Harte Hanks — a “global, behavior-driven customer experience company” — has unveiled its inaugural Most Motivating Brands Index, a list of brands ranked according to their ability to influence consumer behavior.
The top 15 ranking brands, in descending order by index scores, are (1) Google, (2), Amazon, (3), Samsung, (4), Disney, (5), Dove, (6) Target, (7) Nike, (8) Paypal, (9) Home Depot, (10) Apple, (11) Sony, (12) Teladoc, (13) LG, (14) Visa and (15) Headspace.
“2020 is clearly a tumultuous year that has brought a number of societal issues to the forefront in our country. As people seek to make sense of these issues, they are reevaluating their lives and enacting a number of changes, including in how they make purchase decisions,” says Gretchen Ramsey, chief strategy officer, Harte Hanks. “The brands topping our list are the most successful in maintaining influence in people’s lives during this time, and they are doing it in ways that will likely have a long-term impact after this culture-reshaping year.”
The Most Motivating Brands Index is part of the Harte Hanks Behavioral Index, a global initiative to uncover emerging behavioral shifts that influence consumer behavior. The Most Motivating Brands were determined using a proprietary methodology that evaluates brands on a set of drivers critical to empathy – or, the act of showing consumers that they are being listened to and understood – and that demonstrate Action to serve those consumers.
Google rated the highest on a number of drivers, including Creativity and Cultural Relevance. Amazon, the second highest-rated brand on the Motivating Brands Index, was rated the most Reliable brand, and also scored high in areas such as Responsiveness and Relevance. Apple had the highest Action total score, while Dove ranked highest on total Empathy.
The Harte Hanks Behavioral Index launched in March 2020 and is updated on a continual basis. It uses a mix of periodic surveys, continuously pulled web-based data and ongoing analysis to uncover emerging behavioral shifts and trends. As of today, the Harte Hanks Behavioral Index includes insights based on 500 million global social conversations 7,000 people surveyed, 40,000 global stories and 2 million semantic artifacts.
(Dennis Sellers has been covering the Apple industry since 1996. In addition to“Apple World Today,” he also runs his own freelance writing/editing service. If you want more info about the latter, email him at dennis.sellers@comcast.net.)
