50% of UAE population on Facebook

With exponential growth in social media globally, reports indicate that usage in the Middle East is increasing at a phenomenal rate, with more and more internet users spending time on social networks.

According to a report conducted and published by Dubai School of Government (DSG) in April 2011, 50% of the UAE population were using Facebook while Bahrain had 36% and Qatar 30% penetration of the same platform. Furthermore, the GCC countries (with the exception of Saudi Arabia) primarily prefer to use English on Facebook, most likely because of their large English-speaking expatriate population.

The UAE showed the highest number of Twitter users in the GCC region with more than 200,000 users according to the same report published by DSG. What is very significant however is that most information on Twitter is generated by a minority, while the majority use Twitter to consume news as more of a news feed than a micro blog.

The report is prompting companies and organizations to adapt to social media as a branding and communications platform in the digital age.