Ooredoo companies take the lead in social media initiatives

Ooredoo companies across the world are investing in and extending their social media presence to deliver a leading customer experience.Social media has proven to be the most effective way for Ooredoo companies to reach out to and interact with customers in line with the brand’s three key values of “caring, connecting and challenging”. Reflecting this trend, the number of initiatives, social media partnerships, dedicated Facebook pages and online communities supported by Ooredoo companies has increased exponentially in the past three years.Ooredoo’s strategy has been to work with the leading social media companies in addition to connecting and interacting with a diverse range of communities across its international footprint. This has led to large followings on social media accounts and strong take-up of innovative social media services online as well as on smartphones and feature phones. Dr Nasser Marafih, Group CEO of Ooredoo, said: “We are already seeing our online presence as the most popular way for customers to contact us with questions and requests, and are looking to offer new services in the coming months to transform the entire customer experience. Social media is moving beyond simple customer relations - it is about building a whole new type of relationship with our customers.”At an international level, the company has launched the “Play for Dreams” online portal this month with its global brand ambassador, Lionel Messi (www.playfordreams.com).Companies are using social media in innovative ways to enable customers to care for their friends and family. One prime example among Ooredoo companies is a Mother’s Day Facebook application from Wataniya Mobile Palestine. Hundreds of customers living in Palestine and throughout the global diaspora used the Facebook app to design a Mother’s Day greeting card that was delivered to mothers in Palestine.In Tunisia, Tunisiana has sponsored the first-ever Tunisiana Web Awards. Currently, the company is organising the first Tunisiana Digital Meetup to bring together social media influencers and an awards ceremony for its Facebook Developer Challenge.Nawras held its first ever Tweetup in 2013, taking Oman’s leading Twitter users on a tour of the Nawras campus. Nawras received recognition for its efforts at the Pan Arab Web Awards 2013, where CEO Ross Cormack was named “Telecommunications Man of the Year” and Nawras won “Best Website” in the telecommunications category. Nawras also recently won two Bronze Lion Awards at the 2013 Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.Indosat reached more than 3mn social media users to help design a birthday celebration for the lead singer of JKT48, an Indonesian pop group and brand ambassador, while more than 400,000 social media users participated in a Twitter contest on Korean actor Lee Min-ho.Many Ooredoo companies have seen strong take-up of services, including Gmail SMS Chat, enabling customers to have SMS conversations with their Gmail contacts and using SMS to update Facebook and Twitter. Several Tunisian customers have used Facebook for feature phones, delivering a near-smartphone customer experience.Meanwhile, Asiacell in Iraq has become the first communications company in the Arabian Gulf and Levant to reach 1mn Facebook “likes”, while Nedjma has won the “Best Facebook Page” at the first Algeria Web Awards 2012 and is the country’s most popular Facebook page with more than 590,000 “likes”. Named as the top social media brand in Qatar, Ooredoo has over 275,000 Facebook “likes” and more than 67,000 followers combined on its Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and YouTube accounts. Ooredoo Qatar has also seen more than 40,000 customers download the Ooredoo mobile application.