Microsoft becomes top brand

Marketing news commentators report that Microsoft has been voted as the globally leading business-facing brand – beating top competitor Google for the title.

Marketing Magazine announces that Google has fallen to number five on the Business Superbrands Top 500 survey – which was generated by The Centre for Brand Analysis (TCBA). Meanwhile, Rolls Royce held onto its second place position with BlackBerry and Virgin Atlantic closely following in third and fourth places respectively.

The highest climber was that of hotelier Premier Inn, who picked Lenny Henry to front their large scale 2010 advertising campaign. Aviva, rebranded from Norwich Union, was the second highest climber and interestingly, also utilised a big budget advertising strategy this year, starring the likes of Ringo Starr and Bruce Willis.

The ten biggest fallers of 2010 include four banks, with the Royal Bank of Scotland falling out of the Top 500 completely. Investment banks Morgan Stanley and JP Morgan suffered the most under the strain of the recession, dropping 147 and 152 places respectively.

To select the Top 500, the TCBA compiles a list of 1,200 companies to start with, then short-lists them down to 500 using a small panel of business experts. The results are then voted on by nearly 2000 business professionals from a variety of sectors, who rate the brands from one to ten.

Chairman of TBCA, Stephen Cheliotis, commented on the results, saying: ”Once again, Microsoft and Google have proved their potency by fighting it out for the top sports. The financial services sector however, has seen mixed results, with the investment banks particularly losing ground over the year.”

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