Top 100 World Brands and why I think they are there.

Great, this year's Interbrand rankings for the 100 most valuable brand names are out here.

Branding has always been something of an interest for me because it is the art of how companies shape themselves in the eyes of their consumers. An important skill for a firm to have in both good times and bad.

Not surprisingly, the top of the board are ruled by huge multi-nationals whom have spend decades on bringing their brand name and values around the globe. I'm pretty sure that many of those top contenders such as Coca-cola and Nokia have spend a substantial amount of advertising dollars into both the traditional media as well as experimenting with new avenues that the Internet offers.

Top mover (in terms of percentage increase) on the list is Internet Behemoth - Google (46%). With its rapidly expanding range of products and services coupled its strong business fundamentals in such a volatile industry, its brand value has managed to outpace its closest competitor, Yahoo (15%) , by almost 3 times. Also notable is eBay's 18% increase in brand value, notching it 7 steps higher this year. These are the only 3 Internet Firms on this list and I'm would think that the nature of their business would allow them to increase brand value fairly rapidly over the foreseeable future.

Amongst the top ten, its interesting to see that only non-US companies, Nokia (#6) and Toyota (#7) , have seen double-digit brand value increases of 14% and 12% respectively. Perhaps this could be attributed to the fact that both companies are driving hard into project their brands into the emerging markets of Asia while developing their interests in North America at the same time. Nokia's strength may derive from its aggressive expansion in the Asia markets, most notably China. Toyota may also be doing well in the States as more consumers are ditching their SUVs other gas guzzlers in favour of the more efficient Japanese Automobiles in the face of rising gas prices.

Its going to be interesting to see how these movers and shakers will be evolving to capture more brand value and mind share this year.

Top 100 Global Brands List [via : Digg ]