Social Media usage in United Arab Emirates

As the quantitative results provided at the end of this article show, social media shows a very strong presence for UAE participants. Strong usage statistics are exhibited in major categories.
 
March 30, 2012 - PRLog -- A fundamental question that was considered was the frequency of use of social media. The question is
particular important given theories regarding the interdependence that occurs once media use becomes
substantial. As the quantitative results provided at the end of this article show, social media shows a
very strong presence for UAE participants. Strong usage statistics are exhibited in major categories.
When questioned regarding length of use, more than half of the participants (53%) reported using
social media for over two years. A significant percentage of newcomers (25%) had begun using social
media within the previous year. One way of measuring levels of usage is to ask about how confident
users are in their ability to use social media websites. Confident usage suggests substantial familiarity
and experience. A strong majority (57%) of participants felt "confident" in the knowledge they
possessed about various social media sites, and nearly one fifth (17%) felt "very confident" in their
skills. Attitudes toward social media were also quite positive, suggesting a generally favorable level of
interaction with these sites by residents. For example, when queried about the ability of social media
sites to credibly and accurately relay information as compared with traditional media, far more either
agreed (46%) or strongly agreed (25%), than disagreed (21%) or strongly disagreed (8%) that such
sites were reliable in this manner.
In general UAE respondents favored the same category-leading sites popular in the West and
worldwide. For example, the social network service of choice was Facebook, which was identified as the service of choice by 86% of respondents (followed by LinkedIn at 56% and MySpace 36%). The
video sharing site YouTube proved quite dominant (74%) in its category for survey takers. In another
major social media category, photo sharing, usage was less pronounced, but significant (24% used
Flicker, 12% used Photo bucket). The response in terms of Blog usage was distinctive. While Blogger
and Word Press are the most used blog sites in the West, UAE respondents identified Live Journal
most often as their blog of choice (36% for Live Journal versus 7% for Blogger). Focus group response
suggests that the reason for this is the attraction brought by the strong representation of international
users in Live Journal's user base. The relatively no-frills and technically demanding characteristic of
Live Journal (Live journal, 2011) suggests that respondents possess a substantial skill set for taking
advantage of social media features.
Most participants agreed that the use of social media is on the rise in the current teenage and
adult population (Twitter, YouTube, the IPhone, Blackberry, and IPad were mentioned frequently).
They had a clear conception of a wide range of uses for it, defining it as useful for contacting others,
discussions, searching for information, selling products and logos, making announcements, and
distributing surveys. But when surveyed about how they initially came upon a social media site, only
10% specifically mentioned the attraction of features. Some 27% reported that they subscribed to a
given site after being referred by a friend and 18% after hearing about the site, perhaps through
advertising or public relations

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