Fortune
Magazine just named its “most admired” companies of
2005. At the top of the list is Dell Inc. who displaced
Wal-Mart, which has held the top spot for the past two years
and has now fallen to No. 4. It is an amazing accomplishment for a
technology company to be named at the top of this category.
This bodes well for the online advertising industry because
it means consumer’s will be buying computers and likely
surfing the web. Making the online advertising space even
more capable of reaching the consumer.
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Rounding out the Top 5 are General Electric, Starbucks,
and Southwest Airlines. "Corporate reputation is the product
of alchemy -- a mixture of everything from the way a company
nurtures homegrown talent to how it manages its balance
sheet," Fortune writer Abrahm Lustgarten said.
"Throw in one part customer satisfaction, another part
shareholder return, add a splash of community citizenship
and you have a measure of that company's station in the
hierarchy of American business."
To create this list Fortune used top executives at
over 500 firms and asked them to rate over 100 companies on
the following criteria: innovation, employee talent,
financial soundness, management, use of corporate assets,
social responsibility, long-term investment and product
quality.
The online advertsing space is currently booming in
revenue. We are giving away free-bees to generate consumer
and corporate databases. Providing some good products and
attempting to balance advertiser desire for exposure without
destroying consumer interest.
The Fortune Magazine method of evaluating general
admiration for a company is a good litmus test for each
company in the online advertising space to use when we
evaluate our own companies or each other. Who would be our
top 100 or top 5? Can each or any company in this space
answer the question of, how are we being socially
responsible? The other criteria seem basic to business and
every company can work on them. However, often in the online
advertising space we neglect our responsibility to the
consumer or our surrounding society.
Another interesting trend in the top 5 is that none of
the companies created the market. Rather they improved
customer satisfaction, employee enjoyment, and overall
people experience, when involved with that company. This
is another good lesson. The internet marketing space may
still be young, but marketing is old, advertising is older,
and sales has been around forever. Hopefully we can look at
the companies listed above and try and pick the pieces we
wish to emulate in our business.
The online advertising space has mountains of potential
not only in generating big dollars but also in developing
socially responsible and valuable marketing and advertising
programs. With Dell Inc. leading the way, the online
advertising space should be able to take the lessons this
company can teach and apply them to our everyday business
practices.
