Technology giant Apple has reportedly become the first brand to cross $1 trillion in brand value, a 15% jump from last year, according to global ranking report BrandZ by Kantar. Apple has also retained its title as the world’s ‘Most Valuable Brand’ for the third year in a row, followed by Google and Microsoft.    

According to Kantar’s latest report, the total value of the top 100 brands has grown by 23% to reach almost $8.7 trillion in 2022, despite the challenges of inflation and economic uncertainty.

The new brand valuation ranking report was reportedly based on the opinions of more than 4.3 million respondents and about 21,000 brands across 532 categories.

Interestingly, it emerges that the Business Technology and Services Platforms category has grown the fastest, increasing in total value by 45%, and this has been partly attributed to the buzz around advanced AI. 

The ranking highlights many aspects that contribute to a brand’s value. One is of course the product itself. In the case of Apple, it had recently introduced AI features to revive demand for iPhone, which has reportedly resonated well with consumers. Also, as analysts point out, the brand strictly adheres to its consistent focus on consumer experience, delivering products, services and touchpoints that closely relate to customers, thus instilling deep loyalty. But this works at many levels to convert into brand valuation.   

As Kantar, which publishes the annual ranking of the most valuable global brands - the BrandZ Top 100, says in its website, “Kantar brand valuation is a method of measuring the financial value of a brand based on its contribution to business performance.” More importantly, the most valuable brands in the world create such powerful connections with their customers that they enable them to speedily create shareholder value, resist market downturn and recover faster from recession, according to Kantar.

The Kantar report also differentiates the “strongest brands” – essentially ones that have built what it calls ‘broader’ and ‘deeper’ connections with consumers -- based on three key qualities: 1. Meaningful 2. Different and 3. Salient. This means the most valuable brands are the ones that strike an emotional chord with their customers, have something new to offer, and are also the fastest to come up in consumers’ brand recall, thus enabling faster decision making.  

Kantar also minces no words when it says that delivering exceptional experience and meaningful customer interaction are critical for brand success – 75% of brand equity it says stems from product/service experience.  This also brings into focus the role of consumer touchpoints such as stores. Incidentally, according to an ET report, Apple’s two company- owned stores in India located in Mumbai and New Delhi, emerged among the company’s best performing stores globally, recording revenue of Rs 190-210 crore last financial year. It remains to be seen when the company will extend the success of these two stores to other cities in the country.  

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