Leader: Bland brands in the UK?

The deal that has seen Virgin Mobile combine with the TV, phone and broadband businesses of NTL:Telewest, itself a recently merged entity, was notable for many things but we would put one thing at the top of the list. For a company that deals with millions of consumers, brand perception is critical and it is no surprise to hear execs are looking forward to renaming the whole consumer-facing business as Virgin.

But brand equity is a tricky subject. We know that good brands are valuable, poorly perceived brands a burden - but measuring the extent to which a brand falls into a certain camp is always hard.

A study out this week from brand consultancy Millward Brown Optimor - the Brandz Top 100 Most Powerful Brands 2006 - placed Microsoft, GE ad Coca-Cola at the head of an impressive list.

Our news story on this was quickly greeted by a Reader Comment pointing out that Forrester Research recently ranked Microsoft near the bottom of a pile of its peers in its 2005 Technology Brand Scorecard. But the Millward Brown figures are farther reaching and let's not forget that by and large Microsoft, to most consumers, is a well-regarded company.

So let's look a little further down the list.

It's a list quite clearly dominated by US companies. Toyota just makes it into the top 10 and - a surprise - China Mobile is in at 4.

But you have to get to 14 to find Europe's top marque, Nokia, and Vodafone leads the UK charge at 16.

In truth, it's not much of a charge. Similar surveys in the past often place Reuters - nowhere to be seen here - as the UK's top brand.

And where is a Virgin, as mentioned earlier? Perhaps its lack of a public listing for the group hurt it in this study, though its Virgin Mobile units, as in the UK arm listed above, find themselves on some stock exchanges.

One interesting aspect of the 100 is that as well as measuring a brand's value - is $62bn of Microsoft's market cap really in its brand? - it gives a mark for 'momentum', namely those on the up and up. And some of the usual consumer tech suspects do well here, too.

Google tops that list, with Apple in at 3, eBay (albeit an internet rather than technology company) at 4 and Amazon.com (ditto) at 8.

Tech giants and those with strong or dedicated internet businesses are well-placed to exploit brands over the coming years. The hope would be that those in the UK who perhaps eye the 100 and ask why they aren't there - or ask how they plan to get there and raise their brand's worth more generally - see the importance of using IT and the internet well.