• by Tanya Gazdik , July 13, 2016

Amazon, Netflix and YouTube remain in the top three spots in YouGov BrandIndex’s Top 10 best perceived brands for the first half of 2016. 

YouGov BrandIndex crunched the daily Buzz scores of 1,400 brands it tracks from Jan. 1 through June 30 to determine these scores. Buzz score is determined by asking respondents: “If you’ve heard anything about the brand in the last two weeks, through advertising, news or word of mouth, was it positive or negative?   A score can range from 100 to -100 with a zero score equaling a neutral position.

Google jumped to 4th place from 9th, while Samsung climbed to 5th place from 7th. 

“Google is making progress on driverless cars, is pioneering virtual reality with its cardboard viewer, which has been incorporated in ad campaigns,” YouGov BrandIndex CEO Ted Marzilli tells Marketing Daily. “Samsung's Galaxy S7 handset launched in mid-March to glowing reviews, some touting it as better than the iPhone. Samsung’s timing couldn’t have been better. The payoff was underscored in their recent 2Q earnings report, which reported their best quarter in two years.”

Cancer Treatment Centers of America dropped one spot to 6th place. Walgreens came in at 7th, up from 14th and Lowe’s finished at 8th, up from 11th place. M&M’s finished 9th, up from 18th. Cheerios finished in 19th place, up from 16th.

“Major anniversaries help; M&M's and Cheerios both celebrate 75th anniversaries this year,” Marzilli says. “M&M's launched an ad campaign in March featuring a version of the song 'The Candyman' and has asked consumers to vote on the next permanent color of peanut M&M’s.”

The variety of brands on the top 10 is noteworthy, Marzilli says. 

“While the top part of the list is still dominated by new media, technology and Internet companies, mainstream retailers and top food make the list too, as well as Cancer Treatment Centers of America,” he says.

The top 10 brands with biggest perception improvements in the first half of the year were Facebook, Google, McDonald’s, Nike, Comcast/Infinity, amazon.com, NBC, Chevrolet and YouTube.

There are more brands moving from strength to strength, as opposed to brands that are recovering from prior crises, Marzilli says.

“And bravo to McDonald's, which clearly seems to be getting back on the good side of consumers with their all-day breakfasts and restaurant redesigns,” he says. “They have never appeared on any improvers list before.”

The overall lesson for marketers is regardless of whether you are an established brand or a relative newcomer, you have to keep innovating and adapting to stay relevant and top of mind, he says.

“If you focus on the customers and giving them the things they like and need, you can capture more market share,” Marzilli says. “It's not rocket science -- it's good business.”