Playing my tune
Apple was followed by internet brands Google, Amazon, Yahoo! and eBay, which together managed to push powerful brands like Coca-Cola off the list.
Marketing consultants Vivaldi Partners and Forbes say Apple increased its brand value by 38% in the last four years -- largely thanks to the ubiquity of the iPod.
Handheld email and phone device Blackberry and internet search engine Google tied in second, putting websites Amazon and Yahoo! in fourth and fifth place respectively.
Power brands like Coca-Cola and McDonald's, which typically spend the most on advertising, did not even make it into the Next Generation of Growth Brands top 20. Nike came in 16th place while Toyota, with the highest brand value of $25.8bn, came in 17th place. No British brands in the top twenty either.
I thought at first the digital brands were all top as it was about early adopters, but really that only works for Blackberry.
Google is no longer the favoured search plaything of early adopters and you've sat on the tube and seen that the white iPod headphones are everywhere. It's been adopted. I should add I have acquired anti mugging technology to go with mine (also known as black headphones) in case you see me and worry that I am not part of this ubiquity.
With Red Bull at seven and Starbucks at eight (MTV, Electronic Ats, Samsung are there as well) it seems to suggest that the thing all these brands have in common is the youth market and the word of mouth support that comes with that.
I'd break it down and put the iPod shuffle technology on the list as well. It throws up real random stuff - my list of songs from this morning.
1. Pain Killer - Turn Brakes
2. Personal Halloway - Bush (I must delete this song/band)
3. The House Song - The Beta Band
4. Cohokian - Jay Farrar
5. Don't forget me - Red Hot Chilli Peppers
6. Stars all seem to weep - Beth Orton
7. Swallowed by the sea - Cold play
8. Susan's House - the eels
9. Presuming Ed - Elbow
10. Loretta's Scar- Pavement.
I digress, I wanted to say that the thing for Apple now is that it wants to translate all that iPod brand value into something bigger and sell more PCs, but I think it's going to have a tough time. Most people (ie the 97.5% of people who don't use Macs) are iPod fans rather than Apple fans, and it will take a lot more to convince them to switch.
6 comments:
I was going to write my playlist but in truth I haven't been able to use my iPod other than plugged through the car stereo since the unfortunate incident with my ears. Talk about deprivation! Who needs Live8!
Admit it Gordon, that was just an excuse to tell us what you've got on your iPod?
Shuffle technology is wonderful, I don't own an iPod (saving up for an iRiver and saving my ears at the same time) but hardly a day goes by without some deep revelation springing from a juxtaposition of tracks in iTunes or my car MP3 player. John Allen Paulos (one of my favourite writers) wrote an interesting piece about this in the guardian a while back.
By the way, I don't think I told you: I placed an order for my first ever Apple Mac last week (a 12" PowerBook). Seriously. The Brand Value Translation has begun!
iTunes is currently playing: "Chrysler Chorale Overture" by Jonathan Bepler, from the album "Music for Matthew Barney's Cremaster 3". Very unsettling.
Okay, it was just a playlist ruse. Serioiusly though, you get more processing power for your buck with a PC.
I don't get the whole Mac devotion thing and the worshipping at house of Steve Jobs.
Mac fans have this idea somehow that Apple is like rebel corporation when it is just another corporation lucky enough to have devoted fans.
Not that it respects its customers much - there's no other way to excuse the crappy battery life of the first and second genration iPods.
Dan don't reward Apple, go and buy a nice Sony/Toshiba laptop instead.
Too late, I already bought it. I was looking at a Sony initially, which is where your "bang for your buck" argument falls down: the Sony was £1699, the similarly specced Mac £1049.
I agree with you about Mac devotees and the rebel alliance though, they're all deluded (as the book I just reviewed for you makes very clear). Don't worry, I still have my buck-banging big PC sat at home, the PowerBook is mainly just a "word-processing on the train" thing, plus an experiment to see whether there really is anything in what my Mac devotee buddies tell me (I think there's a little truth to it, just not as much as they'd like to think).
Oh and, Gordon, sell that crappy iPod of yours and buy an iRiver. Much more BANG for your buck.
I'm pretty happy with my iPod, admittedly my first 20gb one died after ten months - but hey, they did replace it with the third generation 60gb model.
60Gb? That's half the size of my MP3 collection of 20,000 odd songs. You'd need one hell of a battery to listen to all that lot.
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