No love for financial service brands

The brand agency Uffindel has researched how much brands are loved. The study claims to measure the success of a brand based on the quality of relationships that those brands have with their customers. The findings have been developed into the agencies BrandLove Index.

It aims to reveal the depth of love that customers have with brands and, ultimately, identify the perfect relationship formula for brands looking to win over customers.

The researchers found that consumers favour brands in the technology and fast food sectors over brands in the financial sector.  Insurance brands fared the worst of all with the bottom 10 being dominated by seven insurance and pension brands.

In total 29 financial brands were analysed and 2,000 people were surveyed. The worst brand at number 29 was Go Compare, which is unsurprising considering their singing salesman featured on their ads is slightly irritating. Uffindell said this overall picture suggests the brand needs to work harder to build emotional connection with its customers to complement its stable and safe image

The other most un-loved brands were:

• Standard Life (24th)
• Barclaycard (25th)
• AXA (26th)
• Admiral (27th)
• Legal & General (28th)

The research also concluded that the financial service brands we love the most are First Direct, Pay Pal and Nationwide. NatWest, part of the Royal Bank of Scotland which taxpayers were forced to bailout at a cost of $45bn, came forth surprisingly. Could the public have forgotten about the banking crisis already? The relative newbie in the financial services industry Tesco clutched fifth place. This could be a result of Tesco’s strong brand reputation across other industries.

Overall the results show that well established names from the insurance sector, which escaped the worst of the financial crisis, sit at the bottom of the index. The index highlights the need for the insurance industry to work much harder at building stronger customer relationships.

Do you think the BrandLove Financial Services Index accurately reflects the public’s opinion of the financial companies involved?

What do you think can be done to improve the relationships financial companies have with their consumers?

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