. “In an age where media is all around us, it is critical that images provide examples that both women and men can emulate.” As we move into a more globalised world, where information and images […]

After the native ad, here comes the buy button. On Wednesday, both Facebook and Twitter made critical moves in their efforts to transform their platforms into formidable spaces for online commerce. On the morning of 17th July, Facebook unveiled a new test click-to-purchase product. Members on desktop computers or mobile devices will be able to […]

  LinkedIn wants to overtake Twitter and Facebook as executives’ social news service of choice. On Monday the business-orientated social network added to its news arsenal, acquiring people-centric news aggregator Newsle to bolster its burgeoning media business. A LinkedIn spokesman declined to comment on financial terms of the deal but he confirmed that the company […]

  CNN International has announced several upgrades for its TV, web and mobile platforms for real time and live coverage of the 2014 World Cup. The network’s coverage will include live programming from Brazil, feature programming from around the world, and online initiatives that will bring audiences up to the minute reaction and analysis from all […]