Born Digital! The Rise and Thrive of Digital Media Outlets

Often do we hear about newly-emerging traditional media outlets? The answer is simple, rarely! Now, most media outlets that we hear about these days were born digitally. It's high time that we gave credit to social media platforms and their fancy online features for creating a broad space for news media platforms to emerge, grow and reach audiences with different interests.

The goal of this newsletter is to bring digitally-born media outlets to light. Egyptian Streets and Cairo Scene will be the main focus of this issue.

This issue will measure how well these two platforms are doing by examining their topics of interest and assessing their content creation and distribution style, as well as their monetization models.

To begin with, Egyptian Streets is an Egyptian outlet that crafts "news, society, culture, arts, politics, technology, travel, and other 'stories that matter' related to Egypt and the Middle East" in English. It is spread across five social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, and Twitter.

First, Egyptian Streets Website

Egyptian Streets also has its website where it publishes its stories. On top, it has a Politics and Society Section, in which readers can find 'Local and International news' and 'Features' relevant to this section's scope, as well as a Photos sub-section.

There are also the Opinion, Arts and Culture, Business and Technology, Travel, and Buzz sections?

What's interesting about Egyptian Streets is that most of its stories show the human side, and hence, appeal to our emotions as readers. To put it differently, while many outlets, especially in Egypt, race toward news coverage to write update-me pieces, Egyptian Streets set its compass toward a different path that triggers one's emotions. The outlet mostly publishes inspire, divert, educate, and give-me-perspective type of stories, while ensuring that each story is visual enough by using videos and pictures to keep readers hooked!

To make sure that each post earns well circulation across different social media platforms, Egyptian Streets has laid the three main social media icons of Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter on each post without even viewing the post from the inside. So, as you hover over each post on the website, you're always alerted by the outlet to share the post on your social media pages, as illustrated below.

As for the website user experience, the colors are cohesive and eye-catching. You can see multiple sections on top of the page, and as you scroll down you can see the latest news stories on the homepage, which are also laid out in a well-fashioned/organized manner.

Finally, with regards to the monetization model, reluctantly, the website does not seem to have many monetization models. It mainly relies on advertisements in generating revenues. Egyptian Streets also has a donation account to raise funds for its business.

Egyptian Streets on Social Media

A- Facebook

Egyptian Streets has around 360000 likes and 400000 followers on Facebook. The media outlet provides a clear description of itself and other social media links it has in the About section. As for the sections in the header, Egyptian Streets highlighted videos as one of its main visual contributions and even directed readers to the newsletter sign-up under the More section.

On Facebook, text presides over videos in terms of content. Egyptian Streets is frequently, and almost daily, posting articles on its Facebook page. Yet, it publishes videos every week, a maximum of twice a week. Regardless, the content is catchy in terms of text and visuals, especially videos, even though they sometimes get as long as 5 minutes. Also, Egyptian Streets does not publish as many videos as articles on Facebook, making the page very similar to the website. Regardless, its videos on Facebook capture thousands of views, comments, and reactions.

Finally, it is worth noting that on Facebook, Egyptian Streets uses the feature of Instant Articles to provide a mobile, user-friendly experience to its followers. This feature allows readers to smoothly navigate website-like content on their mobile phones.

B- Instagram

So far, Egyptian Streets has published almost 1,300 posts and 10 interactive highlight series (stories). Also, it has around 62k followers.

It also has identified its purpose in the header and associated its most popular/used hashtag #StoriesThatMatter with a link under it to direct users to its donations website at

Its audio-visual content on Instagram usually gains thousands of reactions, and as for narrative posts, they get hundreds of likes and sometimes thousands. Both photos and audio-visuals are very appealing with the yellow/white palette color presiding over the text attached to the visuals. Each post has relevant hashtags to increase its visibility and outreach. Videos are also shot vertically to suit the viewing nature of Instagram and the mobile view mode in general.

C- TikTok

While this app in specific can be perceived as similar to Instagram in terms of audio-visual content taking up the whole space on a cellphone or laptop, this app allows users to do lip-sync videos. Cleverly, Egyptian Streets used this feature on TikTok to create videos where Nour, Egyptian Streets' main admin and representative on the platform, lipsyncs different influencers discussing important topics, such as breast cancer, but in a fun, light way.

Egyptian Streets has almost 18k followers on TikTok, less than those on Facebook and Instagram. Yet, its highly-interactive posts reach thousands of users, exceeding those on Facebook and Instagram. It also uses hashtags with every video and applies its main color palette to every post.

Finally, the young and aspiring media outlet replies to its fans' comments on the platform, hence increasing engagement with the content and boosting its viewership and outreach. However, Egyptian Streets does not post on its TikToq as frequently as it does on its other socials.

D- Twitter

Egyptian Streets uses Twitter on almost a daily basis, republishing articles from its website with clear, cconcise minimal text in the tweet body itself. Tweets obtain a moderate level of engagement, and the account has around 44k Twitter users. The outlet, however, does not use hashtags in several, if not all, of its posts. Most of the organization's tweets contain links to update, inspire, and give-me perspective articles.

Finally, the media outlet does not solely rely on content creation but also on curation by retweeting posts relevant to its content/topics of interest. It also sometimes creates threads for people to tap in and follow up on a certain story. It does not, however, upload many videos to Twitter as it does with its other socials.

2- Cairo Scene

Cairo Scene is the first online magazine in Egypt that investigates controversy and conversations since its relaunch in 2013. It tackles different topics including culture, fashion and lifestyle, business, and politics.

Cairo Scene's Website

Cairo Scene has a well-defined and appealing website layout, with many sections to tap into and learn more about different topics, including business, politics, lifestyle, and culture.

The website provides an interesting user experience: on the homepage, you can see an image slider highlighting the hottest news taking place in Egypt and globally. You can also see on the top right a box with four categories, Latest, Likes, Hits, and Recommended. A user can click on any of those icons and see what's breaking and trending. Social media icons are also visible - put on top of the web page - for readers to circulate content on their socials.

Lastly, regarding business monetization, Cairo Scene relies heavily on advertisements to generate revenues. Unlike Egyptian Streets, the outlet does not spread out advertisements in the middle of an article; instead, it puts them on the right margin of the page, hence less diversion for readers.

Cairo Scene on Social Media

A- Facebook

Cairo Scene, like Egyptian Streets, has a clear, appealing layout on Facebook with a clear, concise introduction to its identify and purpose in the About section. Unlike Egyptian Streets, however, Cairo Scene has not referenced links to its other socials, such as Twitter and Instagram, in the About section.

In my humble opinion, this could work to the disadvantage of the Cairo Scene, as it shouldn't rely on a social media user's curiosity to excavate for the other social platforms on their own. Ipso facto, Cairo Scene's other socials will remain unknown for Facebook users/followers.

Regardless, in the More section, Cairo Scene has used Facebook to publicize other features such as Scene TV, in which you can find the latest and most exclusive interviews and impact/success stories of public figures and celebritiesties in Egypt and the Middle East.

In the Video section, you can also find around 10 playlists, each playlist highlighting a certain topic, including Scene Humans, focusing on inspire-me pieces, and Explore Egypt, providing divert, amuse, and educate-me pieces.

As for the home page, you can see tons of posts as you scroll, highlighting different issues, political, social, and economic, amongst others. Cairo Scene does not reshare articles from its website. Instead, it treats Facebook as an independent platform from its website and writes the narrative of each story from A to Z on Facebook.

Followers of Cairo Scene on Facebook are around 460k, moderately engaged with the platform in terms of reacting to, commenting on, and sharing the outlet's content. Posts can get up to 1k likes, which is moderate compared to the platform's number of followers.

B- Instagram

Cairo Scene has an eye-catching layout on Instagram, with its unified blue, white, and black color palette. Cairo Scene's Instagram has a clear objective laid out in the page header. Also, in the header, followers can find the link to download the , Cairo Scene app.

However, there isn't a ubiquitous hashtag that Cairo Scene uses with every post, unlike Egyptian Streets and its hashtag #StoriesThatMatter, which has been even proclaimed in the header section. Instead, Cairo Scene uses several hashtags depending on the kind of post it's publishing. For example, if it is a news piece, then Cairo Scene associates it with the hashtag #SceneNews, andif it is a fashion-relevant post, then it's #SceneStyle

Below the header, followers can find several well-defined and interactive story highlights to view, engage with, and learn more about the outlet's purpose and work. Also, similar to video playlists on Facebook, Cairo Scene has used the story highlight feature to display "light" topics of interest, including Scene Loves, Buzz, and Culture & Fashion. I think this is a smart tactic to devoting a platform such as Instagram, a youth-captivating outlet, to tackle interesting topics or issues for young people.

Cairo Scene's Instagram fanbase is almost 530k followers. It publishes almost every day about current issues and ongoing projects happening in Egypt and the Middle East. Posts, especially videos, on Instagram have higher engagement than on Facebook

C- Twitter

Cairo Scene's Twitter is, more or less, a copycat of Instagram in terms of posting less text and more photos. However, the outlet has not published as many videos or done some curation - retweeting posts from external sources related to the outlet's scope of work. Also, there are no hashtags used with any post. More to this, 'Linktree' is not a feasible means for reading more about a certain topic, especialsincea hat it requires people to sign up, especially that those topics or issues are not "exclusive."

The lingering question, hence, is why hasn't Cairo Scene referenced its website link instead of Linktree? Perhaps because the outlet wants to force people to download the app to read and learn more about undertaken issues.

Cairo Scene does not use other Twitter features, such as Twitter-Threading, to give more depth to its stories on the platform and enhance its storytelling, unlike Egyptian Streets. Engagement also with Cairo Scene's tweets is relatively low despite its fanbase rounding 460k followers.

C- TikTok

Lastly, while not frequently using TikTok, Cairo Scene has almost 17 million views on that platform. It has short videos anchored in fun, light stories, which it has covered and curated to attract younger generations.

Overall, both Cairo Scene and Egyptian Streets are well-known in Egypt and the Middle East for their diversified, unique take on different socio-political and cultural issues happening at the moment, as well as their compelling media production. They have used every digital platform/application to spread their content, enhance their social media-focused efforts, and boost their outreach.

However, while attracting social media users could be a smooth-sailing task, keeping them hooked and excited at each revisit of the website and social media platforms is the most challenging bit.

It's crucial for Cairo Scene, Egyptian Streets, and other digital media outlets to make use of every feature provided by social media companies, such as Facebook Live Stream, YouTube 360, TikTok filters, Twitter Threads, and Instagram Stories and Reels, to attract more youths and keep them captivated with each delivered story.