Will #InAbuDhabi do for the capital what #MyDubai has done for Dubai’s social media presence?
There’s a saying that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. If that’s the case, then #MyDubai, the social media campaign which was launched to give the city’s residents a way to tell their own story, now has another honor to its name in addition to the one million Instagram uploads.
Abu Dhabi has followed in the footsteps of #MyDubai and launched its own hashtag to share experiences. To quote from the Khaleej Times:
Residents and visitors to the Capital have a new platform to share their experiences and events: #inAbuDhabi.
Announced on Sunday by the Abu Dhabi Tourism and Culture Authority (TCA), the new online service is meant to promote the emirate’s culture, entertainment, heritage and hospitality both at home and abroad.
“The #inAbuDhabi campaign will be wide-reaching and rolled out across all communication channels of our visitabudhabi online resource. It will be used across social media for maximum reach and impact and will be a tool to tell the destination story locally, regionally and internationally,” said Mouza Al Shamsi, acting executive director of Marketing and Communications at TCA.
So far, so good. However, despite launching the campaign on October 20th it’s probably fair to say that the #inAbuDhabi hashtag is yet to trend among social media users. Most of the usage has been by corporate accounts related to tourism such as @VisitAbuDhabi, @AbuDhabiEvents and @EtihadAirways.
The hashtag #InAbuDhabi had a strong start but has tailed off rapidly since its launch
Will #InAbuDhabi become another #MyDubai? Does it have the emotional resonance with residents of the capital? Or should Abu Dhabi’s Tourism and Culture Authority not imitated Dubai and done something completely different? What do you think?
Alex of Arabia's Blog 
I think folks #inAbuDhabi are probably not as social media friendly as those in Dubai – that’s possible, right? I think #Mydubai campaign worked because it was spearheaded and led by the Crown Prince.
There’s a good deal of social media addicts in AD Mita, especially among UAE nationals. This means that much of what is shared online here is in Arabic, which is maybe why you won’t see as much activity in the capital. I think this is the most important difference. Dubai is an international city, with lots of different nationalities resident in the city as well as loads and loads of tourists who have turned #MyDubai into a long-term campaign/initiative (whatever DTCM wants to call it). Abu Dhabi has fewer expats and tourists, and they’ll have to do a good deal of work to promote the hashtag with some great, emotive content. The Royal Family in Abu Dhabi has been promoting the hashtag, but they’ll need to do much more to get everyone on board (and at the very least, get people talking via media and influencer outreach).
Thats a fair point but the ones tweeting in Arabic or using social media could just as easily use the hashtag.
There’s a much stronger affinity for Arabic in Abu Dhabi and most Emiratis I know tweet in Arabic and use Arabic hashtags. I do think that the Tourism Authority here should have done more work on what would have made such a campaign a success. At the moment it’s not working for them.