According to Muhammad Badawi, small businesses in Saudi Arabia have already invested 9bn Saudi Riyals in social media. Badawi, an author and social media expert, announced the statistic at a workshop at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JCCI) on Monday. At the workshop, it was revealed that 90% of the Saudi Arabian population have an account on a social networking site, with each user averaging 195 friends each. 

Google is set to launch a new commenting system that will tie into its Google+ platform, web services and web search. According to tech blogger Saud Al-Hawawi, the new feature was discussed at a Google event in Saudi Arabia. The Google comment system will likely have strong connections to Google’s network of services and websites, and will reportedly be available for use on third party sites.

Youtube has become extremely popular in Saudi Arabia and Saudi-based uploads have grown 260% year-on-year. "We launched the Arabic language version sometime ago, and last year we introduced a version that is specific for Saudi Arabia. We have seen a 260 percent year-on-year increase in uploads and views, whereas the average internationally is 50 percent,” said Patrick Walker, YouTube's senior director for content partnerships in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

According to the Saudi Arabia's Undersecretary for Information Abdul Rahman Al-Hazaa, the kingdom accounts for 45% of the advertising market in the Gulf, which is now worth S$2.2 billion in total. "I expect that the Kingdom will soon rank 43 in the global advertising market, with a total volume of over $2 billion," said Sami Raffoul, founder of the Pan Arab Research Centre.

Saudi Arabia has unveiled plans to launch a weather forecast channel. The channel, which will be launched by the the Presidency of Meteorology and Environment (PME) under the supervision of the Saudi Arabian Ministry of Culture and Information, will provide weather updates every hour. 

Ipsos has launched an online panel in Saudi Arabia, as part of its plan to set up several online panels in the MENA region. The next two panels are set to launch in Egypt and the United Arab Emirates this year. The panels will be run by Ipsos Interactive Services, which is led by director Nader Kobeissi. “Our ultimate goal is to build our own panels for all the markets in which Ipsos operates and thus ensure equal data quality among the different countries,” said Kobeissi.