Women have had a better perception of Unilever’s Axe brand than men since the company launched its first fragrance in the US targeting both sexes, Anarchy. In early January, men and women had relatively equal perceptions of the Axe brand. A couple of weeks later, women began breaking away in a positive direction while men remained stable in their perception. Once the fragrance premiered its cheeky “Unleash the chaos” Anarchy ads showing both men and women succumbing to the “Axe effect,” woman’s perception levels nearly doubled before dipping a bit more recently. Men, on the other hand, showed a similar ... read more

Doritos, Chevrolet, Bud Light and Budweiser have seen the greatest increase in consumer perception amongst Super Bowl advertisers in the ten days since the big game. Chevrolet’s Apocalypse ad seemed well received by everyone except Ford (who requested its withdrawal) and the brand made strong perception gains; ranked number fourteen before the Super Bowl it is currently number two. Toyota and Doritos switched places over the past week. The car maker dropped from its number one spot two days after the Super Bowl down to number nine this week, while Doritos, like the sling-shot baby featured in its add, has ... read more

JC Penney has not only weathered the Ellen Degeneres spokesperson storm, but pulled ahead of rival Kohl’s in consumer perception with its core female 18 – 49 audience in the US. Ironically, Republicans helped drive up the chain’s consumer perception for the first two weeks after Degeneres was named new spokesperson, even after advocacy group One Million Moms launched its well-publicized protest early in that time frame. Before CEO Ron Johnson announced the JC Penney overhaul, conservatives actually had higher perception scores for the retailer than either Democrats or Independents. A mere three days after the January 27th announcement which ... read more

This year auto brands, animals and celebrities dominated Super Bowl advertising, with six out of the top 10 improving brands auto brands. With multiple spots in the game, Toyota’s significant investment seems to have paid off, receiving the largest lift amongst all advertisers. Especially impressive given the clutter of auto advertisers, the Toyota ads appear to hit home with their mix of sentiment and comedy—with their ‘Reinvention’ spot featuring the new Camry getting the most kudos. Becoming a staple in the Super Bowl ad line-up, Hyundai autos beat a cheetah in a race and save a mentors life all while demonstrating horsepower and luxury. ... read more

Pizza Hut has gained the most in value perception with fast food eaters in the annual QSR battle against January sales doldrums in the US. Burger King had the second biggest jump in January, followed by Taco Bell. Jack In The Box also had a sizable bump through the first half of January. Wendy’s remained on top of the value perception chart, while KFC lost a bit of ground in value perception. People normally cut back on their QSR spending in January after binging for December holiday shopping. To keep up revenue numbers, dining chains roll out bargain specials to ... read more

The Costa Concordia shipwreck is dragging down the consumer perception of parent company Carnival in the US, as well as all its major rivals at the height of cruise season, especially Royal Caribbean. As expected, perception of Costa Concordia and owner Carnival Cruise Lines have dropped very quickly in the past two weeks during the crisis. The negative halo effect had the biggest impact on the industry’s number two player in terms of worldwide revenue, Royal Caribbean, while others such as Princess Cruises, Holland America, and Norwegian Cruise Lines have been drawn down only mildly. Costa Concordia, Carnival Cruise Lines, ... read more

Netflix’ consumer perception has had a hard time recovering in the US, even six months after the company’s since-retracted announcement of splitting itself in two, as well as hiking its DVD rental and video streaming fees. Netflix is slowly making its way back since it bottomed out the third week of November 2011, yet it is still well below its lowest perception point since early January 2008. Netflix is now running even with traditional premium cable channel HBO. During this same period since January 2008, emerging competitor YouTube, now investing in original programming, mirrored Netflix’s upward trajectory until those back ... read more

The BrandIndex Buzz Rankings compares Buzz scores for more than 1100 brands in 41 categories, to reveal the US brands with the most positive Buzz in 2011. All of these brands were rated using YouGov BrandIndex’s Buzz score, which asks 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?" Subway is the top­-ranked brand for 2011, heading up the overall Buzz list for the second consecutive year. The sandwich giant is the only dining brand to crack the BrandIndex Buzz Ranking Top 10, which ... read more

Three weeks after Black Friday, most of the top 10 retailers in value perception are showing modest gains, but one retailer has remained significantly ahead of its earlier position – J.C. Penney. Like J.C. Penney, Toys “R” Us has also shown a high single digit gain in value perception and the brand replaces Marshall’s in the number 10 slot this week: boosting its value perception after the Black Friday hoopla has long died down. Amazon and Target remain first and second respectively. However, Wal-Mart has seen some of its value improvement erode, and has fallen from third to fifth place ... read more

Samsung has just edged past the iPhone in consumer perception (adults 18+), likely powered by their new set of ads bashing the Apple fanboys who camp out for hours to buy the new iPhone.  Another Samsung ad brings up the biggest public sore point about the iPhone–its short battery longevity.The two snarky ads, which promote the Galaxy SII, appear to be affecting the iPhone’s consumer perception, sending it into decline around the time the first ad appeared and continuing now.  At the same time, Samsung’s perception has crept up gradually and just surpassed iPhone last week. The ads were released ... read more