How does one spell algorithm?

Unlike South Africa or the rest of the developed world, local media monitoring is still done manually. Since this is a tedious task, but still requires a high degree of accuracy, it is a labour intensive undertaking. To improve their efficiency, Namibia Media Monitoring applied to the Competition Commission for a management buy-out of Survey Warehouse’s media department. This was subsequently approved.
NaMedia is a media content analyser specialising in strategic communication evaluation based on a  methodology that entails daily media content analysis of mainstream print, TV and radio by professionally trained analysts. It is not driven by algorithms as in any advanced economy.
According to NaMedia’s executive chairman Natasja Beyleveld, the analysts identify and categorise each article, sentence by sentence and issue by issue, according to a set of more than 700 defined criteria.
“Clients monitor whether their communication strategy is effectively addressing the media status quo, but also introducing relevant and innovative topics to the existing media agenda,” she said.
Regarding the beginning of her small business which employs six permanent employees and two consultants (finance and IT),  Beyleveld said it is almost impossible to do it all on one’s own.
“I knew I could not do it alone and consequently approached FNB’s SME department with my in-depth business plan. Axel Cramer phoned me the same day to guide me through options for the road ahead. Since then, Robert Eiman and his team assisted me and catered for my different financial needs in running this business. This especially helped me during the waiting period for getting the ‘new’ business up and running, while keeping the momentum and paying off the loan,” she said.