Mind Soup

Over the years, as an official Meta trainer and through programs for Google, the British Council, the United Nations, the European Union, JCI, universities, and many others, I've trained more than 25,000 people in marketing and digital skills. That's a lot of rooms, a lot of workshops, a lot of watching the moment when something clicks for someone and the more common moment when it doesn't. Along the way I've formed some strong opinions about how marketers actually learn, as opposed to how we usually try to teach them. Most of what I believed at the start turned out to be wrong. Information is not the bottleneck When I started, I assumed my job was to transfer information. The learner didn't know how paid social worked; I knew; I would explain it clearly; now they'd know. Teaching as download. This is almost entirely wrong, and the internet proves it. Every technical fact I could teach in a workshop is available for free online, in more detail, at any hour. I...

JCI Beirut hosted me on Wednesday March 2, 2016 to conduct a hands-on training about Social Media Strategy at Berytech Beirut Digital District. In this workshop, where more than 50 people from different backgrounds (students, fresh graduates and professionals) attended, I explained how to create a social media strategy for business. The points discussed included examples of brands that do not have a proper strategy, defining social media goals, the sales cycle, asset mapping, defining the audience and creating personas, choosing channels, voice & tone, posting frequency & time, crisis management, and understanding Facebook's algorithm. The session was followed by a Q&A session. I was really overwhelmed by the positive feedback from the attendees after the session especially that several ha said that they learned so many new things that they have not learned when they took expensive workshops or companies. It had been almost two years since I had given a public so...

I was invited to speak at the 4th Arabian Social Media Forum in Kuwait last week. I spoke about some case studies that reflected the state of social media in the Middle East. In my presentation, I discussed successful campaigns from Lebanon, UAE, KSA, Jordan and Egypt. I have also included examples of bad conduct from brands and celebrities on social media, in addition to examples of really bad (ugly) examples of social media customer service from Lebanon and Kuwait. Some key takeaways from the presentation: A simple campaign can go viral for a long time if implemented properly. (# MyDubai ) Negative content spreads much faster than positive content. Campaigns that use negative content in a smart way can take advantage of this with a smaller advertising budget. (Ugliest Couch campaign) You must know and study your demographic before you launch an online campaign. (Samsung Levant's Secret Valentine) With a small budget, small businesses can hugely increase their sales wh...

Linkedin is the premiere social network for business, yet most people do not know how to use it effectively. Cloud961 Magazine's Editor in Chief, Mohammad Hijazi, will be giving a seminar for entrepreneurs and potential entrepreneurs about using Linkedin to promote their start-ups, find investors, partners and employees and build a solid connection base. This seminar is part of Global Entrepreneurship week that is taking place on November 17-23 and is FREE OF CHARGE . Date: November 20, 2014 Time: 6:00pm - 8:00pm Location: Coworking +961, Sursock Palace ( View Map ) Get your ticket on ihjoz now before they run out again! About Mohammad Hijazi Mohammad Hijazi runs the Online Collaborative, a non-profit initiative that aims to promote awareness about technology and social media, and is the organizing entity of The Social Media Awards which took place last year in Beirut and launching in several Arab countries this year. In addition, he is the Editor in Chief of Cloud...

“There is no room for mistakes, the competition is severe. The right image has to go with the right text.” Deema Saidi studied Marketing at the Lebanese American University (LAU). With a committed passion for the arts and everything glamorous, she had the chance to work for prestigious, well-established companies such as Elie Saab, Oscar De La Renta, Missoni, Diane von Furstenberg, Y3, and Furla. Armed with experience in social media for fashion and hospitality, she now resides in the UAE where she works as a luxury and PR marketer. In this interview, I discuss with Deema the state of online fashion marketing in the Middle East. What is the biggest challenge, in your opinion, when managing fashion social media accounts? Fashion social media accounts have a lot of challenges, just like any other product or service you have to make sure that you are consistent with the voice, the brand image and the quality. As you may know, fashion is a form of aesthetics and maintaining the ima...

The two most discussed topics on social media have to be food and fashion. In October, Cloud961 dedicated a whole issue to food on social media platforms, and it was about time that we discussed fashion. In Lebanon’s blogging scene, fashion and lifestyle blogs are the most evolved, most active and most numerous in comparison to other types. Fashion bloggers have different styles as well, some covering professional fashion shows and designers, others creating their own styles with weekly photo-shoots and styling tutorials. A few have even created their own YouTube channels, which constitute the earliest form of consistent v-logging in the country. To keep up with this thriving fashion community, fashion brands and designers had to go online to benefit from the social spotlight. When we were brainstorming for a cover idea, I asked my team about ideas for the first cover shoot. While some suggested local and upcoming fashion designers, the vast majority agreed on Roula Nahas as...

Online Collaborative celebrates its 3 rd year anniversary with the support of Converse’s global ‘Get Loud’ movement as they take to the streets of the city Beirut, November 2013 - Online Collaborative, the student initiative bringing together online influencers in Lebanon, celebrated its 3 rd year anniversary in style, taking part in Converse’s global ‘Get Loud’ Movement.  The movement took over the country’s digital platform, through the hype created on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. Through a series of events in Beirut, a number of the Lebanese youth were brought together and engaged in activities including street art, walking photo booths, and a rocking party until dawn.  Young uprising talents took to the streets of Hamra where they expressed themselves and got loud with their street art. Spectators around the area got excited and contributed to the drawings while the music rocked in the background. Meanwhile, sneakers got even louder in other areas of ...

I was honored to be interviewed on Future TV's English News last week. Check out the video below where I talk about the state of social media in the Arab World , the Lebanese online community, the Social Media Awards and University for Seniors . I'm also very humbled to have been called The Social Media Consultant of Lebanon. Thank you Youmna for the superb interview! For more information about what I do, you can connect  with me on Linkedin.