Bayt.com, the Middle East’s leading career site, has partnered with Souktel to launch a new SMS service for young professionals across Egypt. The service, linked directly to Bayt.com’s popular “Specialties” platform, lets job-seekers and working Egyptians get advice from peers and experts in a wide range of sectors. Through the new SMS service, mobile users can ask questions via text message, and receive real-time answers directly on their phone.
The new service addresses the growing demand in Egypt for personalized job advice–especially among the majority of professionals who only own basic handsets: A March 2014 Ipsos poll found that only 6% of Egyptians have smartphones, despite a national mobile penetration rate of over 100 percent. The new service ensures that non-smartphone users have the same access to content as their peers who own data-enabled devices or computers.
Using the service, a marketing professional might ask a question about “product differentiation strategies”, or a new engineering grad might ask for advice on landing a first job–by texting to a 4-digit hotline that’s accessible from any mobile network in Egypt. The questions are immediately posted to Bayt.com “Specialties”, where they can be seen and answered by over 18 million professionals registered on the site. Answers are sent back via SMS in real time, eliminating the need for web access.
Omar Tahboub, VP of Product for Bayt.com said: “We are excited about the launch of the Bayt.com Specialties SMS service, and the possibilities it brings for professionals in Egypt to ask questions and receive answersin a timely and organized manner. We hope that this service will take us another step in the direction of empowering professionals in the Middle East.”
Yazeed Sheqem, Souktel’s Middle East/North Africa Business Development Director, added: “The launch of this service creates incredible opportunities for the millions of Egyptians who don’t have regular computer access. The Specialties SMS service gives young professionals a chance to interact with a community of peers and mentors–right from their mobile, without needing the Internet. Souktel is honored to partner with Bayt.com on this initiative”.
Bayt.com is the leading career site in the Middle East, offering a complete range of end-to-end employment solutions and career planning tools. Founded in 2000, Bayt.com is fully functional in English, Arabic and French, and offers the fastest and most cost-efficient methods for employers to find quality candidates, and for job seekers to find top jobs, in the Middle East and North Africa. With over 18 million professionals and over 40,000 leading organizations using Bayt.com’s recruitment platform, Bayt.com is today the single largest marketplace of professionals and companies in the region.
