As usual, the review will cover top-50 most visited Nigerian site. While we have about 140 sites ranked this month, we shall focus on the top-50. It was big news last month has nairaland.com once again lost the number one spot to ever growing vanguardngr.com. I will say, vanguardngr.com is the top Nigerian company with a well-coordinated web strategy having being able to go to users where they are, serve them content the best way they consume and being consistent for months. vanguardngr.com first clinched second spot in January 2011 then stayed on for the following 6 months before finally overtaking nairaland.com this July.

Punchng.com, 234next.com, gtbank.com and sunnewsonline.com all retained their 3^rd, 4^th, 5^th and 6^th respectively as vconnect.com moved up a whopping 11 places to enter the top-ten caucus on the 7^th spot. Dealfish.com.ng has cemented its place on the 9^th spot having reached the spot for the first time last month.

You can view the complete ranking here.

The Movers

• myschoolcomm.com 93
• unilorin.edu.ng 40
• waecdirect.org 32
• wakanow.com 20
• gnaija.net 19

The Shakers

• latestnigerianjobs.com -21
• pmnewsnigeria.com -13
• Web4africa.net -8
• ngcareers.com -6
• jobrapido.com.ng -6

Debutants

• myschoolcomm.com 29^th
•  Thenetng.com 43^rd
• wakanow.com 47^th

Bounce Backs

A look at the sites that has once being in the top 50 but dropped and now re-entering.

• gnaija.net
• unilorin.edu.ng
• waecdirect.org

Drop Outs

• searchnigeria.net -39
• guruslodge.com -39
• nigeriabestjobs.com       -30
• mobility.com.ng -30
• zenithbank.com -19

Throughout the month of July, discussions were centred around Big Brother Amplified where a Nigerian, Karen Igho participated and won the competition. It was a milestone giving that another Nigerian also won last year. It is clear that Nigerian internet population and technology adoption helped her win the prize. Nigerian technology space is also buzzing up as Mobile Monday Nigeria held its monthly meeting which was tagged “Pitch Monday”. The event gave opportunity to tech start-ups to pitch investors present for a possible investment in their companies.

Generally, we discovered that there are no much shake ups in the top sites in the country this means that for every sites that made it to the list, they have been consistent and possibly serving their visitors and growing. I expect to see much more happen in the month of August as we count down to ending the year.

While most people still consume news contents, couple of jobs sites gained significant traction. Naijahotjobs.com cemented  it stand on the top ten and nothing less than 8 jobs sites made our top fifty in September.  Exam and academic activities also saw good moves with Neco exam being the top search amongst others.

All in all, nairaland.com remains the indisputable number one and showing growing power having displaced Wikipedia to break the jinx of remaining in the top 9 (of all sites visited by Nigerians Yahoo, Facebook and Google included). It now stands at 8^th most visited site in Nigeria, behind windows live.

Gtbank.com and sunnewsonline.com dropped 3 places but still in the top ten, as saharareporter.com entered the elite sites, nigeriagalleria.com also came back to lock it down on the tenth spot.

View this month’s table here.

Top Ten

1. nairaland.com
2. punchng.com
3. nigerianbestforum.com
4. naijahotjobs.com
5. 234next.com
6. vanguardngr.com
7. gtbank.com
8. sunnewsonline.com
9. nigeriagalleria.com
10. 10. Saharareporters.com

The Movers

• kwarapolytechnic.com +57
• goodlife.com.ng +49
• kalahari.com.ng +46
• Bellanaija.com +34
• flyaero.com +21

The Shakers

• compassnews.net -18
• nigeriang.com -12
• multilinks.com -11
• unilag.edu.ng -11
• smslive247.com -5

Debutants

• dragnetnigeria.com
• enownow.com

Rebounds

• goodlife.com.ng

Trends

The political scene is heating up; top Nigerian politicians are beginning to engage Nigerians via the internet by opening social media accounts. Leading the pack is President Jonathan followed by Fashola, Lagos state Governor. The world focused on Nigeria during the anniversary day as CNN and BBC engaged Nigerian bloggers and activist online.

Social media is beginning to set the pace of impact of the internet, given its ability to cause social and impactful change in the country. The president’s declaration on Facebook to contest the 2011 election is a case so significant that it made headline in local and international media.

We expect more spending from the politicians in the coming months and more user participation in the affairs of the country. A tech meetup has also been scheduled to take place with top Nigeria technology people willing to brainstorm on how to better use technology/internet to help the country conduct a free and fair election.

This is just the beginning…

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).

Last 2 months; September and October saw the news website had dominance of the top 10 most visited websites making up 60% and 50% respectively. The story has changed today as the top 10 now have just four news websites. Vanguardngr.com lost its second place to a debutant bbnsms.com while other new website shed points except sunnewsonline.com which maintains its 4^th place.

The Movers

Last month’s debutant 9jamovies.com is our top mover for the month; moving 30 places to stamp its presence on the Nigerian top 50 websites. Currently on the 47^th spot from 77^th last month, it sure gaining momentum. Buyright.biz is definitely the most significant mover of the month, having moved steadily to 46^th last month and a whopping 28^th places this month to stay at the 18^th spot. Buyright.biz last made top 30 in June this year but has once again rebounded. Jobberman.com the job search portal that has gained widespread attention is also a top mover this month moving 25 places to join the top 30 this month. Nigerianbulletin.com followed Jobberman.com moving 16 places to join the top 20 club. Another mover worth noting is ngcareers.com one of the debutants last month moved 15 places to 23^rd spot.

The Shakers

The casualties this month are news websites with all but sunnewsonline.com and thenationonlineng.net recorded losses in their respective ranking. The biggest shakers for the month are independentngonline.com and thepmnews.com still news websites both dropped 33 and 31 places respectively. One may really want to ask; what is wrong with the news websites? These 2 websites have dropped from the Nigerian top 50 websites. Nairalist.com also suffered drop in places, shedding 22 places to stay on the 41^st spot. Mtnonline.com and flyaero.com jointly shed 17 places to stand on the 29 and 32^nd places respectively.

The Drop-outs

These are the sites that made our top 50 last month but have lost out this month;

• independentngonline.com
• thepmnews.com
• cscsnigerialtd.com
• zain.com
• cenbank.org
• flydanaair.com
• 9jacf.net

Starting next year January, we will give you the opportunity to nominate website of the month.

Movers

Our top movers for the month is Naijaloft.com, which moved 21 places follow by Informationnigeria.org (19 places) and gtbplc.com 18 places.

Shakers

Site that dropped most places from the ranking table; 9jabook.com 12 places, independentngonline.com 8 places, and nigeriamasterweb.com 7 places. This shows that most didn’t drop too much compare to how much the movers moved.

Top ten

It is quite encouraging to see how things have changed in the last 30 days, in the top-ten last month we had 60% of the sites from the news sub-sector, but things have changed slightly this month. Gtbplc.com made the top-ten after a long spell off the circle, spending the last five months wandering up and down the table.

As usual, nairaland.com remains the no. 1 site in Nigeria but this time around followed by vanguardngr.com which replaces sunnewsonline.com that now stands on the 4^th spot. nigeriagalleria.com arrived on the top five last month and now stamping its authority by moving 2 places to the 3^rd spot, its first time ever on this spot. ngrguardiannews.com dropped a point to stand on the 5^th spot.

naijahotjobs.com failed to lift a leg from last month’s spot remaining on the 6^th spot, what’s happening to the top job hunting forum? thisdayonline.com, 234next.com both remained on the same spot they were last month, this shows steady but no increasing site hits for these two sites.

Gtbplc.com is one of our top mover for this month, climbing 18 spots to the 9^th spot as nigerianbestforum.com stands on the 10^th spot with 3 places move up the table.

Top twenty

There is no much upset from this list as most of the sites here last month also made the list excerpt for goodlife.com.ng that dropped from the top-ten to 11^th place. punchng.com continued its journey downward by dropping yet another 2 points to now stand on the 13^th spot. tribune.com.ng and nairalist.com dropped 5 places to stand on the 14^th and 19^th spots respectively as Saharareporters.com sealed the 20^th spot.

Top Thirty

Naijaecash.com is leading on the 21^st spot having gained 5 places, followed by Naijaloft.com which moved a whopping 21 places to stamp its presence on our list, currently stands on the 22 spot. Thepmnews.com retains the 30^th spot for the second time in a row as Informationnigeria.org moved 19 places to stay on the 29^th spot. Thenationonlineng.net , osundefender.org are the last newspaper websites; maintaining 25^th, 26^th and 27^th spots respectively. They seem to be the least traffic news website in Nigeria. And finally, nigeriamasterweb.com dropped 7 places to stay on 28^th spot.

Top Forty

This section has 3 debutants (internetmarketingnigeria.com, nigerianbulletin.com , smartbuyng.com) on our ranking table. It also features two Nigerian social networking sites; naijapals.com and 9jabook.com. Cscsnigerialtd.com is now at 31^st followed by arikair.com on the 32^nd. Unilorin.edu.ng (I was with the Tech guys at Unilorin earlier in the week, this is massive students registration going on, which pumped the ranking up) also made the list, standing on the 34^th spot. smartbuyng.com (36^th place) has witnessed a significant growth and displacing a top ecommerce site, buyright.biz.

Top Fifty

This list contains 2 telecoms companies’ sites, 2 banks and the central bank.  A debutant (smsdam.com 41 spot) tops the list, followed by zain.com which dropped a place. Firstbanknigeria.com, intercontinentalbankplc.com and cenbank.org maintain 43^rd, 44^th and 45^th spots respectively.

Buyright.biz has witnessed a downward trend in recent months and now stands at the 46^th spot. Etisalat.com.ng have been enjoying good reception since they started business in Nigeria in 2008, and with their recent product launch, they are surely making waves.

Nigerian sites are gaining momentum, as more sites are beginning to challenge the dominant news websites for attention more site are also being launched. This trend is expected grow bigger next year.

In my last post I discussed about what corporate strategies was and how to get started defining one. Title for today simply wants to focus on how to form a team that will deliver a fulfilling web strategy.

The Team

Snap shot of those who should be on the team;

• The CEO or COO
• The CIO or top IT personality in the organization
• Customer Support personnel
• Sales & Marketing
• External consultant (Web designs, Developer and Strategist)

That’s the ideal fulcrum of people you should make members of the team, now let’s look at their respective roles in the building process. Remember, less is better, don’t let too many people be in the team so as not to slow-down the process.

CEO or COO

The CEO is the engine room of the company, with keen understanding of the business role, the role of company in the industry and the future of the company. In case the CEO is not available, the COO or vice-president can stand in. These other people are members of the Management and will be able to voice the importance of the web project and be able to allocate resources according to the company’s budget and strategies. Even though the CEO may have an idea of the importance of the web campaign, he should further be educated by the consultant or the IT person on the strategic roles of the web. The CEO will be more concern about the ROI of this campaign hence making sure that overzealousness is curtailed in the process. I have seen in some companies in my course of consulting with clients that, some CEO may have read, heard and seen some positive effect of the web (and IT), they just want it implemented ASAP, hence given less room for thorough implementation and strategies. So, thorough briefing or education is very important.

CIO or IT Personality

In most organizations, there are separate department for IT and a figure-head in form of manager or CIO. IT personalities are generally informed to a large extent as to what is happening on the internet, the service providers, competent vendors and experience as to how to implement the web strategies. Their roles are very important so that you don’t over pay for services to be rendered by the external consultants.

I have seen some companies making the web building process a sole responsibility of the IT department to their detriment. Most IT persons don’t know rudiments about the business, and mostly placed in the support department. So they just implement the website just the way they think other people do it with the company’s operations in mind.

Customer Support Personnel

The web has evolved from just another brochure for marketing to customer service. With the advent of web 2.0 and its child social media, web sites are now responsive giving the customer service department a better way to help customers faster. The customer service personnel should be in the team to tell their story, how customers respond, which method they like to be served and the trends.

Sales & Marketing

As Newton once said “Everything remains at the staff of rest until a force is applied”, in business nothing really happens until a sale is made! The sale is what brings in the money, while the marketing is worth expose to people what you have to offer! The input of these departments is very important because it is the ultimate thing that will affect the bottom line which will make the CEO happen and every other staff members and investors.

The sales and marketing persons explains the method they have been using, how they have performed so far, what they want change, what is hot in the market and ways to make them reach the customers better. If all their comments are well taken note of and integrated into the web strategies, the success of the web campaign is inevitable.

External consultant (Web designs, Developer and Strategist)

Getting an expert in these areas is very important, if your IT department are not web savvy, you must consult an external person to help you in this process.

Talking about the web consultants, you need to understand that, the web is vast and in most cases one person doesn’t know it all. Firms generally consultant with a web designer or developer who are basically tech people and may not be able to maximize the potential of the web. Yea, well they will provide their service to your liking but I will like to add that the impact of a strategist is the void currently needed to be filled in your next web campaign (in case you don’t have one). The role of the strategist is simply to create a bridge between the business process and the web technology at hand for optimum return. This will make sure that, all efforts are geared towards serving the customer and at the same time getting good return on your expenditure.

Summary

I will summary the works of each team members as; CEO brings the business needs, challenges and focus to the ground, while the customer services & sales and marketing personnels brings the business process, customer needs and their ideas to fore, the web designer/developer create the web pages and application while web strategist link the business need with what the designer/developer is doing for effective return and monitoring.

Do you have a web team? What are they comprised of and how have they performed so far? Drop comment below…

Web4Africa.net

Founded by a top Africa blogger, Oluniyi David Ajao, a young Nigerian base in Accra, Ghana. He started the company in 2002 and since then it’s been in upward trajectory. This young man has also been profiled as one of the most influential Nigerians online here, and was present at the last barcamp Nigeria held in Lagos. Web4Africa operate both in Nigeria and Ghana serving its teeming customers across Africa and other continents.

web4africa.net has been  live for 7 years now and still competitive. I will group the company as a game changer  in the industry given their way of operation and means of payment.

Nairahost.com

Founded in 2004, by another young Nigerian based in Malaysia Kayode Muyibi popularly known as Kazey. In fact, Seun of Nairaland had to make a lot of public notice that he was not the owner or had any interest in Nairahost.com during the startup period. The site was recently rumored to have been acquired by Deolu Akinyemi of Generis Solution for $500,000, but when I got in touch with Deolu, his response was “No comment!” well am not sure he acquired it but with all indication he probably might have acquired it since he is the current CEO of the company. Both Deolu and Kazey were recently profiled as Most Influential Nigerians on the internet here.

Nairahost.com has been  live for 5 years now and still competitive. I will group the company as a game changer  in the industry given their way of operation and means of payment.

I will be reviewing more hosting companies in Nigeria next week. Keep it locked down here!

First this month in Johannesburg is BarcampJozi 10/11 October 2009, then in Douala Cameroon. Barcamp Jozi will be holding its third edition while Cameroon will be holding its inaugural barcamp on 7th of November 2009.

Startupafrica broke the news this morning.

The event is scheduled to hold at Centre of Innovation  and Learning .

Ringo (a top ISP in Cameroon) is the official sponsor of BarcampCameroon, giving it a headstart to make it happen.

Follow @barcampJozi, Follow @barcampCameroon

BarcampNigeria was held in April this year.

BarCamp is an ad-hoc gathering born from the desire for people to share and learn in an open environment. It is an intense event with discussions, demos and interaction from participants who are the main actors of the event.

Learn more about Barcamp here.

Africa is really on the move!

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.

The Movers
Nairaland.com once again affirmed its position as the most visited Nigerian site, having moved from 17th spot in April to current spot of 10th.  It lost the top spot in April to naijahotjobs.com then to punchng.com in May, June and later reclaimed it in July. 14th overall in July and 12th in August and now on the 10th spot. Both naijahotjobs.com and punchng.com have since lost their competitive edge at the top spot with heavy competition from their peers. Naijahotjobs.com is fighting it hard with careernigeria.com while punchng.com made what most web people called “archaic” decision to monetize is site content by way of subscription via scratch card. This has made it to continue its downward trends since July!
Nigeria saw its Apex bank (CBN) made heavy decision by sacking 5 CEO of Nigerian banks causing panic in the economy and making people jostle for information where ever they can lay their hands on it. The highest gainer is the newly launched media outfit 234next.com. I will call it a Media 2.0 firm in Nigeria with heavy usage of social media to reach diverse Nigerians with its hot news. Moving from 32nd in Nigeria and 138th overall last month, to 8th in Nigeria and 40th overall this month. Sunnewsonline.com also saw a massive move to stay at the 2nd spot this month (first time ever) by moving 10th places overall and 3 places in Nigeria, sending ngrguardiannews.com, naijahotjobs.com and vanguardng.com down the table.
Biggest movers

The Shakers
On the down side, we have total of 18 sites, even though some (tribune.com.ng, nairalist.com) moved from the overall but still failed to add a point at the home front. nigeriamasterweb.com leads the shakers on the table. The biggest causalities are independence news sites; this could possibly be attributed to the event happening around the country (CBN, Finance industry debacle) which made people seek for more authentic and reliable sources.
Biggest Shakers

The Newcomers
Zain.com has been inducted into the hall of top Nigerian sites this month with its debut on the table. 9jabook.com also featured here for the first time in recent months. Unilorin.edu.ng also enters for the first time marketing it the second school site after unilag.edu.ng to ever feature on our list. The ultimate regulator cenbank.org also made it; this is largely due to the list of the debtors (non-performing loans) of the “sick” banks on its website. A newly launched website; goodlife.com.ng also made it to the list.
Welcome backs
There are the sites that drop-off the table and now reenter the table; odili.net is the only website to rebound after spending a month in the Goners list.
Drop-off
Site that failed to make it to our list this month (though present last month): buyright.biz,
The Goners
Sites that has spent more than 2 months off the table;

• gsmhosting.com
• starcomms.com
• alljobsnigeria.com
• jamb.org.ng
• myjambexams.com
• jambonline.org

Around the World
Yahoo remains the most visited website in the Nigeria and the world at large, while Facebook has displaced Google at the second spot. People are going more social than searching these days! Also bloggers.com is on the 5th spot and youtube.com on the 7th spot (are Nigerians truly watching video online, with our current internet speed?) while Microsoft sites (live.com and msn.com) maintains the 8th and 9th spots. WordPress.com, Twitter.com and myspace.com maintain 31st, 32nd and 33rd respectively. While myspace.com myspace.com is dropping in the ranking list, wordpress.com and twitter.com and moving up the ladder.com
Summary
Overall, more people are getting to realize the importance of free news online. 3 of the top 5 sites are news site. The CBN action also affected the traffic for this month. Given the nature of Nairaland.com (forum), it gave people opportunity to discuss the issue thereby making them come back. The biggest gainer in this remains 234next.com while punchng.com continues to trade below its peers; we hope the management will reverse their action.