Sales vs. Brand Power
Automobiles are not just a means of transportation, but also cultural icons. So, a brand image is essential to determining success in the future automobile market. Unfortunately, the brand power of Hyundai Motor cannot quite match that of the global top 5, and therefore Hyundai Motor needs to work on this urgently.
According to the best 100 brands of 2014 announced by Interbrand on Oct. 9, Hyundai and Kia Motor were ranked in seventh and 11th places, respectively, in the automotive sector. Toyota was global number one, and Mercedes Benz, BMW, Honda, Volkswagen, and Ford followed.
These results for Hyundai and Kia Motor are very contradictory to those of Mercedes Benz, BMW, and Audi, which have highly-appraised brand power in spite of their lower sales records compared to Toyota, the world’s number one for both sales and brand power. Mercedes Benz and BMW have sales rankings below the top ten, but their brand power is ranked in second and third places, respectively, far ahead of Hyundai Motor. They definitely prove what name brand recognition means.
Industry professionals generally agree that the above companies have put a substantial amount of time and effort into establishing strong brand value.