I got a couple stats regarding Eskimi, the burgeoning mobile social networking site making waves in Nigeria. It is interesting to note that, the company has as a matter of top priority stated recruit able hands for business development in the country. It was reported last month that a top consultant from Goal.com has joined the company as Business development manager.

Stats

2,200,000+ registered users in Nigeria alone.
10,000+ new users every day in Nigeria.
5M+ registered users across the world.
130,000+ unique Nigerians access the site on average per day.
They open 7,000,000+ pages and
spend more than 50 minutes on site per day.

Growing Scammers

Meanwhile, spammers are now making use of the site to lure users to part away with their money. Yesterday I received an email from a user who wanted to confirm if truly he’s won an award. The email he got directed him to make deposit to someone’s bank account to claim the award. I forwarded the message to the site’s CEO and he said they are dealing with the growing threat.

In case you receive any email claiming you have won an award, please ignore it.You can get in touch with Eskimi directly! If you receive call from person named Mark from this number, 07032832854. Kindly ignore it.

Eskimi could be called Nigeria’s Social network as Nigerians make up more than 40% of it’s users.

As the country set to enter e-commerce phase, a site that help you get best deals for your product is really needed. Enter prices.com.ng, a new startup which was launched some months ago. The site currently has thousands of products from hundreds of merchants. It covers categories from: Home Appliances, Books, computers, Phones, Games, Electronics, Clothing, Bags and other products.

A quote from the press release;

“Our aim is to help Nigerian internet users find and compare product prices from reliable shops across Nigeria. We provide concise product description and prices from multiple shops and allow users compare, then choose the one they are comfortable with. With our service, we believe we will save users the hassle of shopping around to find quality products at good prices online and offline.”

How it works

To compare prices, simply log on to the site; select the category of the product or simply use the search box to get the product you need.

It also has an alert system that sends you an SMS or email to notify you if a product price changes.

As the e-commerce in Nigeria is about to take off, this is definitely a needed startup in the country and one to watch too!

Visit: www.prices.com.ng/

Disclosure: Webtrendsng.com and prices.com.ng share investors.

What a way to start 2012! This new startup wants to help you conveniently search for and book hotels across Nigeria and Africa. The site is based in Uyo, Akwa Ibom state, Nigeria and currently has close to 300 hotels listed across Nigeria. Imagine this, you want to visit a state and don’t know which hotel to book base on informed opinion. With its user review mechanism, and Facebook verification, you can get a feel of the hotel’s service from past users.

The site was co-founded by Mark Essien, an innovative young Nigerian. The site has raised some funds to help it get off the ground, most of which have been spent on development and data acquisition. With a long term focus, it hopes to build its hotel base, help hotels take orders from a branded-android tablet app and become profitable in a couple of years time.

The hotel (and tourism as a whole) need disruption in Nigeria and I think this is a way to go. I really hope this site can get has much data has it wishes upload, then it can reach its full potential.

Check out the site here: www.hotels.com.ng

Co-creation hub’s monthly developers’ meetup to hold next week and will be anchored by Google. Google wants to share it’s plan for the developers community and how its technology can help startup launch and get revenue. They will also use the opportunity to answer questions. Will Google eat my startup (Mocality, OSM?)?

Date: 2^7th January 2012

Venue: CcHub, 6^th Floor, 294 Herbert Macaulay Way, Sabo, Yaba

Time: 5.30pm

Discussion will focus on the following:

• Google tools and APIs
• Youtube in Nigeria and opportunities in New media
• Entrepreneurial Opportunities in Nigeria with Small and Medium scale businesses using Google tools
• The Google Technology User Group
• What to expect in 2012

234next.com, closed its print business but its online business is still relevant, thanks to its coverage of the 2011 elections. It continued to see drop after shutting down offline business but still managed to finish 6^th in 2011. Thnationaonlineng.net saw the biggest move in the top-ten moving from 16^th in 2010 to 7^th in 2011,that is massive! Saharareporters.com also made it to the top-ten moving from 11^th in 2010. Forum generally is seeing drop in ranking, no wonder nigerianbestforum.com is gradually fading out. The once dearling naijahotjobs.com has drop out of the list. Nigerianbestforum.com dropped from 7^th to 9^th and tribune.com.ng finished the list on the 10^th spot.

Honourable Mentions

Top Site in 2010

The table below shows leading Nigerian sites in 2010, the table is disrupted a bit in 2011. Expect more in 2011.

I expect to see more disruption going forward, but the big question is, how long will it take for real start-ups to displace the news sites on the list?

Nigerian internet sphere moved quite well as many people continue to spend more time online and using various local and foreign sites. Vanguardngr.com sealed its place at top having stayed up since July 2011 and ending the year as Most visited Nigerian site. Nairaland.com finished second while vconnect.com leapfrogs 2 places to finished third. Gtbank’s e-banking service is not dropping as it continued to see massive growth. Jobberman.com seems to have won the battle for number one in the job category having been the top job site for some months now.

One important thing to note is that the number of news site has dropped significantly. This is true to the estimate I made in 2010 that news sites will be losing their grip on the leading sites as new web services emerge. In December 2010, 5 news sites were in top ten while 9 were in top twenty. December 2011 saw just one drop in those numbers; 4 in top ten and eight in top twenty. This number will further drop in 2012 as new interesting start-ups are launched.

Top Ten

1                     vanguardngr.com

2                     nairaland.com

3                     vconnect.com

4                     gtbank.com

5                     jobberman.com

6                     punchng.com

7                     lindaikeji.blogspot.com

8                     dealfish.com.ng

9                     Saharareporters.com

10                 sunnewsonline.com

Top Movers

• waecdirect.org  +77
• lagoshost.com  +69
• cp-africa.com  +25
• omg.com.ng +17
• naijaloaded.com +17

The Shakers

• Mocality.com.ng -12
• arikair.com -11
• naijahotjobs.com -12
• flyaero.com  -10
• notjustok.com -8

Drop Outs

• nigeriamasterweb.com                 -14
• quickteller.com -8
• 9jabook.com      -17
• myairnigeria.com             -14
• gnbo.com.ng     -22
• zenithbank.com               -17
• bbnplace.com  -21

Trends

Major internet brands are not letting go of their leadership even as emerging platforms are popping up daily. Going into 2012, more investments will be made online and as such, the battle for the top spots will be very fierce.

To view December’s ranking, please click here.

Date: 16th December 2011
Time : 6pm onwards
Venue : CcHub, 294 Herbert Macaulay Way,
Sabo, Yaba

You can register to attend here

In line with our mission, “Making it easy for customers and other businesses to find your business both online and offline” Connectnigeria.com has put together this Business fair.

A major objective of ConnectNigerias’ maiden fair is to give an advantage to Small & Medium Businesses, connecting them to people, places & information that would improve their business.

As Nigeria’s Most Innovative Information Search Portal, ConnectNigeria.com makes information easily accessible to everyone, by providing the fastest, easiest and most innovative way to find information about businesses in all commercial sectors. We are positioned to be the home of the most relevant and reliable information about Nigeria and businesses.

The Fair, first of its kind, powered by ConnectNigeria.com is a Business platform where Small & Medium Businesses connect with prospective clients. With an estimated attendance of over 1,000 guests and 20 Exhibitors cutting across all commercial sectors, it promises to be a fulfilling shopping experience.

What Vendors will get:

· Unprecedented reach to the over 1000 people that will come to the event

· Customers looking to do their Christmas shopping

· Online advertising along with the use of other social networks.

· Advertising on our Banners and Fliers for the event

· Radio advertising of the event

· Networking with industry peers

What Guests will get:

· Opportunity to shop for Christmas

· Sample items from vendors goody bags

· Valuable discounts and holiday sales

Date:December: 10: 2011

Venue: Protea Hotel, 22 Awolowo Road, Ikoyi Lagos (by the boat club)

Free admission into exhibition hall.

For more information check www.connectnigeria.com/bizfair
Enquiries can be directed to info@connectnigeria.com or call 0707-777-0000

Get a Stand or be there!

Only one news site is in the top-five and just 4 in the top-ten. This time last year it was 5 news sites that made the top-ten. If not for the last routing of thisdaylive.com, it would have been just 3 news sites like October.

Top Mover

1. bbnplace.com +95
2. jetheights.com +37
3. omg.com.ng +30
4. techloy.com +35
5. dailytrust.com.ng +27

Top Shakers

1. dragnetnigeria.com  -26
2. Informationnigeria.org -14
3. Mocality.com.ng -11
4. naijahotjobs.com -10
5. nigeriamasterweb.com -5

Trends

Major internet brands are not letting go of their leadership even as emerging platforms are popping up daily. Going into 2012, more investments will be made online and as such, the battle for the top spots will be very fierce.

To view November’s ranking, please click here.

DrupalCamp

Last Saturday, DrupalCamp was held at the hub with large turn-out, Drupal experts hared their experiences with budding Drupal users. The explained from how they made money running drual platform. Bade Adesemowo and Aniedi, were on hand to give practical tutorial on Drupal development.

Developer Parapo

On Wednesday, Developer Parapo, Monthly meetup organized by  CCHUB will take place. This edition is sponsored by Microsoft. Microsoft would enlighten developers and participants about Windows Azure, the Windows Phone, tools, the Marketplace, Application Development for the Phone, monetization, partnership with Nokia and others, and also other latest and up-and-coming trends within our Ecosystem.

Date: 30^th November 2011

Time: 5:30pm

Register here http://novdevparapo.eventbrite.com/

Mokolo Technical Workshop

Mokolo – a newly formed joint Pan-African initiative to build a web based platform for African film is running a workshop with experienced developers and programmers.

During the three-day workshop, experienced developers representing a variety of areas (including database programming, social media API development, privacy, payment integration, cross-platform mobile/web app development, front-end/middleware/back-end development, and software as a service models), will exchange ideas and work out a road map for the construction of the platform. Among the participants who come from Africa and Europe are Fua Tse from ActiveSpace, Cameroon, Emeka Okoye from Next2, Nigeria and Mokolo’s Quirin Pils from Pixelchiefs, Germany.

Date:  3^rd – 5^th December 2011

Tech-in Education Meet-up|

CcHUB through this meet-up aims to initiate discussion amongst teachers, parents, technologists and educationist to identify potential roles for technology in driving the items enumerated above. The forum will also help to accurately dimension the range of possibilities of technology interventions to enhance learning at the formative years of a child’s formal education. The outcomes of the meet up will have direct bearing on the call for ideas along the streams of possible areas where interventions are identified, leading up to our open living lab (Tech-In Education) scheduled for February 2012.

Moderator:  Mrs. Bunmi Lawson

Host: Co-creation Hub Nigeria. 6^th Floor, 294, Herbert Macaulay Way, Sabo, Yaba, Lagos

Date: Saturday 10^th of December, 2011

Time: 1:30 – 3:30pm

For enquiries and RSVP email: info@cchubnigeria.com or call Tunji Eleso; 08099242133