The results are in: etsisalat takes the lead as the most talked about brand in the telecoms segment in UAE dailies, followed by Zain and du.

Data supplied is a summary of the period 9 Feb to 22 Feb 2010. Figures include positive, neutral and negative mentions in the UAE Arabic and English morning daily newspapers. Companies are counted only once if its name is used on more than one occasion in a single article. Indices and stock prices are not counted. The margin of error is +/-5%. Impressions are based on the number of mentions multiplied by the claimed circulation.

News about etisalat's epic failure has been all over the place. You would have to be dead or living under a rock to not have heard about it. But, what does it say about du?

I commented on it earlier, but I have since found that a lot of people are missing a very important part of this situation. Where is du in all of this? When you see a poll in AarabianBusiness.com showing that 50% of BlackBerry users wanting to ditch etisalat, you can't help but think.. and do what?

Carrying on with our street signs theme, du comes to the rescue. There have been some talk and speculations on the origins of the beheard.ae campaign. It was obviously a du campaign, as it remained consistent with their branding and design.

The question that was often asked was, what is the purpose of this campaign? Well, apparently they are hoping to get statistics from the answers they get to explain how they listened to their audience.

I would have hoped that they want to listen because the last time we did a report on the telecom industry, du's performance was embarrassing. Unfortunately, that's not the case.

For example:

72% of you said you were spending more and getting less.

WoW Recharge Card
We've been listening

Seriously? It is one thing to fail at providing a basic level of acceptable service and a whole other to ask questions and make them fit into products that already exist! That is just absolutely crazy!

It is obvious that du and whoever is leading these campaigns have very little respect for their target audience.