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Sony and Sanyo: The Best and Worst Consumer Electronics Brands in the World

Stewart-Allen BrandBarometer™ forecasts stormy outlook for some of the world’s most popular consumer electronics brands

London, 5th January 2006 – A recent international consumer survey measuring the health of some of the world’s most famous consumer electronics brands reveals that Sony is the most popular brand, while Sanyo is the least popular across all ages, genders and income levels in 18 countries around the world.

In November 2005, the Stewart-Allen BrandBarometer, co-created by international marketing expert Allyson Stewart-Allen, director of International Marketing Partners Ltd., and GMI, provider of integrated solutions for global market intelligence, surveyed 17,502 highly profiled consumers worldwide about 15 leading international consumer electronics brands.

These brands include Apple, Canon, Casio, Dell, Hitachi, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft, Nokia, Panasonic, Philips, Pioneer, Sanyo, Sharp, Sony and Toshiba. Consumers were asked about their perceptions and experiences of these brands, levels of trust, overall quality and perceived country of origin.

These results come as the 2006 International Consumer Electronics Show opens its doors today in Las Vegas, USA. As in past years, event producer CEA (Consumer Electronics Association) has just released its latest industry growth projections: factory sales of consumer electronics will reach a new high of $135.4 billion in 2006, and sales exceeded expectations in 2005, totaling $125.9 billion. CEA forecasts 8 percent growth in 2006. Future predictions indicate total factory sales will grow to US$158.4 billion by 2008, a rise of 65% since the year 2000.

Respondents were asked to rate each of the brands on a 7-point scale
(1= very unreliable, 7= very reliable.)
Figure 2 shows all respondents’ most and least favourite brands by demographic:
clearly Sony is the winner.

When asked to associate values with a particular brand, BrandBarometer respondents perceived Sony as ‘luxurious’, Nokia as ‘innovative’, ‘friendly’ and ‘engaging’ while Apple was voted the most ‘individualistic’ and ‘exclusive,’ and Microsoft as ‘powerful’ and the most ‘American’ brand. Sony also scored well in other areas: respondents see the brand as being ‘international’, ‘trustworthy’ and a ‘luxury’ brand. Nokia scored highly for being ‘customer-focused’, for ‘listening’ to its customers and for being the most ‘responsive’ and ‘empathetic.’ Sony and Nokia were also seen as the two most reliable brands out of the 15 studied.

When it comes to investing in brand recall and intentional associations, large consumer electronics companies clearly dedicate generous marketing and advertising budgets to achieve these:

• Microsoft spent $260 million on domestic measured media during the first 10 months of 2004 (Adweek, January 25, 2005)
• Sony’s Electronics Division spent $150 million on U.S. advertising in 2004 (Adweek, September 14, 2005)
• Apple spent more than $100 million on advertising in 2003, and about $90 million between January and October 2004, $70 million of which on iPod ads alone (MediaWeek, January 13, 2005)
• Panasonic spent about $60 million in U.S. media last year (Adweek, December 02, 2005 )

However, the BrandBarometer did find some dark clouds on the horizon for some of the other consumer electronics brands. Sanyo appears to have a serious image problem and is regarded as the most ‘stagnant’, ‘dull’, ‘insignificant’ and ‘weak’ of all of the brands in the study.

According to the survey, the power of consumer electronics brands appears to be wavering in Western markets where branding is most sophisticated. When asked how important a brand name is when buying such products, consumers in Mexico, China and Brazil rated it as either important (6 out of 7) or very important (7 out of 7). By contrast, consumers in such countries as the UK, Germany and Denmark ranked brand names as much less important (4 out of 7).

“We know from our previous BrandBarometer studies and the behaviour of various markets that brands take on significant symbolism in emerging economies as they represent aspirational purchases – a communication of status and more upmarket lifestyle,” explains Stewart-Allen.

The survey also provided interesting findings as to where the technology giants were headquartered. Nokia’s Finnish and Philips’ Dutch origins were often misidentified by survey respondents as Japanese and American respectively.

Stewart-Allen adds: “Some of the most recognisable brands in the world relate to consumer electronics. Yet, the most important for these companies is to make sure they get noticed in the right markets. The BrandBarometer finds the latent power of branding in the fastest-growing consumer markets of Mexico, Brazil, India and Russia. There is a huge opportunity here, and consumer electronics companies need to localise their marketing for their brands to have the greatest impact at a regional level, while focusing on some degree of consistency in the ways the brand is experienced and communicated worldwide.”

“The appeal of some runaway brand leaders such as Nokia is based on consistently managing the experience of the brand. What is striking about this BrandBarometer is that some of the world’s best-known names are adrift and losing appeal despite their heavy investments in marketing,” comments Stewart-Allen.

About the Stewart-Allen BrandBarometer™

Allyson Stewart-Allen – the world’s leading authority on international marketing – recognised the need for international brands to better align their global and local marketing practices. Working with GMI (Global Market Insite, Inc.), which offers one of the world’s largest online international consumer panels, she devised the BrandBarometer. A worldwide panel of 17,502 consumers – representative of age, gender and, where applicable, geographical region, ethnicity and race – is surveyed quarterly on their perceptions and direct experiences of the world’s most recognised brands in four key industry sectors.

About Allyson Stewart-Allen

Allyson Stewart-Allen is recognised as the world's leading authority on trans-Atlantic business, international marketing and working across business cultures. As founder of International Marketing Partners, Allyson Stewart-Allen advises a number of national government agencies and Fortune 100 companies. An American based in London and Los Angeles, Allyson is a member of the Advisory Board of the New York-based organisation Business for Diplomatic Action (BDA), and a recently selected judge for the UK's 2005 International Business Awards. Co-author of the first book on U.S. business (Working with Americans, © Prentice Hall), Allyson Stewart-Allen is a regular contributor to the international business media, including CNN, BBC, USA Today, Newsweek, Business Week, Les Echos, Bloomberg, Financial Times, Sky News, Wall Street Journal, MarketingMagazine as well as major daily newspapers.

More information on Allyson Stewart-Allen is available at:
www.intermarketingonline.com
www.workingwithamericans.com

About GMI

GMI (Global Market Insite, Inc.) is the only company that provides comprehensive integrated solutions for global market intelligence for both market research firms and corporate market research departments at Global 2000 companies. Solutions include Net-MR®, a suite of software tools to manage and automate research throughout the project lifecycle, desktop analysis tools, 24x7x365 service bureau capabilities, and one of the world’s largest, highly profiled, double opt-in managed panels, spanning across 200 countries. In addition, GMI offers high-value, real-time enterprise feedback solutions for customer, partner and employee programs. Founded in 1999 with world headquartersin Seattle, Wash., GMI has operations on five continents.