One of the study's findings indicates that top American non-luxury autobrands received higher ratings from online consumers than competingJapanese brands. Biz360 analyzed nearly 300,000 online opinions, culledfrom review websites such as Auto Mall USA, Edmunds, IntelliChoice andYahoo Autos for the period October 31, 2007 through November 1, 2008. Thecompany's new OpinionInsights product was used to analyze the online comments.

Fast facts

--  Overall, Ford & Chevy brands outranked Honda and Toyota on Biz360's    "Net Advocacy" measurement.--  Both Honda and Toyota accounted for a higher percentage of negative    opinions than their two domestic counterparts.--  Performance, comfort and exterior styling are the most important    product attributes according to consumer reviews.    

"Net Advocacy" is Biz360's proprietary metric that factors the positive andnegative sentiment of individual comments, as well as the impact of thesource of each comment, to yield an indicator of a product or brand'sreferral value in the marketplace. This process is automated by Biz360's OpinionInsights product, which lets companies quickly compare advocacy scoresof different brands, models, product attributes and features. By measuringconsumer sentiment on a specific product or feature, Opinion Insights isable to deliver marketers ongoing insight into consumer opinion more costeffectively than traditional research.

Report findings

Note to reporters: more details of the study are available from Tim Cox,ZingPR, tim@zingpr.com.

--  The study highlighted the attributes and features most likely to be    commented on by consumers. Their comments indicate which factors most    influence satisfaction and purchase decisions in the automotive category.--  For non-luxury auto manufacturers, four key product attributes    accounted for more than 75 percent of all online opinions: performance,    comfort, exterior styling and general opinions.--  Ford and Chevy ranked higher on more key product attributes than did    Toyota and Honda, and Ford outranked all three car companies overall in    rankings across these attributes.--  Over the past year, Toyota vehicles received 16 percent more negative    comments than the average of the negative comments for the four vehicles    combined.--  Both Ford and Chevrolet outranked Toyota and Honda on overall Net    Advocacy.    

"With the national spotlight focused on the fortunes of U.S. auto makers,we were interested in looking at consumer feedback of the most popularbrands in the mid-size car category," said Stephen Foster, senior directorof analyst services at Biz360. "The results of the analysis are encouragingfor these domestic brands. They indicate that certain American cars brandsare considered superior to equivalent Japanese brands by consumers whenthey discuss the key attributes of performance, comfort & exteriorstyling."

"Technology has changed the buying landscape forever. Consumers now havethe tools to be more vocal and influential than ever before. Whethersatisfied or not with a product, they can reach out and communicate theiropinions to a world of other consumers. And whether we like it or not,consumers are listening and are influenced by those heartfelt opinionsexpressed by their peers," said Brad Brodigan, CEO of Biz360. "In order tomake smart business decisions, it is essential that marketers embrace newtools to understand and interpret the new online consumer dialogue that ishappening around them."

Research methodology

Approximately 300,000 consumer opinions from October 31, 2007 throughNovember 1, 2008 were analyzed by Biz360 Research. The study includedopinions from a universe of leading consumer review and shopping sitesincluding Auto Mall USA, Edmunds, IntelliChoice and Yahoo Autos.

About Opinion Insights

Opinion Insights captures and analyzes consumer opinion from thousands ofexpert and consumer review and shopping sites. This proprietary Web-basedsolution is built on advanced data aggregation and analytics techniques,including natural language processing (NLP) to enable expert and consumerreview extraction and analysis across multiple brands, products, attributesand features. It provides marketers with a series of real-time metrics thatcan be leveraged over time in product planning and development.

About Biz360

Biz360 delivers media and market intelligence solutions to Global 2000business decision makers, providing them with a 360-degree view of theirmarketplace. The company gathers and analyzes vast amounts of traditionalnews media, social media and customer opinion information about anorganization, its brands, products and competitors to deliver real-timeinsights that help its clients make better and faster business decisions.Biz360's clients include AAA, Aetna, AstraZeneca and Sun Microsystems.Biz360 can be reached at 866.424.9360 or www.biz360.com.