Last year, IMWF conducted a comprehensive analysis of the digital presence of Austria’s 498 largest industrial companies. It evaluated all publicly available online mentions of these companies, which were derived from a wide range of sources such as news articles, social media posts, blogs and specialist forums.
>>> The 250 largest companies in Austria’s industry
A specially developed algorithm used AI-based text analysis to examine around 176,000 text excerpts. These were classified into categories such as “products,” “profitability,” “sustainability,” “management,” “employer,” and “innovation.” The tone of the mentions (positive, neutral, or negative) was also taken into account. Another criterion was the reach of the platforms on which the mentions appeared in order to weight the statements.
A score was determined for each company in the respective categories: A high value reflects a larger number of mentions as well as a positive tone and high reach. The best company in each category received the maximum score of ten points, while the others were graded accordingly. The final overall value resulted from the weighted average of the individual category scores. “Our ranking is particularly informative because it not only shows the positions of the companies, but also shows the strongly varying ratings in the various reputation areas,” explains Axel Maireder, Managing Director of IMWF and author of the study. The analysis shows in which areas companies can actually build a positive reputation. The algorithm even recognizes the finest nuances in comments and posts, which leads to a particularly precise assessment of the company’s reputation.
