Facebook users in Nigeria crosses 1 million, as African countries see growth

Internet usage in Africa is on the upward trends as social media adoption also grows. We have been following African (selected) countries on Facebook for about a year now, tracking the changes in user base. Our last review was in November, you can read that here.

Nigerians on Facebook hits 1 million, though later than we predicted it still shows that more Nigerian are login on to Facebook and millions are yet to join the train. Our last review, Nigerians on Facebook was 901,840 and now added about 127,460 under 3 months to stand at 1,029,300. A break down below;

Total: 1,029,300
Male: 654,240
Female: 342,740
18 year and above: 948,560
25 years and Above: 589,120 Male: 396,540 Female: 177,820

With the above data, Facebook penetration amongst Nigerians online stands at 9.4% showing a big room for growth over the coming months. As witness in other countries, Facebook usage has reached the mainstream, with more 30% of some countries internet population present on Facebook. About 92.1% of Nigerians on Facebook are older than 18 years as again 96% in November while 57.2% are older than 25 years, a change of 0.2% from November’s users. The younger (below 18years) are also showing progress. Facebook in Nigeria is good for business looking at the number of mature population of the users.

Around Africa

Egypt has overtaken South Africa as the largest country with Facebook users in Africa, though Facebook penetration in Egypt is much lower than south Africa, it show that there is room for more growth. For now, South Africa’s Facebook users seem to have reach climax as the growth rate is almost flattened. With the table above, Tunisia has the highest penetration up 11% from last November of 45%, given the number of internet users in Tunisia, the growth might not last for too long before it stops. Egypt, Morocco and Nigeria are the top countries in terms of Internet users and as such, we should expect growth from these countries. Morocco has just 12.4% of its internet population on Facebook while Nigeria with 9.4%. Ghana also shows a good Facebook penetration but insignificant as its internet users are still hinging below 1 million mark.

News users

The northern Africans are leading the new users sign up, with Egypt atop new users with 415,360 or 19% added, Tunisia 26%, Morocco 21% and Nigeria 14%. Facebook growth South Africa is flattening haven reached more than 50% of its internet population.

Overall, there is a massive hype around Facebook in Africa, as local social networking sites have not been able to capture the interest of their internet users.

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Most visited Nigerian sites in January 2010

Let me take you through our traditional review here, by looking at how Nigerian websites performed in January. Nairaland.com remains the unmoved table topper as punchng.com finds its feet, moving 6 places from the bottom to the fourth place on the table. I believe punchng.com management has learnt their lesson! Vanguardng.com is the second most visited Nigerian website having stayed within the top 3 for the past 5 months. This shows a consistency in policy and service delivery. Nigeriagalleria.com keeps it locked on the 3^rd sport moving 2 places from 5^th position. Punchng.com in the 4th place after making a comeback last month. If punchng.com continuous like this, it will battle it out in the 1^st and 2^nd places this February.

Sunnewsonline.com on the 5^th place shedding 2 points, naijahotjobs.com juxtapose its position with gtbank.com as they both stand on 6^th and 7^th places respectively. It’s a big comeback for 234next.com as it moved 9 places to stay on the 8^th spot after missing out on the top-ten list last in December.

Should we say the battle is too hot for ngrguardiannews.com to fight? The last time it made the top five was in October 2009; looking at its influence in the industry and print circulation, it’s expected to do same online but continuously fails, what is happening?  It has been shedding point since September last year, now stands at number 9. Nigerianbestforum.com is also flexing its muscle, moving 3 places to finish on the 10^th spot. It made the top-ten last in October 2009.

You can view the full table here for the current and historical ranking. This review covered the top fifty.

The Mover

Let’s look at the top movers for January;

• osundefender.org 20 places
• mobilitynigeria.com, nairalist.com 15 places
• 9jamovies.com, olusegunajibode.com 13 places
• 234next.com 9 places
• careersnigeria.com 8 places

234next.com has the most significant move here as the move allowed it to break into the top-ten once again. Osundefender.org is also a site to watch having rallied throughout last year. Let’s see how it will perform this year.

The Shakers

These sites could not keep-up with the heat, so they shed points;

• Naijaloft.com 22 places
• bbnplace.com, Informationnigeria.org 15 places
• naijapals.com 12 places
• smsdam.com 6 places
• bbnsms.com, goodlife.com.ng, ngcareers.com 8 places

Debutants

It’s lovely to see that Nigerian web industry is active and adding many more sites daily. A total of 7 sites debuted on our ranking list. Epaymonster.com topped the list having been able to break into the top-twenty despite its newness. Let’s see how it slugs it out with the rest. So, I will call epaymonster.com our debutant of the month.

• epaymonster.com 14
• jambutme.com 18
• smshulk.com 28
• txtoweb.com 39
• nigerianscomplain.com 40
• Bellanaija.com 49, after a long spell outside of the top-fifty, bellnaija.com was able to break in this January.
• aratext.com 50

Bounce back

Bounce back box contains sites that have made our list before but somehow, lost out and later regain thier momentum and make the list.

sturvs.com the Nigerian social bookmarking site bounced back after a protracted absent on the list. Last appeared on our ranking table in June 2009. Keeping it locked on the 36^th spot this January.

Drop outs

These sites eventually dropped out of our top-fifty Nigerian sites;

• intercontinentalbankplc.com 54,-32
• internetmarketingnigeria.com 63, 18
• kwarapolytechnic.com 69, -22
• uugobest.com 72, -24

The Nigerian web industry is very active, adding more sites daily and seeing these sites garner enough attention to making the most visited site is a big thing.

If you look at it critically, Bulk SMS sector is the most active in terms of new site and models. We will write a study of this sector soonest. It’s still very obvious that 5 in 10 Nigerians reads news online. The battle is on, are you ready for this? What’s your site address and model? Share below!

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Most Visited Nigerian Site in 2009; Analyst Report

General Recap

This report is an excerpt from our Nigerian Internet Report to be published next month. You can join the survey here for the reports to be published alongside the paper. We recently wrote an Analyst Report on Google Zeitgeist 2009 here. To view the complete ranking through 2009 you can visit our site ranking page here.

Generally, Nigerian web industry is on the rise and 2009 marked a giant leap as trends unfolded and players’ unleashed strategies to generate value from their site.

What is in this report?

We looked at the historical data of the top sites for 2009, looking at the factors that shaped the patterns. We also looked at the top sites by industry; painting a picture of browsing behaviour and wants of Nigerians. We also gave advised on the top industries and how to crack in. We discussed about the emerging industries and a possible next mover. We hope to expand this report by the time our full Nigerian Internet report is ready.

How we rank

Our ranking is based on Alexa ranking algorithm but we cache historical data to generate our reports. The cumulative ranks for each of the site over the period of 10 months is the base of the calculation that now arrived at the point base system (PSB) for this report. The sites under consideration are the ones that have featured on our ranking table for at least 3 times during the period under review. We believe this will help maintain consistency. The ranking accuracy is highly dependable as events shaping the traffic pattern reflected in the table. Also Google’s Zeitgeist was in tandem with our reports. For 2010, we have planned to integrate other mechanism for our ranking system. So stay tuned!

Download the full report here (10 Pages).

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Google Zeitgeist 2009 for Nigeria; An Analyst look

Google Zeitgeist 2009

Nigerians surfing the web showed varied interests from education and online tools to international and local musicians. Yahoo, facebook, Nokia, Google and Badoo all featured in the year’s most popular searches reflecting the growing importance of finding and sharing information online. The fastest rising searches were dominated by local requests – Zain, Aero, Gani Fawehinmi and Kwara State University – a clear indication that local content matter to Nigerians. And finally Nigerians are absolutely passionate about music as the top celebrity search list is dominated by pop stars with Obama as the only exception!

Above is the conclusion of Google for the Nigeria search pattern for 2009. Google Zeitgeist is the annual search pattern recorded by Google for each year. This year Google decided to extend it to Nigeria; this point to the fact that Nigerians’ online activity is gaining the giant’s attention. Nigeria currently has about 11 million users online.

Fastest Rising

This list represents most happenings around the internet in Nigeria. It will change significantly next year as it will be replaced by the events of Next year. Though one or two may still make the list but others will surely drop off.

1. facebook
2. zain
3. aero
4. opera
5. yahoo mail
6. mtn
7. michael jackson
8. gani fawehinmi
9. myjambexams.com
10. kwara state university

Facebook is the most significant search term for the year 2009 pointing to the importance of Facebook to Nigerian online. We recently reported that Facebook users in Nigeria crossed the 900,000 mark double the number last year. According to Alexa, Facebook is the second most visited site in Nigeria after Yahoo. With Facebook growth, it is expected get more attention next year given the number of of Nigerians on it; less than 10%.

The growth of Zain could be attributed to change in name from Celtel to Zain late last year. Taking the Nigerian telecom market by storm and phone users’ searching the internet to know more about it and what new stuff they’ve got to offer.

Aero and Airline operator in Nigeria organized promo this year, offering cheap price across its local flights and a compulsory online payment for the flight booking. Flyaero.com debuted on our top Nigerian site in July on the 17^th spot and grew steadily over the following months. It made our top ten in August with its growth and fell in September to regain itself in October. But in November it dropped 17^th places to 32^nd spot.

Opera search is also worth noting, I visited couple of Cyber Cafés this year and most of them have it installed on their systems. Some internet users also like the interface haven implemented tab-based browsing before Mozilla and Internet Explorer.

Yahoo Mail remains the most used internet program, used amongst almost all Nigerian internet users. MTN a search term people used mostly to get to mtnonline.com; MTN introduce various products and services to its product line this outgoing year and saw its site visit soar. The site ranking has dropped significantly this month from 12^th to 29^th place on the Nigerian top websites.

Michael Jackson’s death in June, shake the world, Nigeria inclusive. No surprise people went online searching for the “King of Pop” bio and Funeral procession.

Gani Fawehinmi;a top Nigerian human right activist. Also died in the outgoing year. This increased search for information about his online.

Myjambexams.com: It debuted on our Top Nigerian Websites in April on the 12^th spot which obviously is Jamb season.

Kwara state university is also a significant search term as student went online to register for its post UME exam.

Most Searched for Nigeria

It’s also good to note that Zoom Nigeria gained attention after it rebranded last year. Punch made a big blunder as to the mode of access to its news content that I believe gave guardian newspaper an edge. We also need to understand that Guardian Newspaper is one of the most trusted tabloids in the country. News remains a top activity of Nigerians online as news related searches represents 3 of the top five searches (No 2,3,and 5).

1. zoom nigeria
2. guardian newspaper nigeria
3. Time in Nigeria
4. Firs Nigeria
5. newspapers in nigeria
6. lasunigeria
7. hitv nigeria
8. first bank nigeria
9. klm nigeria
10. nigeriaworld

Most searched for Media

Osun defender really got the year started on a good note given the tussle between the incumbent governor of Osun state and the AC candidate over 2007 election. Osundefender.org debuted on our ranking list last march, since then has remained on our list. Mnetafrica’s growth could be attributed to the Big Brother Africa that started in the third quarter of the year and just Sunday. Others on the list are news site that saw significant growth during 2009.

1. osun defender
2. mnetafrica
3. the nation newspaper
4. pm news
5. daily trust newspaper
6. guardian newspaper nigeria
7. sahara reporters
8. vanguard newspaper
9. bbchausa.com
10. bbc sport football

Most Popular

Nigeria top the list, which means (as stated above) Nigerians wants something that relates to Nigeria. More people wanted something about Nigeria much more than they want to use Yahoo or Facebook or Nokia not even news. Yahoo and Facebook on the list goes to validate the Alexa ranking where both sites occupy number 1 and 2 most visited websites in Nigeria. Google is default on most browsers and people don’t search before they get to Google; they go to other sites from Google. Badoo; a social networking site also made the popular search term, this shows a good knowledge of social networking amongst Nigeria internet users. Expectedly, MySpace search has reduced and couldn’t make the list. Chelsea news shows a strong and increasing support for the popular English Premier League top club.

1. nigeria
2. yahoo
3. facebook
4. nokia
5. news
6. mail
7. google
8. badoo
9. michael jackson
10. chelsea news

Most searched for Brands

Telecom and airline companies dominate the top searched brands for 2009 with zain topping the telecoms list and aero topping the airline operators list. Firstbank also made the list having successfully undergone CBN scrutiny and refining its IT drive to serve is customers.

1. fitc
2. zain
3. aero
4. dana air
5. mtn
6. arik air
7. blackberry
8. first bank
9. dhl
10. wema bank

Most searched for Celebs

Michael Jackson death this year increase quest for information about the “King of Pop”, while that is understood, Wande Coal top other living celebrities list with his hit album “M2M” coming atop Kanye West, Rihanna and Whitney Houston.

1. michael jackson
2. wande coal
3. kanye west
4. rihanna
5. whitney houston
6. beyonce
7. chris brown
8. lil wayne
9. akon
10. barack obama

The Google Zeitgeist 2009 is consistent with our Nigerian web ranking for 2009. As Nigerian Internet population continue its growth. It could be concluded that most Nigeria comes online to do the following;

• Read News
• Socialize
• Read about Celebrities
• Search for information about their gadgets
• Make flight schedule.
• And find information about general buzz around the world.

As we look forward to next year, we expect online activities of Nigerians to grow and diversify. Local content will surely be on the rise next year as more startups are bracing up for launch next year. What do you think? Have you ever make searches about any of the item that made the list.

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Top Web Development Companies in Nigeria

I will be reviewing on this page, top web development companies in Nigeria, we would look into applications they have developed, how long they have been in the business and their general influence on the web space in Nigeria. Don’t mind if I start from the big guns, I think we should appreciate the impact they have had on the industry.

Sidmach Technologies

They developed Waeconline.org.ng, jamb.org.ng Nigeria‘s first online examination registration websites. I will say these projects opened a new chapter in the web industry in Nigeria!

Looking at Sidmach’s portfolio, they have more government related projects than Taviatech.

They have offices in Lagos, Abuja and Portharcourt.

Taviatech

“Tavia Technologies Limited is an experienced technology company offering Web, Wireless & Business Intelligence services. We have consistently provided first class services to our valued customers in the Telecommunication, Banking, Oil & Gas, Law Firms, Insurance, Real Estate, Non-Profit, Recreational, Manufacturing Industries and other sectors. “

Taviatech has been in the business for 10 years and have deployed high-end solutions including Interswitch e-payment system (website), MTN, Access Bank, FCMB, Starcomms portal and other great solutions. Their office is located at Motor ways centre in Ikeja, Lagos.

This is just the beginning as more companies will be featured here. We will also look at individual designers that are world-class from Nigeria.

Stay tuned!

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Most visited Nigeria Sites for September, Punchng.com finally drop off top 10

Welcome yet again to our monthly ranking table. We would be dissecting the movement and trends one after the other, but before that let me welcome you to our newly structured ranking format.

The new format allows you to see how the sites moved from the start of the year till current month. This helps you look at the trending and make sense of the ranking. You can view the current ranking and historical ranking here

The Elites Sites

Punchng.com, Nigeria’s premier newspaper finally dropped-off the top ten Nigerian sites. As usual Nairaland.com maintained the top spot having bounced back since July. While Punchng.com languishes on their model’s downside, other news sites have taken prominence ever since. Sunnewsonline.com seals it on the second spot for the second time in a row. While vanguardng.com, moved 3 places to displace ngrguardiannews.com.

Naijahotjobs.com dropped 2 places to stay at 6^th position, what is happening to Naijahotjobs.com? Well the recruitment industry has witnessed a boom with new entrant coming into the industry. Jobberman.com recently launched a job search platform and has since garnered considerable hits. 234next.com also confirmed its presence in the top 10 sites by remaining on the 8^th spot for the second month in a row. Goodlife.com.ng a debutant last month rally surprisingly to join the Elites club, with a rally of 15 places, it indeed shows sign of seriousness.

Overall, 60% or 6 of the top 10 sites are news site, while 2 forum sites and 2 portal site makes up the remaining top 10 for this month.

Nigeriamasterweb.com rally back up to the top 21, after drop by 14^th places last month. Flyaero.com dropped 6^th place from the top 10 of last month.

The Movers

Goodlife.com.ng is our top mover for the month, moving 15 places while nigeriamasterweb.com is second top mover with 14 places move. Thepmnews.com comes third, moved 4 places to stay at 30^th spot.

The Shakers

Cscsnigerialtd.com is the biggest shaker for the month dropping a whopping 26 places, followed by zain.com which dropped 19 places and odili.net which also dropped 14 places.

Worldwide

Yahoo remains the most visited website in Nigeria followed by Facebook then Google. While Blogger.com is gaining momentum, this buttress the fact that, worldwide rave of blogging is also finding its feet in Nigeria. Youtube.com and also are forces to recon with on the space. Microsoft websites (live.com and msn.com 6^th and 9^th respectively) are also not left out, though dropped so many places in recent times. Twitter.com and wordpress.com also remained solid on the hit grab from Nigeria.

Summary

News website remains the top hit grabber followed by forum and portal. Various events happening around the country contributed to the hit being generated by these sites. Whilst newly launched sites are finding their ways into the ranking table, more sites are beginning to generate considerable hits to get them on the table.

Note: this ranking is based on Alexa ranking.

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Analyst Report

With our intelligent research on the Nigeria internet sphere, we compile report to bring to your knowledge the business behind the buzz. How trends on the internet can affect your business and how you can plan according to better manage your business.

We provide mostly Nigeria website ranking, we will expand this to include strategies, spending pattern, users’ habit and investment on the internet market in Nigeria. This we believe will prepare you for the challenge of the emerging Nigerian market!

With our monthly, quarter and yearly “Nigeria Internet Report” you can be sure that we will deliver on our promise.

You can subscribe here to receive our report in your mail box.

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