Web co‐word analysis for business intelligence in the Chinese environment

Purpose – The study seeks to apply Web co‐word analysis to the Chinese business environment to test the feasibility of the method there. Design/methodology/approach – The authors selected a group of companies in two Chinese industries, collected co‐word data for the companies, analyzed the data with multidimensional scaling (MDS), and then compared the MDS maps generated from the co‐word data with business situations to find out if the co‐word method works. Findings – The study found that the Web co‐word method could potentially be applied to the Chinese environment. The study also found the advantages and disadvantages of the Web co‐word method vs the Web co‐link method. Originality/value – Knowing the applicability of the Web co‐word method to the Chinese environment contributes to the knowledge of this new Webometrics method. Mining business information from the Web is more valuable when applied to a foreign country where language and culture barriers exist. To use the co‐word method, one does not have to be able to read or write in that language. One only needs to have the names of the companies to study, which can be easily obtained without knowledge of the language. The value of business information about countries such as China is obvious given the global nature of contemporary business competition and the significance of the Chinese economy to the world.