Digital Influencer Mohanad Al-Hattab: Character, Comedy And A Whole Lotta Marketing Mojo
Sacha Baron Cohen is famous first and foremost for his character development and outrageous tactics. Controversial material peppered his Ali G, Borat, and Brüno Gehard personas often under the guise of jest, and Cohen later transitioned his comedic success to more challenging (and serious) roles. Had Cohen began his career in the age of social media, he may very well have opted for Instagram and Vine as his first mediums. The MENA region now has our own hilarious version of Cohen’s Borat, and he goes by the name of “Hassan El Coach”- one of the many fictitious characters developed by digital influencer and performing artist, Mohanad Al-Hattab. Al-Hattab uses social media channels to share his work, and yes, make people laugh. “I was watching standup comedy with my father, and we started talking about the art of comedy and he mentioned Lord Byron’s quote, ‘Always laugh when you can. It is cheap medicine.’ When I sat down to place a cover photo for my Facebook page, I felt that this quote would be just right.”
A Syrian National, Al-Hattab was born and raised in the UAE, and started his now Instafamous account approximately a year ago, following up with a Vine account a few months later. The 24 year-old digital influencer has impressive reach. He’s a heavy social media user, and at the time this interview took place in late October, he was at just under 165,000 Instagram followers from across the MENA region. His characters span dialects and genders, and they each have their own cult-like fanbases with some crossover between characters. After completing an undergraduate degree at the American University of Sharjah in Marketing and Management, Al-Hattab followed up with a Masters in Marketing at Brunel University London in England. Abu Dhabi-based, most of his videos are filmed at home, often with the help of his family who are in on the jokes. He develops identities and back stories for each character, and periodically releases highly-anticipated new installments in their individual sagas. The tech-savvy artist explains that while there are people who recognize the work that goes into each character and storyline, he is aware that many people assume it’s all quite easy.
“I do also believe, that there is a number of people who do not comprehend the thought that goes into my work. For example, the fact that I try to diversify my characters could be perceived as a way of me trying to gain more followers from different regions, when in fact it is simply to challenge myself as an aspiring actor. I’ll try a new dialect, and attempt to create new storylines and to be that new person. When I’m trying to explain to people all the thought that goes into my work, I try to show it to them through my commitment to my characters, and by trying to be as original as possible in my sketches. Every single word that has been said in my Vines are not derived from any other source but my head, and I believe people hopefully notice my hard work through this process of striving for originality.” He remains optimistic that there are more people out there who see the creative process at work in his videos than there are casual dismissers, adding that he thinks that there “are aspiring actors and people in the creative fields who understand that this is not just a stupid character that makes them laugh. They can tell that there is a whole creative process behind each character ranging from their names, to their mannerisms, to the way they pronounce certain words.”
Sports fil shorts ma3 hassan el coach. #HassanElCoach #putterfly #arabvines #egyvines
A video posted by Mohanad Hattab (@mohanadalhattab) on Oct 10, 2014 at 7:40am PDT
Al-Hattab’s character “Khaleh Ghusoon” is a sort of Syrian-hen mother, while character “Hassan El Coach” is a comical Egyptian TV-pseudo trainer. A popular female character of his named “Rash Rash El Mozee3a” is Rasha, a catty, pop culture commentator opining on the likes of Chris Brown, Bruno Mars, and Lady Gaga. Al-Hattab’s grand dame, Hessa, is an Emirati middle-aged mom desperately clinging to her fleeting youth. Planning to relocate to Dubai shortly, Al-Hattab spends considerable time rehearsing each skit before the final video airs via his channels, garnering almost immediate virality after each new post. “My personal favorite character would have to be ‘Ka2eban’, a dramatic girl who always gets broken up with. In reality, I hate drama; I almost always find dramatic situations and people to be absolutely hilarious. It’s the ultimate challenge -and fun- to play a character that people laugh at while that character hurts. It does sound cruel when you put it this way, but I like to think that Ka2eban will grow up and later look back at herself and laugh about her immaturity along with everybody else,” he says.
Digital companies in the know quickly wised up to Al-Hattab’s reach and influence, and he has teamed up with megabrands like Lay’s potato chips (a division of PepsiCo) and Chiclets gum (a Cadbury Adams division) after resourceful marketing people happened upon his videos. He was recently negotiating to act as an influencer for a major automotive company’s regional launch, but as the campaign goes live late November, Al-Hattab isn’t able to disclose more details.
What is a digital influencer? In brief, a digital influencer can be defined as a social media user like Al-Hattab who is able to generate traffic, user discourse, and sometimes viral activity for their content and the content of others that they share or re-share through their chosen mediums. Reach, a term often used to describe both how far an influencer’s material travels and its longevity (except on the ephemeral mediums like Snapchat), is key to measuring influencer capabilities.
A good analogy often used to describe reach to those outside of digital arenas is water waves. Those waves, and the subsequent smaller waves and ripples, explain the initial release and the eventual diffusion of user content on the Internet. How far that content goes, and how likely people are to both engage with and re-share the influencer’s content makes for tricky metrics, but it can be measured using viewer analytics and the influencer’s overall audience demographics. Influencers with broad viewer appeal like Al-Hattab can pretty much be vehicles to market anything, due to his range of audience and high penetration rate.
A fashion-oriented digital influencer might be invited to be the first to preview a fall collection, and then share exclusive images pre-mass release. A tech-influencer might be given a new smartphone, and asked to discuss device features and maybe perform an online “unboxing”, a popular tactic in reviews and promotions.
A video posted by Mohanad Hattab (@mohanadalhattab) on Oct 10, 2014 at 6:31am PDT
Who is Al-Hattab open to working with commercially? “Any product or service that is light, fun, and that has a positive energy would a perfect collaborative effort. I want my channels to be an escape from the real, harsh world that we live in, and my characters are developed to draw a smile from people. Basically, any commercials that I am allowed to incorporate into my videos in a comical form would be a good match.” Al-Hattab has yet to really apply his marketing degrees to his profile as a digital influencer, but that hasn’t stopped clever agencies from reaching out to him. He doesn’t have his numbers and metrics on-hand, and instead talks about how much he loves entertaining his fan-base.
Ultimately, he says he’d love to pursue a full-time broadcast and performing arts career, but he knows that there is still some stigma attached to that particular business in MENA. “Unfortunately, I believe that a majority of the Arab culture look down on the performing arts. We are always taught to take the safe road by becoming doctors or engineers, because that will certainly secure good fortune which will supposedly result in a happy life. We aren’t opening our minds to finding new ways of making money, and new ways of being happy. That being said, when I say Arab culture, I absolutely do not mean to include all Arabs My parents are fully supportive of my love for the performing arts. I’m sure that there are many more Arab parents that have a similar perspective on life- just not enough of them.”
A lack of obvious advertising and product promotion on Al-Hattab’s part only increases his credibility with his audience, since he so rarely promotes products and executes campaigns. Influencers as a general rule are walking a fine line, and must strategize carefully in terms of contractual promotions, lest they turn off and deter their existing audiences by appearing too commercial.
“I try to be as subtle as possible about that aspect. It can be extremely annoying pushing an advertisement into an audience who are visiting your channel to simply laugh. So I try to make sure that I hit two birds with one stone by making my audience laugh, and at the same time incorporating the brand. For example, in one of the videos I posted, I did a Christina Aguilera impersonation to encourage my followers to go and vote for me in the Lay’s chips competition.”
Like most digital influencers, Al-Hattab has his fair share of trolls, and like most many trolls, they attack everything from his appearance to his masculinity- the latter for his portrayal of female characters. This “generic hate”, as Al-Hattab refers to it, actually serves to increase influencer virality; trolls in general are acting as de facto promo vehicles by visiting mediums and revving up the discussion on digital platforms, increasing the particular channel’s relevance level. “In terms of how I deal with them, I completely do not acknowledge their existence. I never reply to any hate messages or comments, and I never delete them as well.”
His comedic mini-episodes have the potential to become full-blown TV and even movie material, and perhaps the region will soon have our own Sacha Baron Cohen… once the non-digital content producers catch on to his onscreen charisma, and his hyper-loyal following.
Lenovo Introduces Yoga Tablet 2 Pro
Ashton Kutcher is still hanging out with Lenovo product engineers and now, the products do too- hang, that is. Yoga Tablet 2 Pro features a smart kickstand that allows you to enjoy content in four ways: Hold, Stand, Tilt and Hang modes. Named for its flexibility, the Yoga tablet modes allow you to use it anywhere, and it’s packed with top-of-the-line entertainment features like an 8W JBL sound system with bass subwoofer, and a built-in projector that creates a 50-inch home theatre experience on any wall. With 32GB of storage, expandable up to 64GB via a Micro SD card, you can conveniently store all of your multimedia. How’s that for a new way to entertain at home!
Developing Nations: Why Bahrain Should Not Follow The Singapore Model
“If I have to choose one word to explain why Singapore succeeded, it is confidence.” Lee Kuan Yew
Let’s make something clear from the very start: Singapore is a successful country and a shining example of how determination, hard work and tenacity can literally transform a country from third world to first in just one generation. I am a huge fan of Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore’s founding Prime Minister. He, and the People’s Action Party (PAP), ruled the country for over 30 years. He stepped down back in 1990 but has remained active in Singaporean politics ever since. The PAP is still very much in charge, led by his son and current Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.
I read Mr. Yew’s From Third World to First, The Singapore Story during summer vacation in Germany back in 2012. I could not put the book down. I think I read the 700-page book in less than two weeks. I underlined several parts of it, and made notes in the margins. What I particularly admire about the Singapore model is that even though the odds were very much against them, they managed to build a nation. It was a small country surrounded by some hostile countries and ideologies, with no natural resources to speak of, and a racially fragmented and divided population speaking multiple languages. Yet they built a nation that is the envy of the world.
I really admire that. Mr. Yew and the PAP are not perfect by any means, but their track record speaks for itself. They delivered. What I particularly liked about Mr. Yew’s approach in building the nation was that it was based on pragmatism, not ideology- a notion I share 100%. For anyone interested in politics and development, reading Mr. Lee Kuan Yew’s book is a must. I would make it compulsory for all senior officials.
The Singapore model is so successful that many countries have tried to emulate it, or at least parts of it. One of those countries is Bahrain. If fact our very own Economic Development Board (EDB) idea was taken from Singapore. A Singaporean was even considered to run it.
So of course this begs the question, “Why shouldn’t Bahrain follow the Singapore model?” The answer is plain and simple. Singaporeans aren’t happy. In the book, the former Prime Minister acknowledges that “it will take another generation before our arts, culture, and social standards can match the First World Infrastructure we have installed.” One might argue that the price paid by everyday Singaporeans was too high. One might ask what’s the point of all this development if it does not lead to happiness?
I last visited Singapore this summer. I went with my wife and children on family vacation. This was my third visit, and each time I’m impressed with how advanced, clean and beautiful the country is. But whenever I visit a country, I make sure to speak to the locals; from taxi drivers to business people. During the trip I heard over and over again how hard, expensive and competitive life in Singapore is. I asked a friend about her thoughts on whether the PAP could continue winning elections in the future. She told me that “Lee Kuan Yew ruled with an iron fist, but he earned the people’s respect. His son has not earned it as much as his father had.” One of course should not discount the current Prime Minister’s vast experience, but it’s unfortunate that his father has such a large shadow. It covers swaths of Asia. The reason I asked my friend this question is because the PAP, though still very much in control, has been losing some seats in every round of general elections. So there may come a day when they actually find themselves out of office.
The Numbers
According to the World Happiness Report 2013, Singapore is the 30th happiest nation in the world. That’s not bad by any means, but hardly stellar considering how much the Singapore model is lauded around the world. (Incidentally, Bahrain ranks at number 79, right after Libya and before Montenegro). My contention is that a country should not pursue development and growth for their own sake. Every human being’s ultimate goal is to be happy.
So a country’s ultimate goal should be to make its citizens happy, and then develop its long-term plans based on what would make that happen.
So which countries got it right? Let’s look at the top 10 happiest nations:
1. DENMARK
2. NORWAY
3. SWITZERLAND
4. NETHERLANDS
5. SWEDEN
6. CANADA
7. FINLAND
8. AUSTRIA
9. ICELAND
10. AUSTRALIA
A developing country would do well to analyze these 10 countries, and adapt certain elements and create its own unique model. I want to emphasize this point, we cannot copy a model completely; we have to develop our own model based on our own circumstances and culture. But the ultimate goal should be kept in mind, and we should constantly ask what will make the Bahraini people happy? A cursory look at the nations in the list above reveals that they are all mature democracies with a strong regard for human rights. The top 10 list have capitalist economies with a strong socialist bent -at least the European nations and Canada do- and they aren’t driven by ideologies, instead they are driven by pragmatism. These countries have good education systems, but they do not overeducate their school children (unlike say the South Koreans, where school children routinely study 12 hours or more a day).
How Other Developed Countries of Note Scored
Just for fun, let’s look at how some relevant countries scored:
- SOUTH KOREA (41)
- JAPAN (43)
- GERMANY (26)
- CHINA (93)
- UNITED STATES (17)
Interesting, no? It’s also worth noting that South Korea has the third highest suicide rate per 100,000 people in the world. Japan is number 8. This leads me to ask if we can consider their models successful?
Happiness Should Be the Goal
The good thing about being a developing nation is that you can emulate the good in other nations. We’re the adolescents of the world, and we can decide how we want to grow up, and who we want to immolate. And I say we should emulate Denmark, Norway and Switzerland, while still keeping the Singaporean model in mind. The Singaporean experience is too valuable to ignore. What makes it particularly interesting and appealing is the speed in which development was achieved. The other countries are mature democracies which developed over centuries. Bahrain has more in common with Singapore than the European nations. The ideal would be to develop a hybrid of the different models, while keeping happiness as the ultimate goal.
Can Bahrain Achieve Happiness?
Yes, of course it can. Certainly the odds are against us when we consider the MENA region’s instability, and Bahrain is weathering the worst political and sectarian crisis in generations, and our citizens are unhappy. Despite these significant hurdles, I think we can make it. We have some of the best human capital around, and despite the pervasive unhappiness, Bahrainis of all walks of life love their country. It’s just a matter of time until we overcome the crisis, and start rebuilding our nation.
One day we might even make it to the top 10. I bet on it!
Founder Ghaith Akkad Wants To Plan Your Next Vacay With Tripzzle
“I personally never believed in the job life,” says Tripzzle co-founder Ghaith Akkad. “I believe that God created us all as entrepreneurs but due to some various situations we just tend to settle down for a job.” The Syrian ‘trep was inspired to start Tripzzle after struggling to find a nice vacation spot with friends. “We tried some known travel booking engines which typically assume that travelers know where they wish to go, that was not really practical.” Akkad moved to the UAE just five years ago, eventually starting Picasso Interactive Limited, the web design firm that is behind Tripzzle. He studied Computer Science and Software Engineering back in his native Syria.
At first Tripzzle sounds like just another booking website, but turns out it’s more than just that: It “provides travelers with highly accurate travel destination and hotel recommendations based on their passions and interests when they seek ideas about where to go and where to stay.” In a saturated market, providing recommendations based on consumer tastes is a huge bonus, which could foster them long-term success. How does it work? Akkad and his team designed and structured a ranking algorithm that he claims “is both intuitive and scientific to pinpoint various tourism destinations around the world that match travelers predefined criteria.”
Sounds like a very technical project, but I also wanted to explore the business side of things. What was setting up Tripzzle like? Akkad said it was “challenging but fun”, admitting that they nearly abandoned the whole thing halfway through. Akkad and his team “combined various databases like hotels, cities, passions and interests, weather information, average room prices, and so on. Then we needed to come up with a smart algorithm to rank more than 160,000 hotels based on a complex criteria, and return no more than a 100% almost handpicked hotels- all that should be super easy to use, and super instant.” That said, it looks like that they’ve created a visually simplistic (yet rich) online database. Here’s your daily dose of motivation, young ‘treps!
Tripzzle seems like a capital-intensive setup (and it is). Akkad says that they haven’t been involved with any angel investors as yet, so how’d they do it? Bootstrapping. Tripzzle’s team is comprised of five people active in marketing and tech spaces, and they did everything themselves. “We have all the knowledge and experience to build such a product from scratch.” That said, the folks at Tripzzle aren’t ruling out getting support from an investor if it “gains enough traction.” Understandable given the costs needed to maintain Tripzzle, including “databases, advertising, servers, and maintenance.” According to Akkad, they’re on track for ROI. “We’re still evaluating the idea actually; the numbers so far are great in terms of interested people and conversion rates at 12% to 15%, where looking up hotel details for booking is considered a successful conversion.”
At first Tripzzle sounds like just another booking website, but turns out it’s more than just that: It “provides travelers with highly accurate travel destination and hotel recommendations based on their passions and interests when they seek ideas about where to go and where to stay.” In a saturated market, providing recommendations based on consumer tastes is a huge bonus, which could foster them long-term success. How does it work? Akkad and his team designed and structured a ranking algorithm that he claims “is both intuitive and scientific to pinpoint various tourism that travelers know where they wish to go, that was not really practical.” Akkad moved to the UAE just five years ago, eventually starting Picasso Interactive Limited, the web design firm that is behind Tripzzle. He studied Computer Science startup portals spread the word as well. Makes sense. After all, in the digital age, why not fortify your social media and overall web presence?
Marketing strategy is critical when trying to penetrate a saturated market, so how is this startup approaching the game? Tripzzle is using social media to generate interest and user base by “mainly targeting travelers looking for inspiration, which is considerably an easy target, but very expensive to attract hence the competition. Social media -especially Twitter- was a great help in directly reaching out to people seeking travel ideas and hotel recommendations,” said Akkad, crediting Twitter for providing 20% of Tripzzle’s overall traffic. They’re not stopping at Twitter though; they’re working on a Facebook strategy and taking advantage of some of the tools it provides that can help generate users, like benefitting “from the power of their Graph API and friend connections which in turn means more personal recommendations.” The team is hard at work and recently “introduced a map to visualize hotel destinations. We’re also silently updating the logic behind our ranking mechanism. More exciting features are in the plan,” says Akkad confirming that they’re currently working on both mobile and tablet apps that should be available soon.
What advice he would give to aspiring ‘treps? “Learn, execute, fail, repeat.” Maybe all this effort will earn him a holiday in Barcelona next summer, his favorite vacation spot.
Norway’s New Currency Takes An Artistic Turn
No, your eyes are fine and these banknotes aren’t something out of Minecraft. Actually, it’s the new Norway currency design, set to roll out into circulation in 2017. Norges Bank, the central bank of Norway, released artistic currency motifs by two Oslo-based design firms, chosen among proposals from a competition. The designers were tasked with trying to depict the ocean in works of art as homage to the Norwegian national identity.
The front takes a more traditional approach by presenting depictions of life at sea, designed by The Metric System and Terje Tønnessen titled Norwegian Living Space. It’s a cool contrast to the pixelated colored seascapes on the back, a series called Ripple Effects by Enzo Finger. A bit of trivia? Besides the fact that the banknotes are a fusion of modern and traditional art, it has a surprise element that you’ll notice only if you look closely- the higher the values of the banknotes are, the more abstract the pixelated artworks become.
The Weird (And Sometimes Wonderful) World Of WikiHow: Crowdsourcing Online Info On Everything
This is what happens when people run amok on the Internet- portals like wikiHow come to exist, and they see serious traffic numbers. Don’t get me wrong; the concept of wikiHow is altruistic, and I acknowledge that “helping everyone on the planet learn how to do anything” is a very grand mission statement. They aren’t kidding about the “learning to do anything” part. After brainstorming the most random online searches that I could think of, I saw tips on everything from building a computer to beginner’s yoga to creating your own origami dinosaur (pictures and illustrations included). But what’s the point of wikiHow, and who has time to curate and write this stuff? Describing themselves as “a community of knowledge philanthropists”, they rely on collaborative effort to create “the world’s most helpful how-to guides”. As manifestos go, that’s not so bad.
It makes you wonder, who comes up with these tips? Since 2005, the founder, Jack Herrick, who previously built and sold eHow, is joined by a “small paid staff of full time employees” and volunteer community of writers and editors around the world. WikiHow really do value feedback and their community– it’s littered with thumbs up/down on their mobile site asking whether it’s been helpful or not, and the site regularly features a community member’s profile on the sidebar. Along the way of exploring the rabbit hole-like website, I noticed that there’s three kinds of guides.
First the useful instructions, the kind that you would Google like How To Prepare For Interview Questions Thoroughly and How To Reduce Your Carbon Footprint. Then there are those that linger between common sense and philosophical topics like How To Maintain A Positive Attitude, How To Enjoy Dating and How To Stop Thinking That Accepting Help Is A Sign Of Weakness. And finally, the bat crazy, can’t-believe-someone-actually-wrote-this category: How To Be Antisocial, How To Create A Love Altar, and How To Use A Computer Mouse— yes, these guides actually exist.
In some ways, this category can actually be useful. Miley Cyrus even Instagrammed a photo when she went to wikiHow to find out how to care for her pet pig. I suppose there’s something for everyone. There’s also a bunch of handy ones for the ‘treps: How To Buy Business Attire, How To Name Your Business, How To Start A Small Business, How To Finance Your Business, and How To Build Your Personal Brand, among others.
How is it running? WikiHow founder has taken a different approach to their business model. Just like Wikipedia, wikiHow is a wiki, which means that anyone can write or edit a page on the site. It uses a Creative Commons License to give its community the “right to fork”, meaning users have the freedom to move its content and software without the wikiHow staff. With so much faith in its community and mission, the company is running as a hybrid organization, “a for-profit company focused on achieving a social good”, supported financially by “showing optional advertising” (WikiNews). And it works, as of June 2014, it’s the 142nd most popular website in the world, with 10 language versions and over 40 million people reading wikiHow per month according to Google Analytics. You can love it, hate it, mock it, but this sharing culture-loving website is here to stay and has a special place in our hearts… and our browsers.
I tried it! #TrueStory: Cringe-worthy wikiHow adventures
Following our Editor’s instructions, I let my curiosity take over and tried out a couple of their how-to manuals and even documented a bit on my Twitter feed with #wikihowadventures.
1. How To Quit Watching TV
This 15-step guide gave tips on using free time to do something else, prompting me to read books, listen to podcasts and watch documentaries. For the most part, it worked on letting me wait out Game of Thrones episodes to enjoy a documentary called Food, Inc instead. They gave practical pointers until I had to stop at a few that included, “use the TV timer”, “keep a TV diary” and “get rid of and hide TVs.” But most of all, it was this tip that struck out the most: “Remember that television is not a requirement for living.”
2. How To Live Without A Computer
At one point of this experimental week, my laptop gave up on me and I took this opportunity to wikiHow the way to live without a laptop. It turns out I can’t because one of the firsts step is just not possible: “Change your job.” The page for it was adorned with Shutterstock-like photos throughout the 13-step guide. Guess what? It had been read 25,153 times at the time of my experiment- that is some serious net action.
3. How To Act Like A Vampire
I’m not sure what was more surprising: that such a page exists, that it takes 29 steps (with pictures!), that it had 124 editors or that it had 383,522 views. The guide makes no judgment call- whether you want to act like Dracula for a costume party or a “committed lifestyle choice”, the editors who have contributed are fine with both. From giving advice on finding “vampiric inspiration”, to tips like “Decide what kind of vampire you want to be”, “Be narcissistic” and “Work on your soul-piercing gaze”, my night was made.
4. How To Be Popular
I expected this 16-step guide with matching illustrations to reek of tips fueled by teenage angst but for the most part, it echoes celebrating one’s individuality. It gave tips such as “Be yourself– for real” and “Realize that popularity doesn’t define who you are” and came with warnings of “You might not have much time of freedom after you become popular.”
This is the Internet: Cray cray wikiHow instructions for you to try at home
Besides being a treasure trove of how-to guides, it’s also a home base for ridiculous instructions that are pretty great conversation material.
1. How To Make People Think You Are Alien Step 6: Refuse to do something that will reveal your ‘alien’ self.
2. How To Be Okay With Having A Communist Friend Step 7: Focus on the better things in your friendship. Don’t just argue about communism vs. capitalism all the time. Life is too short for that.
3. How To Be A Creepy Person Step 3: Get a stuffed animal like a cat or a doll and carry it everywhere you go, and refer to it as your “best friend”. Pet it and say things like, “Good Bessie, Good Girl,” as well as telling people not to stare at him/her because it is shy.
Ritz-Carlton Dubai’s Raul Salcido Is All About Business Bests
Over two decades of service with The Ritz- Carlton is what Raul Salcido brings to the table. After three years with the company’s San Francisco property, Salcido relocated to Dubai to oversee The Ritz-Carlton Dubai as General Manager in 2012. It’s worth mentioning that The Ritz-Carlton San Francisco is a historic property at over a century old, and a frequent part of the city’s landmark mentions in both local and international travel guides.
A graduate of Mexico’s University of Puebla, with a Master Certificate in Hospitality Management from Cornell University, Salcido joined the Ritz-Carlton team in 1993. Working his way up through the company, the GM has since participated in the launch of an impressive nine hallmark properties: “Having been in the company for 21 years and opened hotels in different parts of the world from Chile, Spain to Turkey, in 2012 I was offered this challenging role to handle The Ritz-Carlton, Dubai. With its multiple projects from renovation, hotel expansion to the full repositioning of the resort within the very competitive market of Dubai, it is indeed a unique opportunity to combine all these projects in one single setting.”
When discussing business travel, Salcido says that luxury properties first and foremost need to consider “simplicity, seamless and efficient and personalized service,” as key priorities when catering to the corporate guest. “In my personal opinion, business travelers chose to stay here because of the legendary service which The Ritz-Carlton is known for worldwide. Apart from that, our hotel offers an intimate oasis environment with advance meetings and conference facilities combined with its strategic location in close proximity to Jebel Ali Free Zone Authority (JAFZA), Media City, Internet City and the emerging Jumeirah Lakes Towers business hub.”
For those of you thinking of arranging a dining experience for your corporate evenings, Salcido recommends authentic conceptual palate-pleasers developed by their Chef de Cuisine. “One of my personal favorite dining experiences in the hotel is Blue Jade, especially with its Ginger Lotus Sea Bass dish. What makes this a standout dish, aside from the wonderful ingredients, is that Chef Ta Van, brings the heritage of this dish all the way from his grandmother’s original recipe. I also cannot miss talking about the apple crosttata, The Ritz-Carlton Riyadh lobby a dessert from our newest restaurant, Caravan, this is just irresistible.” Catering to the corporate crowd with an appetite, indeed.
Recommended By The GM
Exec Stay
“For all our business travelers, our dedicated team from Executive Reservation Service (ERS) will assist with not only for their room booking, but also in arranging flights, airport and city transfers, and restaurant bookings. We recommend them to experience a stay at our Club rooms and suites with special benefits that include an exclusive access to The Ritz-Carlton Club Lounge which offers the highest personalized service through an exclusive Club Concierge team complemented by numerous culinary presentations, and unlimited premium beverages served throughout the day. In addition to the seamless service provided in the Club Lounge, all of our GM Raul Salcido rooms starting from a Club Deluxe Room of 50 sqm, Club Junior Suite of 90 sqm to Club Executive Suite of 100 sqm are complete with latest technology including a high-speed wireless connection, working station, and a dedicated tech-savvy team to assist on any IT related requirements.”
Options
“Our Conference Concierge is a standout business value-add. Every hotel offers the latest conference facilities and technologies but for us, we do have that dedicated person to support and assist with every business traveler’s needs. The Ritz-Carlton Dubai has 10 meeting rooms which can ideally hold high-powered business meetings starting with a well-designed executive boardroom, and it’s equipped with a TV Screen and conference call facilities. The hotel also offers daylight meeting rooms, ideal as breakout rooms, as well as an expansive foyer area that serves as a networking and reception space. For more intimate discussions with business partners, the hotel features a well-designed Majlis. Our grand ballroom is the perfect venue for massive awards and conferences.”
Connectivity
“All the meetings facilities are fitted out with built-in speakers, LCD projectors and screens, high-speed Internet connection, adjustable lighting and temperature control as well as sound-proof walls. The indoor conference areas are accessed by a separate entrance, helping conference attendees’ convenient and quick access to meetings.”
Downtime
“I recommend our business travelers to just be on the beach watching the picture perfect sunset by the Arabian Gulf. Business travelers bring an important contribution to the resort’s segment mix. Thanks to the overall layout of the resort, these guests can also enjoy their time as leisure travelers, making it possible to balance both business and leisure purposes. The Ritz-Carlton Dubai is an urban oasis where you can start your morning enjoying the fantastic views of the Arabian Gulf and within minutes, you are ready for your business day in the city.”
Delice Confectionary Founder Jalel Ghayaza Goes Global
It took two things to get Jalel Ghayaza to launch the now-successful Delice Confectionery. “To me it was like a treasure,” says Ghayaza explaining that his love of Tunisian sweets was one factor. The second reason, according to the brand’s founder, was opportunity: “I noticed a big gap in the market in UAE, where chocolatier and sweet shops lacked decent packaging and quality of service.” Delice Confectionary is now a successful Dubai-based franchise operating in several countries. Ghayaza, who has a degree in Mechanical Engineering, had worked in the F&B and Horeca spaces (Iranian caviar, anyone?) for a while before starting developing his own concept back in 2004.
While the founder didn’t talk much about the business side of setting up Delice, he does point out that it wasn’t an easy experience. Ghayaza says that for the first six years, producing all of Delice’s products were just four employees clocking 16 hours a day, seven days a week. We assume that his staff has grown in significant numbers, now that Delice has numerous franchises. Two of Delice’s earliest franchises are located in Bahrain and Armenia. According to Ghayaza, both countries are gateways to bigger markets, claiming that Armenia is a “gateway to Moscow” where he believes Delice could gain real brand traction. His choice of Bahrain reflects wider- GCC ambitions, calling the small Gulf state “the gateway to KSA.” Saudi Arabia is on Ghayaza’s priority list when it comes to regional expansion, and it’s just a matter of finding the right franchisee that will do the brand justice. “We received a lot of enquiries, but taking into consideration the very upmarket positioning of our concept, selecting the right franchisees will be an important element in the success of the brand.”
Outside of the Middle East and Armenia, Delice has managed to open a branch at London’s Harrods last July- impressive to say the least. Harrods first approved Delice in October 2013, and have now positioned the Middle East brand up in their chocolate room next to some of the world’s foremost confectioners. Ghayaza boldly claims that “the six biggest chocolatiers in the world are complaining from their lack of sales” ever since Delice set up shop there. The founder also told us that as of this month, Delice will be part of the Harrods “Personal Shopping Lounge”, only accessible to the high-end department store’s shoppers who spend significant (and somewhat obscene) amounts of money.
The entrepreneur’s plans for growth don’t end there. We should expect a Delice Confectionary branch opening up in CIS- goldmine Baku, Azerbaijan this Christmas. Ghayaza has also hinted that there are “great opportunities” in New York, Miami, and Seoul in the offing, and that we can expect to hear more about those branches in early 2015. Despite having numerous franchises operational, Delice only has one center of production: the Dubai Deira City Center branch. Considering Ghayaza’s claims that they’ve centralized production in UAE for quality assurance and control purposes, I couldn’t help but wonder
if this has been the cause of many burdens that the company faces in terms of logistics. Apparently I’m wrong; Ghayaza quickly interjects that quality assurance via micromanagement is part of the brand.
“That is about Delice culture, to make things happen, to do things in 24 hours which others cannot do in two weeks.” While it seems like an easy task for neighboring Bahrain, it seems tedious and inefficient for their farther-flung outlets. Then again I’m contradicted, as Ghayaza also claims that orders from Harrods are delivered a mere 18 hours after they’ve been placed from the United Kingdom. And he’s not worried about the extra costs either adding that “the freight is not a burden, as the cost of the freight is minor to compare the cost of our luxury product.”
Delice Confectionary is one of the few but growing number of cases of franchises that are based in the UAE demonstrating outward growth. While Ghayaza says that there aren’t many brands in the UAE that franchise globally as yet, he believes that “the UAE government and rulers offered an excellent atmosphere to the investors to grow and to expand in excellent conditions.” Despite franchising globally being a highly challenging experience, Ghayaza says that it has been a positive learning journey for him. He talks about how opening in Armenia was nothing like opening at Harrods in London; while they dealt with very supportive management, they also had to deal with the huge luxury organization’s internal rules that he describes as “usually not flexible.”
On the other hand, Armenia’s small population meant that Delice’s target demographic was a very small percentage considering the number of luxury clients and purchasing power. He does point out that doing business with different cultures dictates different methodologies and brand adaptation. Setting cultural barriers and differences aside, Ghayaza said that it was also a challenge to train the franchisee teams.
Delice’s agenda for now, according to Ghayaza, is that he and his team are directing their energies on global progression in the aforementioned Saudi Arabia, Azerbaijan, Russia, in addition to the U.S. and South Korea. That said, they’re not just sticking to franchise expansions, as they do have plans for further brand development; Ghayaza admits that once Delice Confectionary reaches “maturity globally”, there will be further exploration of the brand including a “Delice cafe? concept.” The taste of success is sweet, and perhaps sooner than later we’ll be witnessing a Middle East launch of Ghayaza’s homegrown hospitality outlets.
Infographic: Electronic Spending in MENA on the Up and Up
Electronic spending is what its all about in the MENA. More and more markets are beginning to show signs of huge increases in electronic spending. Visa took a look at this, focusing on Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman and some larger markets: the UAE, KSA, and Qatar. They compared Visa card usage in the holy month of Ramadan and the Eid holiday of 2013 with 2014, and the results show some promising growth. The infographic below shows the details of the results they found, and it’s worth a look.
Startup Hashdoc Could Be Your Company’s Next Digital Resources Hub
The business world always gets a little more interesting when new ingredients are tossed in the mix. There are two things that occur to me immediately; first of all there’s crowdfunding, which has challenged conventional means of financing projects (and lately real estate), and can taking existing endeavors to a whole new level. The second is the open source movement, which is likely to have more drastic implications in the long run. I chatted with Jordanian ‘trep Tarek Koudsi, founder of Hashdoc, an open knowledge database that players in the business and entrepreneurial fields need to check out.
“I come from a technical background,” says Koudsi, “I grew up in a family of computer engineers, and I’ve been hacking code since I was eight.” The second-generation techie started a degree in Information Systems and Management from Brigham Young University in Utah, and worked in multiple sectors for 12 years. Before Hashdoc, Koudsi was involved with brokerage houses, the public sector and consulting stints with three of “The Big Four”–he’s worked with Deloitte, KPMG, and PrincewaterhouseCoopers- and he realized something that eventually led to the creation of his startup. He noticed that large consulting companies have what he calls an “internal repository of business documentaries that empowers their employees. It provides a boilerplate for deliverables on the projects that they’re working on,” noting that they enhance productivity and efficacy. But here’s the catch; Koudsi realized that tons of money has been spent on resources that can easily be found on the internet for free.
“Witnessing that over the years made me wonder why can’t there be a similar platform that’s open all over the world, where freelance consultants or boutique consulting houses can benefit from its [existence],” and according to Koudsi a “goldmine” of documents that aren’t within reach outside of the dominating companies. He immediately clarifies that he’s “not replacing consultants,” but claims that “there are a lot of boilerplates available on the net that regular marketing officers or enterprise professionals are not aware of.” Not aware? In the internet age? That’s almost like being unable to solve a basic math problem with a calculator right next to you. He cites two main reasons for this: the professionals’ lack of skills in advanced web searching, and that many (if not most) of these documents end up in the “deep web”, making them difficult to access.
That’s the problem that inspired Koudsi to create Hashdoc, and he hopes it will become a hub of a knowledge and resources that can be accessed in a simple and user friendly manner. He describes Hashdoc’s functionality and relationship to the current market eloquently: “We’re not inventing a new market, but we’re just tidying up and organizing an existing one.” What does that entail? Making these resources more accessible and available to people who aren’t part of the large consulting firms. Hashdoc is targeting three segments from across the relevant industries. The first segment, “consumers”, are described as “regular professionals”. An example of a consumer would be a marketing officer in a large enterprise trying to find resources to help them with a project. The second segment, “document publishers”, have two sub-categories: “those who are solely in the business of producing business documents,” and those that release periodical or seasonal documents, but aren’t solely document publishers. This is especially common in many marketing departments that put out reports about different consumer trends.
Koudsi mentions that many of these documents are released as infographics, which has been trending on the web for a while. And finally, Hashdoc targets freelance consultants and boutique consulting houses. He claims that they benefit by looking for resources to help them complete their tasks, and to promote their own work, meaning that Hashdoc can act as somewhat of a networking resource to find clients. Having a clear and relatively narrow target audience means that unlike similar platforms, content will be well-defined and thus more organized and easily accessible. This sets them apart from other websites that allow users to upload documents of any form. “The main difference is that we have a defined scope. And our scope is business/enterprise, meaning that you cannot put e-books or e-magazines for example.”
A quick skim of Hashdoc, and you’ll find all sorts of interesting resources that are relevant to a number of topics, from social media and consumer trends to finance, accounting, and operations management, mostly in PDF files but Excel spreadsheets and PowerPoint slideshows are on there as well. How do Koudsi and co. make sure that Hashdoc’s documents don’t go beyond their defined scope? “Technically, people will be able to upload whatever kind of document, but that depends on three things we use for curation.” Hashdoc’s staff are always on the lookout for ill-fits, and their users being able to report documents they find unnecessary or inappropriate. They also have an algorithm that “reads” the document being uploaded and detects the nature of its content. Despite my interest in the open-source movement, I always felt a bit skeptical about certain aspects of it, especially the ability of users to falsely claim ownership of content or upload without owner-permission. Koudsi says that problem was a “classic issue” and has been taken into consideration during their design phase.
“One thing we focused a lot on is having a claiming mechanism,” that allows the document owners to claim the relevant content, eventually allowing them to decide whether they’d like to remove it or not. The portal also allows users uploading documents to credit individuals or organizations that took part in creating the work.
“Hashdoc was ‘launched’ in August 2012, but I wouldn’t even call it a launch,” says Koudsi, “we just keep growing and adding more features.” There was no official announcement about Hashdoc going live, instead “we just went online with a few functions.” The founder says their growth strategy has been successful thus far, “breaking records” with more visitors engaging with its content “on a weekly basis.” They have yet to spend any money on marketing, “capitalizing on SEO and the virality of our content.”
To my surprise, the team behind the startup is minuscule. Alongside Koudsi are Software Engineer, Rand Muhtaseb, and Content Manager and Social Media Marketing Officer, Rawan Mehyar. They sometimes bring in freelancers to help with routine tasks, but they have no plans to expand the team until they secure another round of investments.
Hashdoc’s complexity required a lot of capital and resources. And Koudsi admits that they were fortunate early on: “We had one institutional investor and one angel investor [in Silicon Valley] that got on board in December 2012.” Koudsi also successfully pitched the idea of Hashdoc to Oasis500, a MENA startup accelerator program. He eventually began a strong relationship with two U.S.-based investors: angel Investor Amjad Afanah and VC Namek Zu’bi, who both understood and expressed interest in his concept and its potential. In hindsight, Koudsi regrets not injecting more capital and effort into marketing, saying that technical improvements held them back, which was a tedious task.
What about social media? “Nothing.” Nothing? “It started with someone checking out one of our documents and sharing it on Twitter.” Hashdoc is not just relevant to the Middle East, nor is it solely targeted to this region, and over “60% of our traffic and engagements come from the U.S.,” followed by the U.K., Spain, Singapore, India, and the Philippines.
Going forward, he has tons of plans in store. “The product that’s up there right now is about 50% to 60% of our vision. We’re eventually going to allow people to edit documents, revise them, request them, and that’s all on our backlog.” As a self-proclaimed “pre-revenue startup”, he’s also been looking at various options at monetizing without having to resort to ads, admitting he’s a “design freak” and that advertising ruins the overall intrinsic value and experience of the database. Two of the business models he’s looking at include the popular freemium model, where paying a fee for a premium version gives users access to more features, as well as the marketplace model, which gives options for owners to charge people for their documents. Nothing is confirmed, as Koudsi is concerned about impacting the general experience of users. He’s also hoping to convince more freelance consultants to use the site, and to upload and promote their own work.
Does he plan on reeling in Arabic documents? “We’re language agnostic. Our primary language is English, but we won’t stop anyone from uploading documents in other languages,” adds Koudsi pointing out that that there are some Spanish, Italian, German, and even a selection of Arabic documents available on the site already. Does Koudsi speak the language of the internet? Hashdoc seems to be fluent, and that’s probably why this founder’s open source ideals are a great fit for the web.