• by Aaron Baar , March 12, 2014

In a further testament to the importance of the still-nascent category of streaming entertainment in our brand landscape, Internet video service Netflix and Internet radio service Pandora were among the two brands showing the most growth in Harris Poll’s annual EquiTrend survey. 

Of more than 1,500 brands assessed across over 170 categories, Netflix’s Equity Index score (which is comprised of three factors: familiarity, quality and purchase consideration) increased at the fastest rate of the top 100 measured brands. Pandora, meanwhile, had the fourth-highest equity growth rate. 

“Those two brands -- what’s remarkable about them is that they’ve made it into the top 100 brands that we measure [in a relatively short time],” Joan Sinopoli, senior vice president and solutions consultant at Nielsen Consumer Insights, tells Marketing Daily. “Their rate of equity growth is strong. You don’t expect equity growth to expand too quickly.”

Although the brands have established their equity quickly in relatively new categories, there’s still room for newcomers to challenge them, Sinopoli says. “These are evolving categories. There can always been a game changer. They’re enough in flux, and [the category is] new enough they can always see growth.”

Even Amazon, which topped the poll as the brand with the highest equity, has a significant entertainment streaming component to its offering, Sinopoli points out. 

The importance of technology in consumers’ lives extends beyond the streaming entertainment brands to the devices (and the operating systems behind them) being used. Apple (closely identified with its iOS system) and Android were among the top 10 brands seeing aggressive equity increases in the poll. The preferences people show for their handheld devices show how important they have become in consumers’ daily lives. 

“Mobile devices are becoming an extension of ourselves, and there is a special relationship people have with their cell phones,” Sinopoli says. “It’s an issue of the features and apps and how you end up using it, but it all rolls up to what kind of person you are.”