An Obvious great shift from traditional news platforms to online and mobile news sources in the last couple of years. According to Nielsen’s Global Trust in Advertising Survey 2012: 91% of online Egyptian consumers trust recommendations from people they know and 74% trust opinions posted online.
Social Media become a source of information about brands and posts over Facebook and Twitter become a product review to express consumers experience/s. But in a society formation like Egypt with almost 28% of total population is youth according to [Population DATA SHEET 2013] the role of Social Media increasing to be a source of stories that attracts traditional media to cover.
In this new multi-platform media environment, people’s relationship to news is becoming portable, personalized, and participatory.- Via- Pew Internet.
Global Facts and Figures //
According to research from sources including The Washington Post, Pew Research Center and Reuters, social media is a serious contender to print newspapers as a primary source for news.
- 33% of cell phone owners now access news on their cell phones.
- 50% of people have learned about breaking news via social media.
- 46% of people get their news online at least three times a week.
- 28% of internet users have customized their home page to include news from sources and on topics that particularly interest them.
- 37% of internet users have contributed to the creation of news, commented about it, or disseminated it via postings on social media sites like Facebook or Twitter.
- As of 2012, online news revenue has surpassed print newspaper revenue.
From Publisher to Digital Publisher//
A new agreement made between El–Gomhoreya, the first Internet Egyptian TV, owned by Core Publications and On TV.
The first Egyptian channel to be broadcasted on the Internet developed a unique content that attracted one of the leading satellite channels. This is not the only positive fact about the new ideas and new shows, offering you a new experience. But! Core Publications re-branded to be Core Virtual and stopped publishing G Mag, Campus and E7na magazines.
This was a remarkable move done by a successful publisher to stop printings and transform into a vision to be a digital oriented publisher and it seems like they did a smart decision to cope with the market changes and focus only on Digital Media.
Digital Media is not the future anymore //
I became involved in social media analysis since 2012 and witnessed how the digital mediums become a strong channel for brands to communicate with customers. Also in changing people mind. This explains why governments like Chinese and Iranian ban Facebook and Twitter. However, The significant role social media played during the 2011 Egyptian Revolution confirms that what happens on Social Media don’t stay on Social Media anymore and its easily communicated to public even if they don’t have access to the internet.
From Social Media to Newspapers and TV //
With 36.8M internet users and 44.1% penetration rate, Egypt rank is 15 in list of countries by number of Internet users worldwide according to Wikipedia , I believe Digital Media is a truly revolutionary form of communication that can measure the interest if the society, I have gathered 3 examples how trending topics on Social Media recently found its way easily to more exposure via Newspapers and TV
1- Al Mowaten Al Masry character interviewed on AlArabiya
2-Ahmed Shiba lover interviewed by Youm7
3-Ayam Soda is featured on El Watan News
Keeping an eye for what is going on Social Media become very significant for traditional media channels. May be Social Media become the source of more interesting stories or, may be its taking over the news industry in Egypt, What do you think?
