How to make sure that Online Marketing works in Bahrain?

To be seen or to be heard, is what every brand out there is trying to do. With so many brands out there fighting for the same consumer crowd, the idea of marketing boils down to just two things:

a. Making sure you reach the maximum number of people.
b. Making sure the right brand message is conveyed.

The online marketing in Bahrain is in the maturing stage. The online audience is a mix of very savvy youngsters and internet lovers alongwith a vast majority of people who are just learning the ropes. The common thing that they all share though, is Curiosity.

For a market like Bahrain, the most effective thing to be done is to tickle this inherent curiosity, to gain results.

Though there are a thousand reasons supporting online marketing, to help understand the Bahrain scenario it is much better to describe the reasons why most online marketing campaigns fail:

1. "Step-child" treatment:
I think that this is the primary reason why online marketing campaigns do not take off here. The marketers give the online audience only secondary priority. The entire marketing campaign of 95% of the brands in the region are concentrated around louder, brasher, glossier ads in the same set of half a dozen offline magazines/newspapers. The marketers do not give the importance or spend the time and effort needed to identify the right online avenues and to utilize these avenues suitably.

2. Online and Offline marketing messages are not synchronized:
When a brand comes out with a new product, the offline and online campaign should be synchronized. The brand image, the product details, the creatives, the captions and the overall message should be in-line with each other. The online and offline ads should work together, to gain more brand recognition or product awareness.
One product campaign that had a really well synchronized campaign was the KFH (Bahrain) Baytik Ijara Card - www.baytikijara.com

3. Offline visuals and creative formats DO NOT work online!
Marketers MUST understand that the offline creatives cannot be just put on a website and hope that your online campaign will be a success. The online viewing experience is totally different from the offline. Also, online users have a much shorter attention span - hence a magazine or other offline advertisement creative cannot be directly transplanted on to your online campaign.
The marketer must ensure that separate creatives that meet the web-standards are created for their online campaign. The message on these creatives must be same as the lamposts and billboards; however the size, layout, language and the call to action on the online advertisement must be customized to gain the attention of the online audience.

4. Improper budget planning
On an average, a full page advertisement in a newspaper will cost BD1000. This will reach out to about 10,000 people (on a good day) and we can expect about 7000 people to remember your advertisement.
A well designed, professional website, that is tailor made to your target audience preferences, updated with the latest information about your product, your stores and your promotional offers, can gain a minimum of 10,000 visits a month from Bahrain alone. This website will be live for years and is a much more efficient customer conversion tool.
When a marketer is not willing to utilize the power of the web, by suggesting budget concerns, it is clearly a case of being penny-wise, pound-foolish.

5. Lack of follow-up and tracking of the returns from the website/online campaign
Once the online campaign has gone live, it is essential to follow-up on the results of the campaign. Unlike an offline campaign, in an online campaign you can always track the number of viewers, number of clicks, the regions of the world from where the interest has been generated and more. It is essential to track the success/interest generated by the campaign, on a weekly or daily (if necessary) basis. This will help you clearly understand how to improve the campaign as time passes and analyze the ROI - return on investment - on the campaign.


Keeping a few of these basics in mind when planning your next online campaign, will definitely help you create a good online presence for your brand.