Banks.am’s interview with Ofelia Ghazaryan, Head of the MaxMonitor Media Monitoring and Analysis System at Mediamax Media Company

- The year is coming to an end, and assessments are already underway – both for the sector as a whole and for individual companies. What kind of year was it for the media monitoring and analysis market?

– It would be an exaggeration to say that 2025 differed a lot from previous years.

However, several trends are worth noting. In recent years, many companies have begun to entrust the media monitoring function to global free or low-cost platforms. It seemed that they would provide the same quality and depth of service as specialized organizations, but time has demonstrated that this is not the case.

Yes, it is possible to work that way, but if a company is dealing with complex, evolving challenges, it must rely on specialized services. Among other reasons, no global platform will modify its system to meet your needs. We, on the contrary, regularly receive requests from clients and implement many of those changes within a very short timeframe.

While media monitoring used to be a priority mainly for large companies, we are now seeing growing interest among medium-sized and even small businesses. 

There are cases when a company we approach initially believes it does not need monitoring tools and can track the news landscape on its own by checking websites and Facebook pages. Yet after just one or two weeks of using our platform, they become convinced of its value. 

MaxMonitor not only saves time and human resources but also significantly reduces the risk of missing important information. Moreover, when we speak about optimizing human resources, we do not imply that the employee who previously handled this work manually should lose their job. On the contrary: with MaxMonitor, that same employee can redirect the time saved toward analyzing the information.

Another trend we observe is that, whereas many companies previously wanted us to monitor “everything” for them – meaning every possible news source – today more clients prefer selective monitoring and rely on our expertise to filter sources effectively.

It is no secret that of the more than 150 news websites operating in Armenia, only about 25-30 percent consistently produce original content. As a result, some clients request monitoring limited strictly to those outlets. MaxMonitor is highly adaptable in this regard: for one client, we may track the same keywords across 120 websites; for another, 50; and for yet another, just 10.

From the outset, we designed the system to serve both small businesses and large corporations, ensuring it can be tailored precisely to their needs.

– How do you assess the fact that one of the market participants will stop providing services as of January 1, 2026?

– In a way, this development is natural. It is difficult to remain in the market and continue growing if, for years, you follow a pricing policy that helps attract new clients but does not generate enough resources required for continuous product and service development. Our approach is different. Of course, we aim to bring in new customers, but that is never a goal in itself. When you attract a client, you take on the responsibility of delivering high-quality, uninterrupted service – something that is simply not feasible at an unsustainably low price.

That said, we believe competition is healthy for the market, as each company has the opportunity to demonstrate its advantages.

– And what are MaxMonitor’s advantages?

– Perhaps, our most significant advantage is that MaxMonitor operates within the Mediamax media company, whose core mission is the creation of high-quality content. Having worked within a journalistic environment and understanding the industry from the inside, we offer clients an experience and level of expertise that other market participants simply do not possess.

In recent years it has become nearly impossible to introduce a purely software-based solution that is truly exclusive. However, the ability to integrate these solutions with the diverse needs of various clients and to provide supplementary tools requires knowledge of the media landscape, which we have.

Additionally, we are the only company in Armenia that is a member of FIBEP, the international association of media monitoring organizations. This allows us to receive industry updates first-hand and to maintain partnerships in multiple countries. For example, together with our partner in Austria, we offer a comparative analysis service for Facebook pages – the only service of its kind on the Armenian market.

Thanks to these and other strengths, MaxMonitor has been and continues to be the leader in the Armenian market, which, of course, does not mean we can stop thinking about further development. 

- What development plans does MaxMonitor have for 2026?

- We introduce updates to the system on a continuous basis. As I mentioned earlier, some enhancements come directly from client suggestions. We also have plans to integrate various AI components into the platform, and we will work to implement these ideas in 2026.

At the moment, we are offering special terms for companies interested in becoming MaxMonitor subscribers. All clients who sign a contract with us by December 30, 2025, will enjoy a 20 percent discount on our services for 2026. Those interested can contact us through this link.