Study: This is how people talk about auto brands on social media

Social media is a great way to share memes and yell at other people online, but large companies rely on users’ behavior for insights on how they perform in the public eye. YouGov’s recent U.S. Social Listening Report listed the top auto brands among social media users, and some of the more talked-about names won’t come as any surprise.

Part of the study looked at the most-shared automotive news on social media, and in that realm, nobody else came close to Tesla’s dominance. Interestingly, company CEO Elon Musk’s platform X (Twitter) was the one that had the most negative sentiment shared about automakers online.

Despite that interest, Ford outranked Tesla as the most popular auto brand, taking the No. 1 spot in the first quarter of 2024. Toyota, BMW, and Mercedes-Benz were the others in the top five most popular brands. YouGov noted that, despite some shuffling on the list, all of the top 30 brands from 2023 remained in the rankings for 2024.

Consumer sentiment is one of the harder-to-judge areas, but analysts can use comments and news sharing to get a feel for how potential buyers feel about a brand. Alfa Romeo and Aston Martin generated the most positive sentiment in the study, while Infiniti generated the most negative sentiment.

Alfa Romeo has had its challenges with reliability, but the sentiment analysis found that people view the brand as being appealing to collectors and satisfying for drivers who value aesthetics and the driving experience. Infiniti owners complained of “frequent need for and cost of repairs, vehicle and software defects, initial tires that come with the vehicle quickly going flat, and mechanics at Infiniti dealers being unable to deal with repairs.”

Finally, YouGov found that media placements of those companies highly impact online activity surrounding auto brands. The firm cited Aston Martin’s involvement with James Bond films, the Chevy Camaro’s appearance in “Transformers,” and Mini Coopers in “The Italian Job” as key examples.