Michael Kors tops the fashion buzz report

American fashion designer Michael Kors was the most ‘buzzed about’ fashion designer of 2011, according to a report released by Zeta Interactive Corp., a digital marketing company that analyses chatter across blogs and social media networks,

that has been published in The Wall Street Journal.

But the biggest surprise in the report was the entry of John Galliano, the former designer for French fashion house Christian Dior, in fourth place, suggesting his reputation may be recovering.

To create the Fashion Buzz Report, Zeta uses data-mining software to analyse discussions across blogs and social media networks, including Facebook and Twitter, and using an algorithm the company then accessed whether the chatter was favourable or unfavourable; ranking the 50 designers in relation to positive discussions.

Kors emerged as the Internet’s most popular designer, as he had the highest volume of chatter, of which 95 percent was deemed positive. Followed by Vera Wang in second place, who was helped by chatter on the wedding dress, she designed for Kim Kardashian, and Christian Siriano took third spot.

Despite Galliano being found guilty of racist and anti-Semitic abuse following his arrest at a Paris bar in February, the online data shows that the majority of online chatter about him in 2011 was positive. The report shows that the designer's positive buzz slipped from 92 percent in January to 64 percent in March, although overall this year 86 percent of discussions about him had positive connotations earning him the fourth ‘buzzed about’ spot, which was better than his ninth place position in 2010.

According to Zeta, the most popular word to be associated with Galliano this year was ‘comeback’, although it is worth noting that less positive words including ‘criminal’ and ‘tirade’ also rated highly.

Other designers featured in the top ten include Sarah Burton and Jason Wu, who both made the list for the first time, as well as Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein.