For any company to sell successfully, it must target specific consumer segments. This partitioning shapes how marketers design products and services, set prices, strategically position offerings and develop promotional strategies. Conventionally, segmentation is based on geography, demographics, psychographics and consumer behavior. This year, marketers should revisit long-standing segmentation criteria and processes. “2026 isn’t the year segmentation suddenly becomes important,” said Richard Walker of Mustard Market Research. “It’s the year when the gap between static audience models and real-world behavior becomes too wide to ignore.” Widening the gap is “artificial intelligence (AI) and automation … accelerating faster than most audience strategies…
Author: Tamer Hafez
Being perceived as the definitive choice in a product or service category has long been the ultimate goal of many companies. “In an increasingly competitive market, developing a valuable brand is what makes you memorable, helps build trust and sets you apart from the competition,” said Huddle Creative, a branding consultancy, in September. Branding “is not just a logo or a catchy tagline; it’s the entire experience people have with your work, your values, and your vision,” Huddle Creative stressed. “It helps build a loyal community [that] resonates with what you stand for. This connection can transform casual followers into…
This year and next, Egypt’s GDP growth should match and surpass its record highs. According to the IMF, the country’s economy will grow 4.7% in fiscal year (FY) 2025/2026, matching the pre-2008 global financial crisis all-time high. For FY 2026/2027, GDP should rise 5.4%, a new record. Such unprecedented growth inevitably “requires more resources, raw materials, energy and water, generating more waste,” according to the Pollution Sustainability Directory (PSD), a research platform. “Many of our current production processes are linear, following a ‘take-make-dispose’ model that extracts resources, transforms them into products and then discards them after use,” PSD noted. For Egypt to sustain such a…
For online advertisers, securing the lowest cost-per-click (CPC), cost-per-thousand impressions (CPM), and cost-per-lead (CPL) is paramount. However, the “lowest costs” are rising quickly. Google, which accounted for 90% of search traffic in December, according to data aggregator Statcounter GlobalStats, saw its “average CPC across industries jump 12.9% year over year [throughout] 2025,” noted Mktg, a developer of marketing systems, in September. “Over the past three years, CPCs have risen nearly 40%, while conversion rates improved only 7.5%.” Set by the advertising platform, the cost of posting an ad online is non-negotiable. To cut costs, companies are turning to technology to…
Born into a world where the internet and social media are integral to daily life, Gen Z (ages 14 to 29) responds to marketing strategies differently than millennials (ages 30 to 45), who encountered the internet as adults. “Millennials chose conventional [career] paths, starting with internships, getting a job, then growing to be an executive or business owner,” Ahmed Shawkat, co-founder of Shababco, a platform promoting local entrepreneurs under 30, told AmCham Egypt members in February 2025. Gen Z entrepreneurs “follow their passion, using the internet and social media to build their careers,” he noted. “Social media platforms changed how…
For Egypt, securing funding for environmental (green) projects is a priority. “Sustainable finance is a powerful tool that can be used to create balanced economic growth through transforming current threats into opportunities,” the Central Bank (CBE) said on its website. That should make the annual U.N. Conference of the Parties (COP) meeting crucial for Egypt. “COP plays a pivotal role in mobilizing climate finance … encouraging developed countries to fulfill their commitments to support developing nations in their climate efforts,” said Prasad Gollakota, chief content and operating officer at xUnlocked, a climate consultancy. However, at this year’s COP30 in November,…
Since 1977, the U.S. Federal Reserve (Fed) has used interest rates to achieve two primary targets. The first is to achieve “maximum employment,” which requires a rapidly growing GDP (low interest rate). The second is to “stabilize prices,” which calls for low GDP growth (relatively high rates). A third, lesser-known goal is to maintain a “moderate long-term interest rate” to limit changes. Starting in May, balancing these targets could become lower priorities, as the Fed will have a new chair appointed by President Donald Trump. “A new Fed chair aligned with Trump’s views might compromise the Fed’s independence,” Etf.com, an investment platform, said…
Egypt and the EU have long had strong economic ties, supported by the EU-Egypt Association Agreement signed in 2004. The free trade pact eliminates tariffs on industrial and agricultural products, among other provisions. In 2010, both sides signed another deal that further facilitated the entry of agricultural, processed agricultural, and fisheries products into Europe. “In 2024, the EU was Egypt’s largest trading partner, accounting for 22% of Egypt’s total trade,” the EU Central Bank (ECB) said on its Egypt facts and figures webpage. “The EU was also the leading destination for Egyptian exports (26.5% of the total) and the largest source of Egyptian imports (19.9% of…
For most companies, increasing profits and decreasing costs are the dream outcome at the end of every quarter, which typically requires relying on top performers to work harder for longer. And that is likely to lead to burnout. In the Burnout Report 2025 survey, published by Mental Health UK, more than a third of respondents said they are “experiencing high or extreme levels of pressure or stress.” Meanwhile, 91% said they felt pressure or stress at some point in 2024. Meanwhile, employees feeling burned out aren’t taking enough vacation time. “When you’re working hard to achieve your career goals, taking…
Research firm Accenture, IBM, Amazon, Microsoft, courier service UPS, Google, Ikea, U.S. software company Salesforce, and language-learning app Duolingo share one thing: They all laid off hundreds or thousands of employees, saying artificial intelligence (AI) would now perform their jobs. “The fear of AI job replacement is very real, with many companies in 2025 openly admitting that the tech is eliminating jobs,” Isobel O’Sullivan, senior writer at Tech.co, a news and research platform, reported in October. For employees to retain their jobs and advance in this increasingly AI-dominated world, they need the right character traits to leverage AI power, handle…