Apple Picked as World’s Favorite Company

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By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Published
Apple Picked as World’s Favorite Company

© courtesy of Apple Inc.

In a study that ranks “perceived strength” of companies rather than their financial performance, Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) took the top spot.

Research firm Future Brand described it selection methodology this way:

We measured global public perception of the Global Top 100 Companies by market capitalization. Our ranking here re-orders the Global Top 100 Companies in terms of perception strength, rather than financial strength

Future Brand said that the ratings were done via “18 attributes across the Purpose and Experience”

Its methodology:

Respondents are not only drawn from an ‘informed public’, in that they know about the companies in question, but that they are in professional jobs, including top leaders and managers. This is critical when we are asking about corporate organizations that sometimes have relatively low general public awareness.

Screening criteria:

By ‘informed’ we mean aware of and know something about at least 7 or more of the Global Top 100 companies – our aim was to understand strength of perceptions and associations of those people who can show reasonable awareness:

By ‘informed’ we mean aware of and know something about at least 7 or more of the Global Top 100 companies – our aim was to understand strength of perceptions and associations of those people who can show reasonable awareness
21-75 years old, balanced between males and females, none were unemployed or students
Top professional, Chairman, MD, VP/SVP or other very Senior Manager, top level Civil Servant, or similar
Skilled Professional, Departmental or Middle Manager, Senior Executive, Departmental or Head Teacher, or similar
Junior Manager, Junior Executive, Shop Owner or Owner of a Small Establishment, Class Teacher, Nurse, or similar
Respondents were asked questions about those companies based on FutureBrand’s proprietary brand associations model, as well as a series of other factors, and provided answers on a multiple choice and qualitative basis. This formed the basis of our quantitative analysis to develop a new ranking of the companies driven by strength of perception across 18 specific attributes within the dimensions of ‘purpose’ and ‘experience’

Apple ranked first, followed by Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT), Samsung, Walt Disney Co. (NYSE: DIS), Abbvie Inc. (NYSE: ABBV) Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB), Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) and Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN).

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Photo of Douglas A. McIntyre
About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

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