A fly on the wall in any car company boardroom would notice that the most oft-used word – mouthed particularly by CEOs, marketing directors, design bosses and now even engineering chiefs – is probably ‘brand’. It is used more than ‘stock value’, ‘sales’ (although that comes a close second), ‘profit’ (‘third’), ‘horsepower’, ‘sustainable’ (rising fast) and is way ahead of techno car talk (sadly in decline). Car companies, truly, are obsessed by their brands.
They typically have brand directors, brand managers and a bevy of brand consultants, who do brand bullseyes (full of ‘brand’ words that sum the company’s desired image and philosophy). They anthropomorphise the brand (‘if our car were a person it would be Daniel Craig/Russell Crowe/Clive Owen’ etc); they list activities in which their customers partake (snowboarding, mountain biking, paragliding etc, but rarely sitting on their arses watching TV which is invariably nearer the truth); and they talk about other brands to which their customers are attracted (invariably something by Apple and doubtless a posh designer clothing brand or two; funnily enough, Tesco and M&S rarely figure).
Car companies do badly in major ‘brand’ study
So, with all that money spent on ‘the brand’, all that advertising and football sponsorship, all those millions ensuring that dealers have the right corporate type fonts and colour palettes, why do car company brands do so rubbish in the latest global BrandZ study?
This is a survey, done by Millward Brown Optimor, part of ad giant WPP, that calculates the world’s top brands. It is based on ‘brand equity data’ and interviews with more than ‘1.5 million consumers and professionals across 31 countries to compare more than 50,000 brands’.
BMW and Toyota on top – but slipping
The top car brand, BMW, is way back in 22nd place. The only other car brands in the top 100 are Toyota (23rd), Honda (49th), Mercedes (53rd), Porsche (65th) and Nissan (84th). All six went backwards in the past year. Car brands dipped more than any other sector in 2010 (although they slipped even more the year before).
A few observations and what’s gone wrong?
1) The top car brands are all German or Japanese. Twenty years ago, if a BrandZ study had been done, Ford and GM nameplates would surely have figured prominently. (Ford and Volkswagen, although outside the top 100, both grew in the past year – deservedly.)
2) Car companies have had a tough few years. Plus Toyota and BMW have had their own unique problems (Toyota’s quality slump and BMW’s silly ‘Joy’ ad campaign and grating new 5-series GT and X6).
3) Despite all the brand managers, car companies are still generally poor at looking after their reputations and images – inconsistent products, discrepant dealerships, confusing ad campaigns and dysfunctional large corporate structures don’t help.
4) Car companies aren’t ‘cool’. Mind you, neither are Marlboro and McDonald’s and they were both in the top 10.
5) Technology, rather than marketing, is the defining quality of seven of the top 10 brands (hooray!) – including Apple, General Electric and IBM. Car companies have not done a good job at promoting their technical excellence.
6) Great brands differentiate. There is still a perception that all car companies are much the same.
7) A company that really understands its brand doesn’t need brand police. The brand should be a natural extension of the corporate and product ethos, not a quality dictated by marketing ‘experts’. The more a company talks about its brand, perhaps the less it truly understands it.
Further to the final point: The top name in this year’s BrandZ study was Google. They don’t have any brand managers.