Companies always strive to achieve the best results for themselves and for their customers. This means investing time and money, to understand the consumer’s wants and needs. With COVID 19, the online market rose significantly and both consumer and company enjoyed the benefits this yielded.
According to McKinsey’s digital sentiment survey in the Middle East, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, the digital channels and spending will rise in the years to come with AI use increasing across all sectors. The changes that the pandemic brought were well received from both sides and in order for this to continue being beneficial for all, tailoring what each company offers to each consumer according to country and industry will help them achieve the best engagements results.
Digital penetration in each country helps companies better understand where their online consumers are more engaged and where they can grow in coming years and unlock those new resources and new customers. For example, 99% of Dubai consumers have access to the internet whereas only 71% of Egyptian consumers have access; Egypt has plenty of room for growth in the digital world. Overall, the MENA region has had significant growth in the past six months, with a 74-78 percent of digital adoption rate, they are rivaling European and North American countries. This means that companies have the chance to create tailored features for the region that will also work for other parts of the world.
The United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Egypt are also very favorable towards the mobile phone as well as marketplaces, specifically, they use their mobiles 1.6 times more than Europe and North America and interact with marketplaces 1.7 times more; this interaction rate with marketplaces is similar to Asia.
Grocery and healthcare are the only industries that have not been seriously affected by digital adoption, all other industries have seen deep engagement from consumers. Digital is often preferred due to convenience and the time consumers save. In order to maintain this high level of interaction and engagement with digital companies need to persistently develop new ideas and add to the digital agenda.
On the other hand, user experience, product availability, and information are the pain points that digital needs to work on to improve customer satisfaction. An interesting fact about the region, is that the United Arab Emirates fall behind other countries when it comes to digital adoption of certain elements, something that can possibly be explained by the love for malls in the Dubai culture; malls provide a place where one can achieve and buy anything they want.
The rise of digital means a rise in spending. 50% of the users questioned in McKinsey’s survey said they will increase their digital spending, especially in retails and travel. Travel is rising significantly due to people returning to pre pandemic lifestyles and taking more and more vacation. The element that still keeps consumers wary is NFTs and the metaverse. They are cautious or certain elements and their utility.
In conclusion, the region is already adopting the digital strategies at a very quick pace, and they are more than willing to spend more on new emerging technologies. Their love for the mobile phone means that companies need to take advantage of this and accelerate all their plans to fully unlock the regions potential.
