The utilization of Twitter by Lebanese newspapers and news portals

Since its launch in 2006, Twitter has seen tremendous growth in the Middle East and especially in Lebanon where it is increasingly being used as a tool for delivering news and stories to a Lebanese audience highly active online. It is an important part of digital marketing today.

Almost every newspaper and news portal in Lebanon is using Twitter marketing and many of them are tweeting their latest news and stories even before announcing them on TV or radio because Twitter is faster and has a strong reach.

Below is an overview of how Lebanese news sites and portals are using Twitter:

-          Annahar Newspaper has 244,000 Twitter followers which is among the highest following in the Lebanese online newspaper sector. Annahar is following 668 users and has 212,000 tweets. This newspaper joined Twitter in December 2011. Annahar tweets about politics, stories happening in the society and about celebrities’ news. A lot of pictures are used in their posts and they tweet around 20 times per hour.

-          Tayyar.org has 40,800 followers, is following 106 people and has 106,000 tweets. This online portal is tweeting 5 to 10 times per hour and the majority of their tweets are political.

-          L’Orient le Jour has 40,700 followers, is following 308 users and has 60,500 tweets. This newspaper has a low engagement on its page and all its tweets are about political news and social stories. The page directs users to l’Orient le Jour’s website through a link and the number of tweets varies from 5 to 15 per hour.

-          Lebanon Daily News has 5,186 followers, is following 2,264 people and has 21,300 tweets. This newspaper joined Twitter in February 2010 and has a directory from its account to its Facebook page and its website.

LDN posts every hour 2 or 3 text messages and photos about politics and social events.

 

Twitter has become a priority for the majority of Newspapers. Journalists are tweeting about live, spontaneous and immediate insights about people’s concerns and topics of the day. Newspapers are adopting Twitter as a channel to reach potential online users and are benefiting from the big success of this innovative microblogging platform.