Businessweek pdf 2010

The challenge for brands is to respond right away with relevance and sincerity, or else risk compromising the relationship. While this has much to do with its low prices and aggressive strategy, at heart it is also due to the enduring familiarity of the brand.

Its canned soups not only offer an appealing price point, but also a comfort that proves reassuring in tough times. Yet, some brands are already adapting — embracing transparency and a higher level of customer engagement at every touchpoint, while still staying true to their brand promise both internally and externally. The number one brand for the 11th year in a row makes its brand central to its business operations. Coca-Cola was a major presence at the event: asserting itself on billboards and.

This is not as easy as it looks; lack of products in shops and presence at the FIFA World Cup was something for which fellow sponsor and sophisticated marketer Budweiser was criticized. In fact, the Coca-Cola coowned song proved so popular that it went on to become a number one iTunes hit in 17 countries.

Read more about Coca-Cola and social media online at www. However, it has steadily inched back, continually. It has recently seen shares increase more than 20 percent in the U. Critical reception has been just as positive; its cars recently achieved the highest quality ratings from J. Ford has distinct strategies for each of its social media outlets — Twitter to give customers real-time updates about vehicle launches, Facebook to post photos and videos, a Flickr account for product photographs, and YouTube for corporate and crowdsourced videos.

It tapped into all outlets for its wildly successful Fiesta campaign, in which it gave bloggers a new Fiesta car to drive and review — a marketing plan that spawned videos, 6.

Aside from just buzz, however, the campaign was a. Overall, Ford has found the level of engagement on social media to be so high, that it recently decided to opt out of launching its Ford Explorer at auto shows, in favor of Facebook. This year, its Fiesta campaign will attempt to integrate both sides of the coin.

The campaign, a partnership between Ford, University of Michigan and Intel, revolves around the creation of a Fiesta model that has been customized with unique, student-created social media applications. Read more about Ford and the automotive industry at www. Citi, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley not only face new regulations, but the daunting task of rebuilding their reputations and winning back. Unlike competitors, Santander stayed out of U.

As a result, it is a brand that consumers can trust. It further established its presence in the U. There are also plans to increase its U.

It has also launched an ad campaign in the U. These approaches are working: Whereas its name was recognized by only 20 percent of the British public in November , it now has 92 percent brand awareness as of Business is changing, but the principles of strong brands still hold true. In the past few years, marketing accountability and a focus on isolated measurements like Return on Investment ROI or brand perception have led many brand owners astray from these fundamental principles.

As a result, many brands are now seeing. One need only look to Toyota, which was so focused on increasing market share that it compromised the quality and reliability of its products — and the very foundation of its brand — to see the risks in this kind of behavior. It brings together all aspects of a brand — its people, products, positioning and partners — to create a more.

This year, the organizations that failed when it came to commitment were perhaps more visible than those that succeeded. Instead, as news reports note, executives opted to put the brand at risk by taking shortcuts.

In a quieter way, Citi has also suffered for its lack of commitment to its brand. While it has vowed to change and refocus on trust, it has yet to translate this to the customer experience. It may want to change, but until it proves that this promise is central to its decision-making process, it will continue to lose brand equity.

In contrast, ZARA, which has built its brand on providing customers with fast fashion, has shown a high level of commitment to its organization.

ZARA has created internal operations that deliver on its fast fashion proposition, including providing store managers with real-time data in order to make better stock allocation decisions. These factors include proliferation of social media, corporate citizenship, audience fragmentation, the increasing role of product design and increased pressure on ROI. This component examines how secure a brand is across a number of dimensions — from legal protection and proprietary ingredients to design, scale or geographic spread.

This year, brands that scored high in this category include Kleenex and Apple, which both focused on protecting the integrity of their brand. Kleenex, in many ways, holds an enviable position: The brand has become a generic term for facial tissue. However, as with other brands in this position, this comes with risks. Apple is another brand that scored high in protection this year. Additionally, Apple stepped up the registration of all its products, from the shape of its iPod to its desktop icons and apps.

Meanwhile, a brand that saw protection lag was Budweiser. Its year battle to trademark its name in the Czech Republic, Germany and Austria with Czech competitor Budejovicky Budvar which began production of its Budweiser beer in ended negatively for the brand. Because of its failure to protect its brand name, it must now sell its beer under a different name in these markets.

It is vital that those within the organization know and understand all of these elements, because everything that follows hinges on them. Without clarity, a brand lacks insight — the most precious of commodities, particularly in a recessionary climate.

So clarity, as we view it, is about audiences as well as what your brand can offer. Sometimes this is almost instinctive think Virgin and Apple.

At the same time, brands that achieve marketing clarity need to share that knowledge internally across key functions within the business. IBM is one brand that recognizes this. Diageo is another brand that shares its marketing clarity across its business.

The brand makes its DWBB model the Diageo Way of Brand Building central to its marketing culture and internal communications because it forces clarity on those responsible for assets like Johnnie Walker, Smirnoff, Baileys and Guinness. The markets in which we operate are growing harder to understand, but brands that invest in clarity will out-perform those that run on the vapor of instinct.

The brand should have a desire and ability to constantly evolve and renew itself. Two years of recession have impacted the globe.

As a direct result, brands were forced to be more agile and responsive to socioeconomic and competitive pressure. While the trend has been apparent in virtually every sector, it has been especially evident in the automotive category, where the growing concern among customers regarding fuel efficiency and greenhouse emissions, as well as demand for hybrids, has kept brands on their toes.

Indeed, it is no coincidence that every car brand in our study will have some form of hybrid out in the market in the next two years. The true challenge for these brands, however, will be that new offerings adhere to the same design standards as their established models. Another challenge has come in the need to respond to consumers by harnessing the latest technology.

This is evident in the growth of smartphones — especially Apple and BlackBerry, with Nokia seemingly in retreat. Not to be forgotten is the latest innovation from Apple: the iPad. Progress with mobile phones and now smartphones has been driven by fastdeveloping markets, which are driving sales at an accelerating pace.

While this technology has existed for some years, it is only now gaining traction as consumers respond. Yet another challenge is the need to address competition, or perhaps to gain domination over the opposition. Adidas is the major sponsor of football and bought sole rights for the event through FIFA.

It sponsored the German national team, 11 other national teams, and provided the ball the Jabulani. At the same time, Nike, as we have become accustomed to over the years, was extremely active through other events with its own sponsorships. Nike has maintained its momentum well after the football tournament ended, when others stopped. This component is about how soundly a brand is based on an internal capability.

Customers, more reluctant to spend, want to trust the brands they purchase from — and a large part of how brands elicit this trust is through authenticity and a strong heritage. A good example of how this is taking shape is in the luxury sector.

The world is moving fast and brands must keep up in order to stay relevant. Gap is one brand that has integrated mobile into its brand experience. It has developed a mobile shopping platform called Gap StyleMixer that includes video interviews, social feeds from twitter, and products that can be purchased directly from a device.

Its direct mail catalogs also provide QR quick response bar codes that can be scanned with cell phones to get content associated with the product and allow for quick mobile shopping. Overall, the effect is a seamless brand experience — from in-store to web to mobile. And retail is not the only sector using mobile to stay relevant.

This measures the degree to which a brand feels omnipresent and how positively consumers, customers and opinion formers discuss it in both traditional and social media. The rise of social media means that brands have new opportunities to elevate their presence.

A brand that does this exceptionally well and scores high in presence is Starbucks. While it may have lagged in other areas in the past few years, it continues to get social media right. It integrates many different elements — YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, a blog and mobile — combining them together to create a rich and positive online presence.

Central to this is the digital dialogue the brand creates with its customers. This is achieved through a representative in every department, who reacts to the input and output happening online. Additionally, its Mystarbucksidea. Not only must customers recognize the brand, but there must also be an in-depth understanding of its distinctive qualities and characteristics, as well as those of the brand owner.

Apple is a brand that customers immediately understand. They know what they get out of adopting and associating with it. Its products are seen as innovative and creative. This immediate understanding of the brand is in part due to its brand owner, Steve Jobs. Love him or hate him, he humanizes the brand by giving it a face.

This is the degree to which customers perceive the brand to have a positioning that is distinct from the competition. This year, smartphone brands like Apple, Google and BlackBerry faced increased competition and found it particularly difficult to carve out a unique niche. All focused on creating products that stand out from competitors.

BlackBerry may still lead, but the iPhone is the benchmark, with other brands close on their heels. In particular, banks like Santander and Credit Suisse, which stayed relatively immune to the crisis due to conservative investment decisions, have succeeded in crafting a differentiated positioning this year. This measures the degree to which a brand is experienced without fail across all touchpoints and formats.

When we think of consistency, Nike always comes to mind. With its iconic swoosh — a design element from the past — it creates one universal experience across every touchpoint, from advertisements to websites. In recent years, however, consistency has become a bit more complicated. As brands continue to expand, they feel the pressure to adapt to local markets. At the same time, Disney, which is expected to deliver on unparalleled entertainment experiences, suffers when it merely duplicates its amusement parks around the world; to stay consistent with its brand promise, it would do better to reinvent them to delight and entertain new and diverse customers.

There are several criteria considered when valuing the brands for our Best Global Brands rankings. The brand nd is tru truly y global and has successfu fully lly trran ansscen cended ded ge g ogr ograph aphic and a n cu ultu ltural ra diff fferences ces..

It h ces has as exp expand anded and ed d a oss acr ac ss th the ee esta st blished econ sta conomi omi micc cent enters ers rss of the he wo world rld an nd iss ent ent nterin nte ring the h maj majo or or ma kets mar kets of the the h futture e. In meas asur as u ble ura e te ms, this ter thi req re uir uires es that: At least astt 30 percent of revenues es mus u t come from outtsid ide e th the he h hom ho ome cou ountry, and no om more e than n5 50 0 perrc rcent e of revenues should co come me fro rom m any ny one continen nt.

It must have a presence on at least three major continents, and must have broad geographic coverage in growing and emerging markets. Wal-Ma Wal M rt, although it does bus bu iness in int i ernational markets, ofte f n does so under a variety of brands, and is not sufficiently global. Likewise, s several industries have been excluded for similar reasons, such as telecommun m ications, which tend to be strongly oriented to national markets and face awareness challenges outside of home markets.

Major pharmaceutical companies, while very valuable businesses, are also omitted. This is because consumers tend to build a relationship with the product brands rather than the corporate brand. Additionally there is not enough publicly disclosed financial data on pharmaceutical product brands to meet our criteria.

For the purposes of the rankings, the capital charge rate is set by the industry weighted average cost of capital WACC. Role of brand measures the portion of the decision to purchase that is attributable to brand — this is exclusive of other aspects of the offer like price or feature. Role of brand determinations for this study derive, depending on the brand, from one of three methods: primary research, a review of historical roles of brand for companies in that industry, or expertpanel assessment.

Brand strength measures the ability of the brand to secure the delivery of expected future earnings. Brand strength is reported on a 0 to scale, where is perfect, based on an evaluation across 10 dimensions of brand activation. Performance in these dimensions is judged relative to other brands in the industry, and in the case of exceptional brands, relative to other world-class brands. The brand strength inversely determines, through a proprietary algorithm, a discount rate. That rate is used to discount branded earnings back to a present value based on the likelihood that the brand will be able to withstand challenges and deliver the expected earnings.

These branded earnings, which are based on the brand strength, are discounted back to a present value and totaled to arrive at a brand value. It has adapted quickly to social media, with 11 million fans on. Facebook and 96, followers on Twitter as of August The brand is likely to face challenges as customers grow more health conscious in the coming years, and soda is increasingly taxed in the U. However, it is already thinking ahead with aggressive targeting of fast-developing markets and programs like Healthy Active Living which address this criticism head-on.

IBM made strategic acquisitions over the past nine years to strengthen its portfolio and continue its seamless evolution from hardware to service to knowledge economy to innovation. Its focus on emerging economies allows the company to tap into doubledigit growth by providing the infrastructure its clients require. Operating income and earnings per share also dropped. In recent years, Microsoft has spent more time creating defensive products rather than innovating — for example, launches of the Xbox to compete with Sony Playstation, Bing to compete with Google, the quickly abandoned Windows Kin Phone to compete with Apple iPhone, Windows 7 to compete with Linux, and updated other software such as Visual Studio, Microsoft Office and Microsoft DirectX.

Still, despite the many rivals close on its tail, Microsoft maintains its position as the number one operating system on the market. This year, it proved it is still capable of innovation with the introduction of its Xbox Kinect, which uses original technology.

IBM also leads its category when it comes to corporate citizenship. Although it continues to leverage this messaging through investments in Google. And though its effort to pull out of China, which was censoring the search engine, and realign with its message demonstrated its commitment to its promise, only a few months later, it was quietly persuaded to work with the regime again.

Expect the brand to continue to diversify and expand, even as it experiences increasing backlash. Already a strong brand with deep roots, the recession reminded people once again of its great value.

In a year that saw many companies pull back, Intel stayed the course, committing billions of dollars to new and updated manufacturing facilities, which accelerated the rollout of new processors. It looked for ways to expand the business in two directions: moving beyond the PC and server market, launching chips for everything from mobile phones to smart TVs, and creating ways to help its partners improve their businesses via an app store and the creation of an applications developer program.

It has also addressed the issue of security by recently acquiring McAfee. Only time will tell whether the brand that acted as the engine of computing for the past 20 years will continue to play that role for the next GE continues its two-year decline in brand value. While it continues to lead in terms of sustainability, this year the importance of green has decreased.

Instead, efficiency has become the new watchword. GE has also been focusing on introducing more new products at more price points. The idea is to drive management practices to capture new opportunities — essentially taking a low-cost, fast-developing market business model and translating it to the developed world. DISNEY Disney again leveraged its history of quality, family-fun experiences through clean, well-managed parks and kid-oriented movies and merchandise. This year, the youth-oriented brand continued to cultivate a strong social media presence, and announced that it would be rebranding its stores to make them more theme-park-like and multisensory.

Despite the hits to the amusement park industry due to a decline in tourism, incentives like free tickets for volunteer work as well as a variety of discounts on park admission and hotel stays have kept the parks in demand. While the brand continues to expand, it could be more innovative about adapting to the needs of customers in different parts of the world, rather than just duplicating what it has done in the past.

For years, Nokia has been perceived as a company that is committed to enhancing of communications by offering affordable, accessible, functional and creative mobile phone devices and applications. The brand was late in coming to market with a compelling product and it is in this new category that growth, relevance and emotional connection with the brand is built.

Nokia was also caught unprepared for the follow-on explosion of apps and the OS they run on, making it difficult for the brand to build an effective ecosystem for its products. With these challenges and the weakening of the role of hardware over carriers, Nokia is seeing clear challenges ahead that may be hard to overcome in the short-term. As it evolves into more of a services and software provider, HP needs to show that the innovation it is known for in hardware will be replicated in its newer, less tangible offers.

The diversity of its competitors and geographies continues to put pressure on the brand, as it must play to both local and global considerations. Continued success hinges on the commitment of all business units and an effective engagement of its ,person workforce.

Customers looking for quality returned to the brand, despite cheaper competitors. While it continues to struggle with attracting a younger audience due to its reputation as a traditional and conservative brand, it has made efforts to infuse sportiness and freshness into its tone of voice. Overall, it continues to grow its brand with constant innovation, which has garnered it numerous awards.

For products as ordinary as a razor blade and shaving cream, Gillette has introduced new technologies in this market more than any other competitor. However, many of these innovations are easily copied, such as gel shaving cream and multiple razor blade technologies. In recent years, Gillette has taken to user-generated content and other online media to further grow its brand among younger users.

While Gillette might be best known for its campaigns featuring sports legends such as Tiger Woods, Thierry Henry and Roger Federer, its partnership with Woods and Henry has led to a rash of negative publicity after they were both embroiled in scandal and controversy last year.

The number one car manufacturer in , Toyota had established itself as a leader in dependability, reliability, safety, efficiency, innovation, longevity and sustainability through its pioneering hybrid engines. Meanwhile, reluctance to acknowledge the problem only made matters worse. Because Toyota uses shared parts and technologies across multiple models, a technical hitch with one car also means problems with others. Still, historically, Toyota has been a resilient brand, and weathered the recession well.

Cisco continues to evolve, catching and addressing new trends that represent market disruptions. The latest surge on video and collaborative 2. The campaign. Marlboro has a very strong past — it is about heroic men, naturalness and simplicity.

However, recently it has attempted to make the brand more contemporary, by using more youthful, modern images, sometimes getting rid of cowboys, and focusing more on parties and young people. As a result, its image as a brand is a little unclear. Its generalness, which was once its strength, has become a weakness, as it continues to lose out to customers who prefer cigarettes associated with a more distinct personality, like Dunhill or Gauloises.

A strong and consistent story will be more important than ever before as India, Brazil, China and Russia are the new growth markets. One area where Marlboro leads is in addressing the risks associated with its product.

Not only does it ensure that its labor situations and tobacco farming are impeccable, but it also invests in educating children and in domestic violence prevention. Luxury fashion and luggage brand Louis Vuitton continues to successfully differentiate itself by focusing on the art of the journey, despite continued counterfeiting problems.

Overall, however, the brand is performing strongly and should expect to see continued growth in Asia particularly Japan once the market revitalizes. Not only has the brand cultivated a strong social media presence on Facebook and Twitter, but its corporate citizenship policies are particularly notable for this category: It has made progress in reducing the energy it consumes and communicates this clearly to employees as well.

Negative buzz over the iPad name was quickly replaced by glowing sales and avid converts. It continues to control its messages very carefully, which creates enormous buzz and anticipation. Advertising campaigns and interactive websites remain distinct and consistent, keeping the role of brand exceptionally high. SAMSUNG Samsung has been on the forefront of digital and design, developing new products and increasing its presence in all its markets.

Its sales growth, even in tough economic times, demonstrates its ability to effectively hedge its portfolio of businesses. This year, Samsung saw strong mobile phone sales. In the U. Additionally, as Honda moves forward, it will need to step up its product development and design in order to compete with Kia, Hyundai and potentially Ford and.

Beyond hybrids, Honda is also engaged in a broad range of initiatives that support sustainable development, particularly through enhanced quality, safety and environmental conservation. This year, it continued to expand from primarily software into hardware, merging with Sun Microsystems — a deal that gives it control of JAVA programming language , Solaris operating systems , SPARC processors and the MySQL database, all of which will strengthen its portfolio of middleware and business applications.

Only recently has the brand begun to modify its aggressive, sales-focused personality to one that is more customer-service centric. PEPSI Representing fun and refreshment and aimed at a younger-minded audience than its direct competitor, Coca-Cola, Pepsi has the freedom to express itself creatively and progressively. Its offer for customers to get phone credits with every purchase displays a willingness for the brand to live out its positioning as a youth-oriented challenger brand.

Its corporate citizenship programs are extraordinarily well received — particularly its latest initiative to pull soft drinks from schools. While this might impact brand sales in the short-term, it ultimately will pay off. Now more than ever, a credit card that requires you to pay it off monthly and is prudent about who it offers credit to, looks like a safe investment.

From its name to its positioning, victory is the thread that runs through the brand. Competition from adidas, however, means that Nike still needs to focus on upping the stakes. In particular, it could improve when it comes to social media, as this is one area where it trails adidas. This year, despite some hits for its support of Tiger Woods throughout his scandal as well as negative criticism for its ad that aired on the subject , the brand seems to have escaped relatively unscathed. But, while the brand has excelled in certain areas, this year its attempt to offer.

In January , after months of complaints, it was forced to scrap the fee increases. This year, the recession also forced SAP to cut costs sharply and lay off nearly 4, employees.

Overall, its long-term performance looks less positive than its history. Meanwhile, its focus on Nespresso, its next-generation product, has been at the expense of the masterbrand. IKEA is the company that made furniture fashionable, cheap and disposable. It continues to display innovation in product design, looking to ski makers who bend wood and shopping cart makers to understand how to make sturdier furniture.

Its effort to cut prices on its items as well as promote itself in a humorous and quirky way keeps customers engaged and supports the cult following IKEA has built over the years. Additionally, because IKEA had corporate citizenship initiatives in place before it became a corporate trend, they are tied well to the overall brand strategy.

In , IKEA entered its 25th market, opened 15 new stores and saw an increase in sales. However, in comparison to Goldman Sachs, J. Morgan faces fewer challenges when regaining customer trust. This year, J. In particular, the brand has excelled in pulling such design elements of the past as its hallmark Clydesdales, and making them more relevant for today.

It is a huge. UPS UPS, famous for its package delivery expertise, is still not well known for other areas of its business. Expansion into business services has made the brand proposition has become broader and weaker. Since its refresh several years ago, the UPS brand has maintained its strong performance while slowly expanding perceptions. While it received a California Air Quality Award in Corporate Leadership, its corporate citizenship strategy could be better tied to the brand.

A user-generated online video contest, in partnership with the popular Chinese video-sharing site Tudou. Morgan, emerged with its brand intact. It actively seeks expansion opportunities, particularly as brands like Santander extend their reach. This year, HSBC has continued to explore opportunities in emerging markets, though the economic results in Asia were less rosy than anticipated. CANON Since , Canon has maintained its leading position in the global camera market and expanded into imaging solutions with its focus on creating unique technology.

Sony, the premier provider of networked consumer electronics and entertainment, is becoming increasingly efficient, agile and innovative — although it still faces steep competition from Samsung.

Sony also showed its corporate commitment to reducing global greenhouse gas emissions by seven percent in This year it introduced energy-efficient products such as the BRAVIA V5; it claims that the power consumption of the and inch models are the lowest in the market. Open Tennis. Although its brand is loved around the globe, it suffers from a fragmented and inconsistent worldwide product portfolio and brand strategy that likely cause inefficiencies in the brand and business management.

It is clearly committed to brand, as it is one of the top 50 advertising spenders, according to Advertising Age. Despite this, it does not lose track of the desire to push the nutritional aspects of its products. COM It was a great year for Amazon. Although it saw new Kindle competitors this year, it still retains roughly 90 percent of the e-book market. Its Kindle faces growing competition and which is lowering. Surprisingly enough, the leading online retailer has a minimal social media presence and virtually no corporate citizenship practice.

It bred some of the smartest investment bankers and proprietary traders and housed large private equity and hedge funds. Today, however, its aggressive, titanic leadership image has become a detriment. While the bank may appear to have been humbled with the rest of Wall Street in , after a government bailout, strong earnings and high bonuses have led to a great deal of debate around whether Goldman Sachs is working in the best interest of its clients or itself.

Despite a recent. This year, it is becoming apparent that the same trend is not likely to persist if the recession lifts. Goldman currently faces a dichotomy: On the one hand, its economic results appear to be more stable than its competitors although it faces a weaker quarter. On the other, it faces an angry public who will only continue to lash out until Goldman Sachs begins to demonstrate that it is making sincere efforts to better align its ethics with its brand.

As part of its globalization strategy, Thomson Reuters sought opportunities in the developing economies of China, India, Brazil and completed 31 acquisitions in , 16 of which were outside the U. It continues to focus on employee development programs and invest in diversity, community impact, responsible sourcing and the environment as some of the new ways to build its global brand.

Dell has started to focus on developing its brand and sub-brands more than before, although it has had difficulty moving away from its marketing-oriented policies. As a result, Dell is having trouble differentiating itself and establishing a unique and relevant value proposition. Brands like Acer are catching up in PC market share.

Still, Dell continues to do some very exciting work with social media. Not only are customers invited to offer feedback on their website, but Dell has a great tactical response team working around the clock to respond to online chats. Philips has grown across all three main divisions in the past year — Consumer Lifestyle, Healthcare and Lighting. Its product offerings in all three categories respond to major trends that are currently changing the world: an aging population, urbanization, energy efficiency and focus on personal health and well-being.

The company has been able to respond swiftly and effectively to the downturn by reducing their cost base while continuing to make focused investments in innovation, marketing and targeted acquisitions to strengthen their portfolio in key categories. For example, Philips acquired Saeco, the espresso machine leader, and several healthcare acquisitions in emerging markets.

Citi was one of the brands most impacted by the economic crisis and there is continued uncertainty around the long-term direction of the bank. As a result, it is working at reinventing itself by admitting its errors, owning up to problems, collecting customer feedback on a blog dedicated to improving the brand the new Citi blog and vowing to change and recover.

Its attempts to be honest and restructure are a good start, but the brand needs to go a long way to regain trust. Overall, the trend toward timeless pieces allows Gucci to increase prices per piece and create something that the customer feels is an investment.

EBay is in the process of transforming its image from online auctioneer into a global internet marketplace and payment service, with PayPal now a third of total sales. Additionally, many changes aim to improve the sometimes-confusing experience of eBay shopping. Its th birthday celebration last year was the perfect opportunity to launch global citizen projects that included work with education, female employment and self-esteem issues. Heinz has a strong brand personality and tone of voice.

Last year it went through a massive rebranding process but only made a small change to its packaging and image, which demonstrates the consistency that Heinz values for its brand and its products.

In a challenging recessionary year, Accenture positioned itself for the future by enhancing its core business, expanding in fast-developing markets and investing in new and emerging growth areas. It builds value on its responsiveness and relevance. New merchandise arrives in the store daily; clothing assortments are fully refreshed each month. The brand always gets high marks for its green efforts above and beyond all in its category.

But due to the economic crisis, it has been evolving its focus to efficiency, one of the main emerging drivers. Although ZARA has never advertised in traditional channels, it has three million Facebook fans as of mid and a presence on several social media platforms.

While the retailer has been cautious about launching an e-commerce site due to concerns about the complexity of online sales, it has announced launches in the U. A progressive rollout of the site to other markets will follow. Its decision to reject a federal bailout has kept the perception of the brand relatively healthy both in the U. This year, it has been extremely innovative with product designs, incorporating the newest technology into car models.

It has also excelled at marketing its vehicles, tapping into a younger audience through social media. Its decision to slim down its portfolio by killing the Mercury brand will allow it to devote more time and resources to the Ford brand.

Although it has stayed relatively quiet on sustainable automotives, later in it plans to introduce electric models in the U. Additionally, this year it introduced cleaner diesel engines in its heavy-duty pickup trucks, as well as a hybrid SUV. The brand has made progress, with lots of positive momentum for new product launches slated for the upcoming years. It also successfully connected with old and young audiences through its Punch Buggy campaign.

It furthers this brand proposition by continuing to partner with dental offices while making the professional care line a key initiative for further growth and exploration.

Since Colgate differentiates itself from competitors on this platform, it could leverage its expertise more than it does. Colgate continues to lead in advertising, increasing spending seven percent last year, and is usually ranked among the top companies to work for by Fortune.

Crest continues to dominate the home teeth-whitening space, but Colgate has recently attached its whitening system to professional dental offices, which gives it more credibility as an oral care expert. As a result, the music content that the brand was built on is no longer central and its positioning is unclear. This year, the MTV Video Music Awards had a record-setting viewership, and millions continued to interact with the brand through the online after-show content. Still, in recent years, the MTV brand has taken a backseat to the fame of its programming.

This year, it aggressively completed a merger with Smith Barney, to become the largest brokerage force in the world. While this was a big move, Morgan Stanley has remained focused primarily on internal operations — from corporate citizenship to pursuing its signature expansion and innovation.

In an effort to respond to customer needs, it continues to expand its customer base and diversify, moving from device to network services and widening its product line. While all this expansion is a sign of a healthy brand, the latest push from Apple to make inroads in the corporate world continues to put pressure on BlackBerry.

It is still the category leader, but it must continue to innovate and push its product line to compete with Apple. The group ranks above average in its industry in corporate citizenship. Danone sticks to its health-conscious positioning, even if consumers may desire less nutritious options at times. Unlike other companies that simply claim to be healthy, it fully delivers on this promise and sometimes even borders on a nutrition company.

It offers products so healthy they are almost medicinal, including probiotic yogurt and Danacol, a cholesterol-reducing yogurt. Danone is highly regarded for its efforts as a corporate citizen, ranking third in a recent sustainability survey conducted by Two Tomorrows consultancy. Its annual report details corporate social responsibility initiatives closely tied to the brand, which range from providing safe drinking water to educating consumers on healthy eating.

Since rebranding in , Xerox continues to focus on the areas of innovation, the environment and corporate citizenship. So far, its innovation work appears to be working — patents were up 16 percent in While the recession negatively impacted its sales, Xerox can expect to bounce back due to small and midsize businesses showing renewed interest in spending.

Its print donations to communities in Canada and the U. And yet Xerox could more proactively consider its history with paper and develop a corporate citizenship strategy more closely tied to its heritage. It strives to offer quality products to consumers throughout their life cycle and is always looking for ways to add a nutritional boost.

The related ads target teens around the globe, featuring young musicians in various markets. KFC has made progress extending its brand relevance beyond the dinner and picnic option. It leads its category in presence in China, where it is the most popular fast food, and continues to expand in India. The brand is continually at the forefront of innovation and change in the sporting goods industry. Indeed, all areas of the adidas Group are required to generate at least one meaningful innovative improvement per year.

Customers often demonstrate high brand loyalty to shoes, but other products do not provide clear enough distinction apart from the logos. Innovations like this, and its huge presence at the World Cup, are raising the visibility of the brand. In , Audi celebrated its th birthday. With electric, e-tron car models in the works, as well as much time and focus devoted to its product portfolio, advertisements and sponsorships, the brand is likely to only grow stronger in the future.

While still not quite at its brand value levels, Avon has kept to its differentiated brand promise this year, bolstering it with social media and philanthropic efforts. Consumers continue to be its most effective and efficient brand advocates through word of mouth and referrals. In the current economic climate, its ability to harness this power through its unique direct selling business model that employs over six million women as Avon representatives to manage their own business and earn their own income has been even more appealing.

It has prioritized becoming a social networking hub since Carol Bartz took over as Chief Executive in January The brand is also in the process of developing a very consistent, recognizable identity by rebranding 20 percent of its business to the masterbrand. Allianz also excels when it comes to social media.

For example, as a partner of the International Paralympic Committee, Allianz is supporting the Paralympics in Vancouver with its own Twitter and Facebook efforts. In , Yahoo! While there is opportunity here to command more than 40 percent market share, there are challenges as well — namely in ensuring that the search engine experience is compelling enough to convert light searchers into regular searchers.

While the acquisitions put Santander in an enviable position, its ambitious and quick expansion does come with risks: for example, inconsistencies in its visual, verbal identity and experience. However, moves to quickly and seamlessly rebrand its newly acquired U. Still, this year saw strong efforts in social media. Because Kleenex is so closely tied to the environment, it works to protect nature and the very trees that it uses to make its products.

Still, Porsche is perceived to be more than just a sports car, continuing to appeal to car lovers and the wealthy for its inspiring driving experience. It has continued to leverage its brand through a selective number of ad spots, its customer-relationship. While its four-door Panamera could potentially do more harm than good impacting its luxury status , more diesel and hybrid models could bolster the brand.

Although green, in some ways, seems at odds with a brand known for its sports cars, Porsche introduced one hybrid model in Reading free financial periodicals is an excellent approach to expand your financial knowledge without spending any money. You can choose a magazine to fit your individual needs and interests because there are so many free financial magazines available.

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