New audit confirms record growth for Maktoob.com

Maktoob.com announced the results of a second audit of its Internet audience, conducted by globally renowned UK-based ABC Electronic.

The third-party audit certified that Maktoob.com received a total of 9.6 million unique users who visited over 224 million web pages in the month of April 2008, making it by far the most visited audited website in the Arab world.

Maktoob.com conducted its first audit in June 2007, which certified that 6,969,475 unique users visited the website that month. The ABC ELECTRONIC certificate issued for Maktoob.com in May 2008 confirms that during the month of April 2008 a total of 9,589,292 unique users visited the site, with a daily average of 7.5 million page views, showing an increase of close to 40%in its monthly audience, within the span of a year.

ABC ELECTRONIC independently verifies and reports on media performance, providing the online media industry with a major, trusted currency on which media space can be traded, and delivers an independent assurance that a website is attracting the size of audience it claims.

‘We are proud to continue being the most popular web portal in the Middle East, the world’s fastest growing Internet market,’ said Ahmed Nassef, Vice President of the Maktoob Group and General Manager of Maktoob.com. ‘We constantly strive to provide our growing audience of millions with world-class Arabic-language content and the latest in social media and online community tools. This latest audit confirms that we are on the right track.’

Hussein Freijeh, Advertising Sales Director at Maktoob.com said: ‘The ABC ELECTRONIC audit result is very encouraging. It reveals that the Internet is now a mass medium facilitating reach to millions of consumers in the Arab world. The audit figures will also serve to justify a boost in Ad spend on online advertising.’

Tags: ABC ELECTRONIC, Ahmed Nassef, Hussein Freijeh, Maktoob Group, Maktoob.com

Maktoob Becomes the Number One Arabic Women’s Destination on the Net

In a move aimed at solidifying its position as the Arab World’s leading Internet portal and online community, Maktoob.com has acquired Saudi-based AlFrasha.com, one of the region’s most popular women’s websites.

The acquisition of AlFrasha.com, combined with a series of other recent acquisitions and the rollout of an array of innovative services and content especially geared to Arab women makes Maktoob the undisputed number one source of online information and communications services for women in the Arab world.

“With our newly acquired website, AlFrasha.com, Maktoob now has the largest women’s audience of any online media in the Arab world, with access to over 1 million Arab female visitors actively participating in our women’s community forums and accessing an unmatched array of constantly updated information geared to the special interests of Arab women,” said Ahmed Nassef, General Manager of Maktoob.com.

“This will create unique and highly valuable opportunities for marketers and advertisers to communicate with women consumers and create one-to-one relationships that will strengthen their brands,” added Nassef.

Maktoob’s expanded female audience will benefit from the vast amount of up-to-date Arabic content and special tools offered by Helwa, Maktoob’s women’s channel. Some of the regular topics covered by Helwa include health, beauty, parenting, social issues, and home management. Arab women will also benefit from special for-women-only communication tools like women’s blogs, forums, and chatrooms

Tags: Ahmed Nassef, AlFrasha.com, Helwa, Maktoob.com