Webranking by Comprend is the leading in-depth survey of digital corporate content provided by major listed companies across Europe and beyond. This year’s results show that Spanish companies have improved their digital communication activities in comparison to last year’s ranking. This demonstrates that Spanish companies are better addressing the information needs of corporate audiences via digital media.
Webranking 2015-2016 assessed 25 Spanish companies on the basis of 100 criteria, which were derived from surveys conducted with investors, analysts, business journalists and jobseekers. In total, there were 803 corporate websites, from 36 countries included in this year’s Webranking. Despite the increased average score among Spanish companies, the results from the ranking show that Spanish corporations do not provide enough content about crucial investor relations topics – meaning these companies fail to meet the standards demanded by financial audiences.
Investor information: a clear area for improvement
Information about financial targets and achievements, as well as market trends and challenges, are in high demand by investors. Despite the keen interest in these topics – 91% of the capital market demands this info – 21 of the 25 ranked websites did not receive points in this area.
Corporate governance: in need of catching-up
Much like last year, Spain lags behind in providing transparent communication on corporate direction and control, averaging only 38.4% of the total corporate governance score. Most conspicuous is the scarce or absent information on remuneration for executives and board of directors, which is demanded by 83% of survey respondents.
Reporting: definitely a bright spot
Financial reporting is the area where Spanish companies best manage to keep up with its northern European peers, averaging 77.3% of the maximum score for financial presentations – an item that 91% of survey respondents rated important. Spanish companies also perform better than the Financial Times Europe 500 average in providing stand-alone corporate governance reports, an item considered important by 79% of investors.
CSR information: failure to build on earlier progress
Spanish companies have traditionally been strong performers on corporate social responsibility (CSR) content. This year, Spanish companies beat the Financial Times Europe 500 average in the identification of stakeholders. Yet received an average score of only 19.4% of the total on hard CSR data, the kind of information that three out of four investors search for.
Access from mobile devices: still a challenge
The number of visitors from mobile devices keeps rising and corporate websites should facilitate access and enhance user experience through responsiveness and faster loading speed. In this year’s ranking, 32% of the Spanish corporate websites are responsive, but no more than 24% reach a satisfactory loading speed on mobile devices.
Commenting on the Spanish results, Miguel Cruz de Oliveira, Director for Portugal, Spain and France at Comprend, said:
“This year it was extremely gratifying to note that the average score of the Spanish companies we surveyed rose substantially compared with last year – almost a full four points; continued progress must embrace transparent investor communications such as financial targets and achievements and more concrete data on CSR activities.”
Webranking by Comprend 2015-2016 – Spain
With 66.3 points, Repsol held to its traditional top spot on the Spanish list, a place it has secured every year since the first Spanish Webranking edition in 2006. The second and third places were taken by the same companies as last year, with ArcelorMittal receiving second place and Telefónica third. Amadeus made great progress as it climbed to the 4th position. Both Ferrovial and Red Eléctrica kept their positions while substantially improving their score.
See the full Spanish results here.
Read the post in Spanish newspaper, Expansión. (In Spanish)
Webranking by Comprend – est.1997
Webranking by Comprend is Europe’s leading survey of corporate websites. It is the only research that has every year since 1997 ranked over 800 websites according to how well they address the information requirements of corporate stakeholders.
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