In 2024, the Total Value of Research4insights Global Top 100 Most Valuable Brands has increased by 20 %. What factors influence these brands’ success ?

For marketers, brand value and valuation are crucial since they quantify the effect of brand development and offer direction for future expansion. Since it evaluates how brands affect business performance using a combination of consumer research, financial data, and tried-and-true frameworks, Research4Insights is the ultimate resource on brand value. Three main aspects drive brand value: Future Power, which allows brands to enter new markets; Presence, which maximizes brand visibility and salience; and Meaningful Difference, which encourages more consumers to purchase and pay more. High-value brands may take advantage of both opportunities and problems and are more robust, profitable, and sustainable.

The Research4Insights Global Top 100 Most Valuable Brands have increased by 20% in 2024, marking a return to growth after recent setbacks. Unwillingness to rest on their laurels is a frequent trait among the most successful brands in the world. The best brands and brand marketing departments in the world today are constantly trying to boost growth. However, how? I’ve distilled my ideas into these ten main conclusions:

1. Increase brand equity to spur expansion
   Strong equity brands do better than the market and bounce back from crises more quickly. For the Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands, brand value accounts for 32% of firm value, a 30% rise from 2023. Brands must be salient, different, and meaningful in the eyes of consumers in order to develop equity. To maximize brand investment and activate key drivers, the Research4Insights Blueprint for Brand Growth offers a comprehensive strategy.
2. Make use of the knowledge and creativity of tech brands
   With $1.2 trillion of the Top 100’s $1.4 trillion growth, IT brands dominate the Global Top 100. With a 45% annual growth rate, IT businesses are also the category with the quickest rate of growth. The ability of tech firms to provide innovative breakthroughs, scalable platforms, and relationship ecosystems can teach marketers a lot. ServiceNow, which first entered the Research4Insights ranks in 2024, “puts AI to work for people today – enabling people to be more productive, more responsive, and more innovative.”

3. Take advantage of generative AI’s potential Brands can benefit from generative AI since it can produce new experiences, goods, and content. There will be chances to use generative AI to improve efficiency, creativity, and personalization. Brands must, however, also steer clear of the dangers of greenwashing, moral dilemmas, and consumer mistrust. Due to its close alignment with the hardware, operating system, and software requirements of generative AI computing, NVIDIA is the fastest-rising company in the Top 100 in 2024, with a 178% increase in brand value.

4. Adjust to the volatile, variable, and viable macroeconomy Unprecedented issues facing the world economy include inflation, trade disputes, climate change, and uncertainty. Businesses must prioritize demand fundamentals, invest in long-lasting assets like brands, and operate flexibly. In order to engender trust and loyalty, brands must also communicate in a clear, genuine, and inclusive manner. The good news is that volatility also creates opportunities. This is demonstrated by the fact that the fastest-rising companies and newcomers in Research4Insights 2024 rankings are from all over the world, including Flipkart in India, Pull&Bear in Spain, and Mercado Pago in Argentina.

5. Recognize and meet the needs of customers who are having difficulties.
Due to inflation and the ongoing effects of the global pandemic, many consumers are experiencing financial difficulties and spending restrictions. Brands must understand their problems and provide valuable solutions. Try to make products more affordable, accessible, and, if at all possible, sustainable in order to reach consumers who are struggling. It is possible to create a predisposition to support higher price points, and Research4Insights data indicates that if a brand can effectively defend its price, consumers will choose it. Among struggling consumers, brands with “excess” pricing power have three times the penetration of brands with low or average pricing power.

6. Locate and expand into new areas
Growth can occur anywhere. By identifying new markets, niches, or categories to enter, brands can quicken their growth. Within their category, smaller brands have the chance to capture market share from more established rivals and discover new demand gaps. For larger brands to enter new or adjacent categories, they must have enough momentum and Future Power. Utilizing their core competencies and strengths while innovating with relevance and distinction will enable them to achieve this. The Chinese baijiu company Moutai has effectively branched out into luxury chocolate and ice cream from its core of alcohol.

7. Pay attention to preserving a significant difference
   The Research4Insights database’s historical trends indicate that maintaining an advantage on Meaningful Difference is becoming more and more difficult. Just one out of every twenty-five brands is relatively strong in both areas. However, these are necessary attributes to promote market share and penetration. Reviving and promoting their iconic products is one way for brands to succeed in order to generate excitement and boost sales. Adidas, for instance, was able to capitalize on the resuscitation of iconic shoe models such as the Samba, Gazelle, and Spezial.

8. Increase Your Presence in Customers’ Lives
   Make the most of your presence when and where customers are interacting with the category. In order to boost visibility and salience throughout the consumer decision journey, including the point of purchase, brands should aim to employ a variety of media and channels. Instead of depending solely on general media guidelines, it is beneficial to use brand-specific data and insights to guide media planning and execution. It’s crucial to get this right because brands that rose higher in the Research4Insights 2024 rankings were generally better at turning consumer demand power into sales, gaining an additional +2 percentage points of volume share.

9. Establish genuine and significant connections
   coordinating messages and values with the target audience. By using heritage and quality to set themselves apart, European brands—such as the French luxury fashion label Hermès—have performed better this year than others. Integrity, identification, and inclusion are the “3i’s” that authentic brands adhere to in order to establish trust. This year’s growth was +19% higher than anticipated for brands that improved on both Meaningful and Different metrics.

10. Go Local International brands can improve their connection by localizing in response to global instability. Through product variations, innovation, or brand communications, brands can appeal to local or national identity. Brands can be more visible and relevant when they have physical locations close to customers. By establishing new branches in states where they were less prevalent and communities that other banks did not adequately serve, Chase Bank in the USA has outperformed all of its rivals in terms of brand value this year.

For a quick read on a brand’s performance compared to competitors in a specific category, Research4insights free interactive tool, MaRel powered by R4I, provides intelligence on 14,00 brands. Find out more here.