Purple Cow: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable

Purple CowFor years, marketers have talked and continue to talk about the “five Ps” (in fact, there are more than five, but everyone picks their favorite ones): product, pricing, promotion, positioning, publicity, packaging, pass along, permission…etc.

With time these became the components of a basic marketing checklist, a formula that people followed time and again to make sure they’ve done their job, and hopefully create success.

Seth Godin argues that it’s time to add an exceptionally important new P to the list: Purple Cow.

In his book “Purple Cow: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable“, he makes the point that cows, after you’ve seen one, or two, or ten, are boring. A Purple Cow, though…now that would be something, that would definitely stand out and grab your attention.

Purple Cow describes something phenomenal, something counterintuitive and exciting and flat out unbelievable. Every day, consumers come face to face with a lot of boring stuff-a lot of brown cows-but you can bet they won’t forget a Purple Cow. And he argues that it’s not a marketing function that you can slap on to your product or service; Purple Cow is inherent, It’s built right into the product from the beginning, or it’s not there.

In Purple Cow, Seth Godin urges everyone to put a Purple Cow into everything they build, and everything they do, to create something truly noticeable, that basically markets itself and makes people want to talk about it and spread it.

Purple Cow is a fun and really interesting book to read for anyone involved in building new products and launching them, offering an exciting way of looking at things and approaching product definition, development and marketing.

[Amazon: Purple Cow (Seth Godin)]

StartUpArabia Turns One Year Old

The idea of StartUpArabia was one that I had in my mind for quite some time, but I only got around to start working on it in the beginning of March of last year, planning out where I wanted it to go, putting everything into place for the first steps, and working on a bunch of content to be ready for the official launch so that readers wouldn’t come to an empty site.

The first alpha version went online on March 15th 2008, where I continued to tweak and work on it, shared the link with some friends and industry insiders to get their feedback, while also giving a chance for the search engines to start picking it up.

A month later on April 16th 2008, with a good initial amount of content that was already getting indexed by search engines, and after having reached a point where I was happy with how things were looking, and having integrated most of the feedback I got, I officially launched StartUpArabia with this post: “Welcome to StartUpArabia

The launch went very well, and the feedback was overwhelming and very encouraging from everyone. A nice little extra was that StartUpArabia was even noticed by Michael Arrington of TechCrunch on its first day and he tweeted about it here; which gave it a good little boost.

One of the points a number of people often suggested early on was the need for an Arabic version, which was already in my plans, but that I pushed even higher in priority, rolling out the Arabic version of StartUpArabia on June 30th 2008.

After that I started working on a project that would months later see the light of day as StartUpArabia Database, the database of Arab startups, entrepreneurs and investors. The database was ready by August of 2008, but only officially announced at a DemoCamp Dubai event earlier this year, as I kept wanting to work on it more.

In parallel to working on the database, a few other smaller projects were launched for StartUpArabia; The job board went live on August 4th 2008; The mobile version went online on November 20th 2008; and the Arab world’s tech events calendar was launched on November 28th 2008.

The past year has been a great ride, giving me an opportunity to meet so many great and passionate people from the internet scene in the Arab world, as well as help even in a small way in raising awareness around internet startups in the Arab world.

I’d like to thank every single person who has been there along the way; reading and commenting; offering help, support and encouragement; you all rock. StartUpArabia wouldn’t be what it is without you all.

Special thanks go to my wife for her never-ending support and help throughout the whole thing, especially with the Arabic version, and for bearing with me all the evenings I’ve spent toiling away in front of my laptop working on StartUpArabia.

A new year starts for StartUpArabia, and I’m looking forward to it with a lot of excitement, as it shapes up to be even greater than the first. A list of really cool projects are planned, a lot of ideas are floating around, the Arab internet scene is even more active, and it’s just awesome to be in the middle of it all.

Bayt Launches Intilaq, Gets Into Early Stage Funding For Internet Startups In The Arab World

IntilaqBayt.com, the leading job portal in the Arab world, is launching a new and very interesting initiative called Intilaq, that aims to fund, mentor and support aspiring entrepreneurs with early-stage technology startups.

Intilaq is interested in funding and supporting startups based in the Arab world, or who are interested in relocating to the region, that drive regional internet adoption, usage and functionality.

Intilaq is not an incubation program, nor a competition, what they’ll be doing is evaluating ideas and people on an on-going basis, looking for the right fit, and funding chosen projects in exchange for equity in the company. Depending on how much progress the entrepreneurs have made, the funding could be at a seed round or at a follow-up round.
There is also no defined amount with which they are seeding the fund, choosing to remain flexible and acting on a case by case basis.

Intilaq is interested in hearing from both technology geeks, who have technical talent and a great innovative idea looking to start a company, as well as business people, who have great business aptitude (e.g., operations, sales, marketing, business development, finance) and who want to work with technical people to build a great company.

By doing this, Bayt is looking to invest some of the experience and money it has gained over the years, building their own success, into new startups in return for equity, or the benefit of a strategic acquisition, or even to just help grow regional Internet usage and winning by growing the online employment market for Bayt.com.

Besides funding, experience and mentorship; Bayt also offers to help with invaluable industry contacts from around the region, and even workspace in some cases whether at their offices in Dubai Internet City or one of their other offices around the Arab world.

The Intilaq team is made up of Rabea Ataya, the CEO of Bayt.com, and Dan Stuart, the Head of Strategic Initiatives at Bayt.com; both as managing partners, with Dan running the day-to-day operations.

Intilaq

Tunisian Business Portal Web Manager Center Launches Arabic Version

WMCWeb Manager Center, the leading online portal for economic and business news in Tunisia just announced the launch of their Arabic version today.

Over the past years, the French version of the site has become a well known resource for business people and reporters alike.

This move comes to cater to readers from Tunisia who prefer reading their news in Arabic, as well as to reach out to readers from around the Arab world who are interested in economic and business news out of Tunisia.

Web Manager Center provides daily detailed news updates covering the latest developments and events in the areas of economy, business and technology.

The portal works on providing the latest news on the Tunisian economy and its various sectors from industry, to agriculture, to finance, services and healthcare. It also sheds light on the world of business in Tunisia, the deals taking place, investments and partnership opportunities. It also covers the information and communications technology sector in the country, detailing all the latest products and services in the market.

WMC

The site also provides a ticker of the latest stock prices on the Tunisian stock exchange, as well as exchange rates for the Arab currencies.

In short, just like the French version before it, the Arabic version of Web Manager Center aims to be a central resource on everything related to the Tunisian economy, business in the country, as well as technology, through the news and analysis it provides.

Damrej, A New Local Thematic Web Search Engine

DamrejDamrej is a newly launched thematic search engine developed to make it easier for users to look for different items they want to buy online, special offers, cars, properties, jobs and more.

Damrej takes a local approach, and has been launched for Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Libya and Egypt for the time being; with versions for the UAE and other countries to follow soon.

The services’ robots crawl different websites from the country building its indexes of shopping catalogs, jobs, real estate offers, cars and other types of classified ads; making them all searchable from one central point. The results provide some collected details about the item and point to the original website where the item or offer can be found.

Some merchants or classifieds services also provide an updated feed directly to Damrej to make it even easier to index their content and provide through the search engine.

Users can search by theme, narrow their search by using theme-specific filters, and get results from one or all online services depending on their choice. Related offers are also served up next to the items found through the search.

Read More

Submit Conference 2009 – A Roundup Of The Event

Submit ConferenceSubmit Conference 2009, a gathering for entrepreneurs and professionals involved in the Internet industry in the Middle East, was held on April 8th and 9th in the Habtoor Grand Hotel in Dubai.

It grouped a number of speakers from around the world and the region to talk about internet and entrepreneurship related topics, share information and have an open discussion with everyone present.

Among the attendees were investors and entrepreneurs from the Arab region, which made for a great networking opportunity too.

Turnout was good but not as big as I had hoped, and judging from some of the feedback I got at the event and elsewhere, it’s mainly due to the ticket prices, that were still a bit steep even with the discount offered through StartUpArabia. Hopefully the next editions will be more affordable for people who wish to attend.

The following is a roundup of the two days of the event and the various topics the event’s speakers touched upon in their talks.

Read More

BarCamp UAE Un-Conference, Dubai Internet City, May 9th 2009

BarCampAfter the DemoCamps, Tweetups, and Twestival; Dubai will soon be witnessing another interesting event: BarCamp UAE.

BarCamp is an ad-hoc gathering, born from the desire for people to share and learn in an open environment. These events are quite intense with discussions, demos, and interaction from attendees.

The unconference will be taking place on May 9th 2009 in Dubai Internet City’s Building #3 (Thuraya Conference Hall.)

The concept lies on the basis that everyone is able to teach something and learn something in return, so it is open for all participants to talk, share, discuss, debate, enquire and learn.

Some of the topics that some of the participants will be talking about are: Why it’s the best time to build a great enterprise; Sustainability; Advertising, digital media, social media and more; Web standards; How to build a cohesive presentation; Media in the Middle East; Think tooling your life; and so much more, with people from different background, covering different topics and subjects.
For an idea about the different topics, you can check this link: BarCamp UAE 1 Topics.

People interested in participating can sign up through the following form: BarCamp UAE 1 Sign-up Form.

For more information and details about BarCamp UAE, you can check out the site: BarCamp UAE.

If you’re registered to the StartUpArabia Events iCal feed in your calendar software, the event should already be showing up in your calendar for that day.

Kammelna: An Online Multi-player Baloot Card Game Service

KammelnaTaking its first step into the online gaming world, Saudi web company Remal IT has launched a beta of its ‘Baloot’ card game site, Kammelna.

Kammelna is an online multi-player ‘Baloot‘ game, a popular card game played in Saudi Arabia (which is quite similar to the French game Belote), that is built in Flash and runs in a browser.

Being a flash game, the game does not require downloading, and is played directly from within the browser, featuring a simple Arabic interface that is geared toward getting the players started with a game as easily and quickly as possible. 

The game also supports firewall traversal, which will allow players to play the game even from within restricted networks.

Kammelna

Remal IT noted that Kammelna.com basic playing features will be free, and that the site will be supported through ads and extra paid playing features. They also hope to roll out more free online games, geared towards the Arab market, in the future.

Remal IT is a Saudi based Internet applications and services startup that was established back in 2005. It owns and operates a network of social sites and Internet applications, and relies on e-commerce and e-marketing for revenues.

Kuv Capital Launches Project To Create A Media City In Lebanon (Updated)

Lebanon FlagMy friend Hervé Cuviliez, Founder and Managing Director of Kuv Capital just wrote about a great and ambitious new project that they’re launching in Beirut, Lebanon: The creation of a Media City in Lebanon.

This stems out of their belief that Beirut has a window to become a Digital Middle East Hub, and that despite the weak broadband infrastructure, unreliable power grid and Lebanon’s inability to reform itself, it still is a country that offers a great opportunity to entrepreneurs with all the necessary ingredients to create a startup and have a low burn rate.

Creating a company is cheap and easy (limited liability company starts at 3500 USD) and so are office space and expenses. There’s a great pool of talent available, at lower costs than the GCC countries for example.

The idea is to find old warehouses or factories, rehabilitate them into offices with decent broadband and electricity, free spaces for students who want to work on innovative projects, showrooms for high tech companies …etc.

They’ve already started working on the project; they’ve spotted three places around Beirut, talked to investors, convinced six digital related companies and a media group to move in, and they’re still reaching out to more.

The hope is that by doing this, and grouping all these innovative companies and people in one place over time, they will be able to replicate to a certain extent the creation and growth of Silicon Valley.

If you want to be involved in any way or help in growing this project, you can contact Kuv Capital at: info@kuvcapital.com

Updated: Kuv Capital released more details on the project on their official blog.
They’re in the process of setting up a company  that will run this project, and will be creating a strategic committee to advise the company on what needs to be done in the Media City.
The timeframe is currently:

  • April-May(-June if needed) will be dedicated to identify potential locations and initiate discussions with landlords.
  • May: First community meeting to brainstorm on services that should be found in the media city.
  • June: second community meeting, presentation and business model finalization.
  • July-september: meetings with investors.
  • October: Go / No Go decision.

More Arabic Websites From The Gulf, But Few Visitors?

Arabic websites based in the Gulf are increasing in number but the locals are not using them much, according to experts discussing “Investing in Future Media” at the TMT Finance and Investment 2009 forum that was recently held at Sharq Village hotel in Doha, Qatar.

The opening presentation at the forum expressed concern over the fact that although the number of Arabic websites was increasing, these were rarely visited by those who know the language because they were not satisfied with the contents of the sites.

“This is still an open question,” said Mohamad Murrad, Principal, Vice President and Partner of Booz & Company, when asked if Arabic websites from the region can compete successfully with English websites.

Based on the study explained in the presentation, although there are now more Arabic websites in the region than before, their number is still small compared to that of English websites. Another fact is that most people in the Gulf access the popular sites such as Google, Facebook and Yahoo.

The same study highlighted the growth of the mobile platform, on which it is believed Arabic content can get a market share since 99 percent of the sales in the telecommunications industry are derived from it.

Mobile content is already on the rise and has high penetration in the region but the online network infrastructure for Arabic is still very limited, the study disclosed. It said SMS/MMS-based advertising offerings, although still small, showed strong growth.

Online ads are not very effective in the region, fetching just $2 per user, which is way behind the worldwide average of $27 per user and $59 per user in the United States. “The problem with online ads is very much skeptical, that is how to reach and capture the audience,” said one of the speakers.

[Source: The Peninsula]