Mohamed Elzubeir, head of Mediastow

Mediastow, the leading media intelligence agency in the MENA region, launched the region’s first-of-its-kind integrated platform for social media, print and broadcast monitoring, analysis and measurement.  

Mohamed Elzubeir, head of Mediastow, said the move was aimed at enabling businesses to monitor print, broadcast and social media with a fully fledged and integrated approach. The new system’s capabilities are backed up by high-quality operational and maintenance support available worldwide.

“With the evolution of the social media, every blogger is a journalist, exercising a significant impact on any company. It is therefore very critical for a company to know what bloggers are saying and what impact they have on stakeholders,” said Elzubeir commenting on the new integrated monitoring platform.

Elzubeir added: “The new system offers an important tool to companies to understand their position within the social, broadcast and print media. The service is delivered in two packages: DIY (Do It Yourself) with training provided by Mediastow or fully managed by Mediastow analysts.”

Cost-wise, the new system will minimize print, broadcast and social media monitoring and make it more commoditized, in line with Mediastow’s vision for the MENA region. 

Leading brands are increasingly seeking to track online conversations and engage with customers in real-time. Mediastow continues to invest in developing cutting-edge technologies that compete on an international standard. 

The digital interaction amongst stakeholders of any company was never more active as it is today. The Internet could be a key battleground between rivals where a single 140 characters tweet could affect the share price of any company. This requires companies to keep an eye on what is going on in the cyber world.

“We decided to integrate three media disciplines into one channel of monitoring and analysis to educate the market on the importance of every media outlet, whether it is broadcast, web or print. We are equipped to monitor every segment of viewership and readership in a cost effective and reliable methodology,” said Elzubeir.

“Monitoring social media will help companies to develop new approaches to the way they talk to their customers. Monitoring this kind of media is the starting point for engagement, interaction and advocacy of customers.”

Mediastow’s new integrated service helps companies and organizations track trends and identify their sources, allowing communications specialists to engage directly with their stakeholders, emphasized Elzubeir.
 

The ongoing global credit crunch has actually boosted media monitoring and analysis operations in the Gulf, with many private and public companies increasing their media analysis budgets, according to a regional media expert.

The head of Mediastow, the leading media advisory and intelligence agency in the MENA region, Mohamed Elzubeir attributes the growth to the need of public and private sectors in the Gulf to better understand the market, the industries they are working with as well as the economic and marketing significance of the media discussions at the local and global level.

According to Mohamed Elzubeir the total spend on media monitoring and coverage analysis and consultancy in the Gulf rose sharply in 2008, reaching the $25m mark in the first ten months of the year, of which 20% was government spend.

Elzubeir elaborated:'The monitoring industry actually shines in times of crises as companies need accurate market data to make informed decisions and know better their standing in the market and hidden perceptions of their products. Companies now believe that knowledge is power and they are investing heavily, keeping this aspect in mind.'

Elzubeir says media monitoring goes beyond media clippings and he puts forth the view that only qualitative analysis, which includes share of voice, share of favorable discussions, tonality, perception analysis, mass advocacy indexes and key messages penetrations will help companies emerge victorious in troubled times.

Elzubeir adds that media monitoring provides insights into a company's operations, competitors and industry trends, fuelled by the professionalism of the media community that supports effective media monitoring results.

'The global financial crisis has highlighted the need to keep a good eye on what the media says and leverage it to expect the best and prepare for the worst. We see that many public and private sector organizations are dedicating bigger portions of their marcom (marketing communications) budgets to media monitoring and analysis.'

Mediastow, the Middle East’s leading media  intelligence firm, won the AMEC Communication Effectiveness Award 2008 in the Best Use of Integrated Media Evaluation/Research category. The award comes in recognition of their work with Aldar Properties in which they integrated media coverage with surveys looking into the trust perception of the public of Aldar and their competitors to help Aldar optimize its PR performance. They are the only firm from the Middle East to be recognized and awarded with an AMEC award.
 
The International Association for Measurement and Evaluation of Communication (AMEC) is the global trade body and professional institute for agencies and practitioners who provide media evaluation and communication research. AMEC was founded in London in 1996 with just 7 members and has since grown into a trade body whose purpose is to define and develop the industry on an international scale with better professional
standards for both companies and individuals.
 
“To be recognised on a global level like this is truly an honour for us,” commented Mohamed Elzubeir, CEO of Mediastow. “We are very proud of our work with Aldar Properties that has resulted in this award. We have been
working hard to show the industries in the Middle East that there is a way to measure the effectiveness of their marketing strategies and now this hard work has been recognised by an institution as prestigious as AMEC,” he
further added.
 
Now in its seventh year, the Awards program offers a unique opportunity to showcase excellence in media evaluation to the global communication industry. The program is open to practitioners across the PR and communication industry with special categories for consultancy, in-house communications departments and AMEC members. The Awards will be judged by an independent panel of communication professionals from academic, consultancy and in-house backgrounds.
 
“We signed with Mediastow as we were impressed with their fresh and innovative way of evaluating our communication activities,” commented Shamma Al Nuaimi, Corporate Communications Manager of Aldar Properties. “The analysis that Mediastow provides allows us to understand exactly how our messages are impacting specific demographics. which has been invaluable to our public relations and marketing programs and has allowed us to fine tune them,” Shamma further added. 
 
Mediastow is a Dubai-based media intelligence consultancy that tracks and analyzes media coverage and public perception to offer in-depth market analyses to a variety of different clients.

Mediastow, the Middle East’s only media intelligence firm has announced the introduction of a new automated media monitoring system that will maximize efficiency and minimize monitoring misses.

The announcement comes after the signing of a deal with Zissor, a Norwegian company whose software and technology is used by media monitoring giants such as Durrants in the UK (the UK’s biggest media monitoring agency) and BurellesLuce (US-based, and the world’s largest media monitoring agency).

“This extensive investment comes as the recognition of a need in the media monitoring industry,” commented Mohamed Elzubeir, CEO Mediastow. “The system will allow Mediastow to automate the reading of English AND Arabic titles through OCR – Optical Character Recognition. The system will then clip and deliver the clippings to the clients in a much faster timeframe,” he further added.

Zissor is a world leading supplier of end-to-end solutions for industrial conversion of newspapers and all other physical documents to electronically searchable information. This signing will allow Mediastow to create an edge in the market and offer an advanced media monitoring and analysing solution that no other company in the Middle East can.

“This system allows Mediastow to spend less time clipping and more time analyzing the data it is archiving. We will be expanding on our media measurements system to bring together a comprehensive set of tools that allows PR professionals to really understand and assess their PR campaigns,” Elzubeir concluded.

The technology is set to be in place and up and running by the start of 2007 and will allow companies to monitor their competitors news and their market trends easily and affordably. The system also allows PR agencies the convenience of having their published news sent directly to their clients at an earlier than they could manage.

The greatest advantage of the technology is the decrease in miss rates in monitoring the news. Even with the most diligent of media monitors, human error means that a percentage of relevant news is always missed. This new automated system will ensure that no articles with the pre-programmed keywords in are missed and that all relevant news is delivered by 8am to the persons email account.