Increasing Brand America’s Value

Simon Anholt’s recent article “The $2 Trillion Man: How Obama saved Brand America” argues the value of the U.S. brand increased this year from $9.7 trillion to $11.8 trillion. This $2 trillion appreciation in value is based on the Anholt-GfK Roper Nation Brands Index (NBI). Usefully, it reminds us that perceptions do matter: The kinds of increases in polls by organizations such as Pew showing across-the-board improvement in the way the world views the U.S. and U.S. leadership are extremely important.

At Core Strategy Group, we build brand value for a living—and work to increase the value of a company not just in terms of revenue, but also with respect to perceptions of what we call “relevant differentiation”….how a brand is different, special and better.

To be sure, the Anholt analysis should factor in revenue dynamics—and anyone watching an hour of TV news this year knows US debt, deficit and fiscal challenges do not call for popping champagne corks. This has been a rough patch for US “revenues.”

But Anholt is correct in pointing to the additional elements that make a brand valuable—helping guide and navigate people in terms of how they think, feel and act; helping define the context of foreign policy decisions. By these terms, Brand America under President Obama follows the Sinatra melody:

“It was a very good year….”

David Morey