Disney, Yahoo!, Google Top List of 100 Most Loved Companies

APCO Insight revealed its list of the 100 Most Loved Companies. The Walt Disney Company tops the list followed by Yahoo!, Google and Sony respectively.

APCO’s proprietary Emotional Linking (SM) model served as the basis for evaluating the companies by measuring consumers’ emotional attachment to brands along eight dimensions, providing companies with a roadmap to understanding consumer expectations in an actionable way. Technology companies were the largest industry represented in the top 10 with Apple coming in at ninth on the list.

“The best brands are those that build a strong, enduring emotional attachment with consumers,” said Bryan Dumont, president, APCO Insight. “In addition to acting as a highly predictive tool for consumers’ purchase choices, the Emotional Linking model has proven to be an excellent way to help companies retool their campaigns to build stronger emotional attachments between their key audiences and their brands.”

The rankings are the result of a decade-long research project including a global survey of more than 600 of the world’s largest corporate brands among more than 70,000 individuals in 15 key markets around the world. The Emotional Linking model identified eight emotions that are critical to effective brand communication. These eight critical emotions are: Understanding, Approachability, Relevance, Admiration, Curiosity, Identification, Empowerment and Pride.

“We’ve known for decades that emotions guide brand choices, but why does that matter? We need to know which emotions will affect your brand’s bottom line and APCO Insight has finally cracked the code,” said Nancy Bachrach, former chief marketing officer at Grey Advertising. “APCO Insight has quantitatively measured which emotions affect a brand’s bottom line, industry by industry, target by target, brand by brand.”

Trends in Key Industries

Tech (Devices and Web Services) outperforms across all emotions, and especially well on Relevance. Success in this area equates to people thinking a brand “fits” them well, speaks to them and plays a meaningful role in their lives. Compared to other dimensions, the computer industry does less well on Curiosity, meaning the industry could work to better pique consumer interest.

Retail performs especially well on Approachability, people feel like the industry as a whole is accessible. Conversely, it performs less well on Pride. A company rates high on Pride when people want to be associated with the brand.

Restaurants are largely seen as Approachable, but perform less well on Empowerment, defined as making the consumer feel confident or self-assured.

Food and Beverage Processing performs the best on instilling a sense of Pride. Compared to other emotions, the industry performs less well on Curiosity and Empowerment.