Which companies do you think have the best reputation with U.S. consumers? If you said Apple, you'd be right -- but they aren't ranked quite at the top of the latest Harris Poll study this time around.
Harris Interactive released the results of their Harris Poll RQ Study for 2013 on Tuesday, with both Apple and Google joining Amazon in the top five based purely on reputation alone.
In their survey of over 14,000 consumers, Harris measured the reputations of the 60 most visible companies in the United States to see how they ranked in the eyes of the public at large.
Surprisingly, Apple is no longer the top dog, narrowly coming in second to Amazon.com with a score of 82.62 versus Cupertino's 82.54. The remainder of the top five is rounded out by The Walt Disney Company (82.12), Google (81.32) and Johnson & Johnson (80.95).
"Our results show that Amazon has managed to build an intimate relationship with the public without being perceived as intrusive," explains Harris Interactive Executive Vice President of Reputation Management, Robert Fronk. "And as the company that is so widely known for its personal recommendations, more than nine in ten members of the public would recommend Amazon to friends and family."
While Amazon's top ranking may be a first for the e-tailer, the company has managed to keep a great reputation score for five years running, while Google has ranked eight of its 14 years in business.
On the lower end of the scale are the banking industry, with Wells Fargo the only one who's managed to jump from negative to positive over the past four years.
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