The South by Southwest Film + Interactive festival in Austin, Tx. has long been a place for new media companies to launch new products and get noticed. Now, Twitter users at the event are collectively presenting a picture of which are garnering the most attention.

Using the Cision Social Media Dashboard, I analyzed all tweets containing the term “sxsw”, the shorthand name for the festival, from the first two days of the event (March 13 and 14). There were more than 58,000 mentions. Next, I decided to filter those results with the names of all companies with booths on the trade show floor, creating a live feed indicating which are generating the most chatter.

Interestingly, only about 2 percent of tweets containing “sxsw” also contained the name of a company exhibiting there. That makes sense since there’s a lot going on outside of the trade show, such as panel discussions, awards presentations, networking events and parties (“Trade Show Bar” was a fairly hot topic). Still, more than 1,000 tweets did mention the name of an exhibitor. Of those, many were actively trying to use Twitter to attract people to their booths, providing an interesting case study in using the microblogging service for outreach. These brands have attracted anywhere between a couple dozen and hundreds of tweets so far. Out of more than 100 firms there, here are the top 10 most talked about on Twitter:

1. Google Clearly SXSW-goers use a lot of Google services, which they’re mentioning frequently (an unofficial morning jogging group offers a Google Map of its route). But even filtering out those types of messages, Google still leads in Twitter chatter at the festival. Some tweeted about a panel discussion on Quick Response and Mobile Tagging technologies that included a Google engineer. These technologies enable some mobile phone users to scan a barcode on a physical object, an item in a store for example, and be automatically directed to a Web site with more information about the product.

2. ServerBeach The Web hosting company is using Twitter to direct attendees toward its trade show booth for giveaways.

3. Trustworthy The social media monitoring startup is having a drawing for a free iPod Touch to be given to someone who has mentioned the company in a tweet.

4. OtherInbox This e-mail management software company is launching at SXSW and has been answering questions about its product on Twitter from the trade show floor.

5. Blellow A collaboration tool that offers a job board for writers, Web designers and software programmers and facilitates cooperation on projects.

6. PeoplePond is another startup firm launching at SXSW. It offers SEO for individuals who want to take ownership of their online identities.

7. Sony made a splash at the show by giving away 10 Webbie HD video cameras to bloggers who would film the goings on.

8. OrgSync makes collaborative software geared toward universities.

9. Porter Novelli The public relations and marketing company set up a Twitter account specifically for live-tweeting the event: @PN_ATX

10. The Austin Chronicle The alternative weekly newspaper published a special issue for SXSW.

Also, here are some of the most talked-about blog posts written from Austin:

At SXSW Smartphones Rule, Notebooks Drool by Stacey Higginbotham, GigaOm

SXSW: AT&T’s Spotty Service Frustrates iPhone Users by Michael Calore, Wired.com‘s Epicenter blog

SXSW: Privacy (and publicness) by Jeff Jarvis, Buzzmachine

SXSW Panel: Don’t worry kids, the news business isn’t going to die by Nicholas Deleon, CrunchGear

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