Page 32 - Gulf Marketing Review

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UTILISING BOTH OFFLINE AND ONLINE
PLATFORMS WILL BE A CHALLENGE

Rob Gorton, -QRNO -WUUNZLRJT 9O LNZ 7JTTOWZ\QN@WZTM LWU

In 2017, the region saw an increasing momentum indirect yet still influential form, where
in the growth of its e-commerce sector, assisted users can chose to pull information they
by marketers embracing existing and new are seeking, rather than traditional means
advertising mediums. Traditional marketing where advertising messages are pushed to As the e-commerce sector continues to
such as radio remains extremely important to the target audience. flourish, the challenges in 2018 will be to
reach large sectors of the population. With a focus on the e-commerce retail shopping utilise both the offline and online platforms
Increasingly, social media platforms, such sector in which MallfortheWorld.com operates available to most effectively reach and influence
as Facebook, are enabling marketers to target with its app and website providing access target audiences.
specific demographics and interests, and we to shop on 150+ US retailers, we anticipated One such opportunity to reach a specific
are also seeing the increasing importance of that, in 2017, the sector would gain increasing demographic is that of the increasing online
Instagram. Instagram is becoming ever more momentum and, alongside that, we would social influencers, who are often localised
popular and is providing a powerful platform see a greater volume of related marketing. to a region, although many have growing
for brands to reach target audiences in a more These expectations were, to a large extent, met. international followings.

32 I GULF MARKETING REVIEW I DECEMBER 2017/FEBRUARY 2018