Samsung topples Nokia to become India’s ‘most trusted brand’

Samsung has emerged as the most trusted brand in India, followed by Sony and Tata, according to Brand Trust Report (BTR), India Study 2014 (BTR 2014) – a survey carried out by Trust Research Advisory (TRA).

In 2013, the three brands had ranked second, third and fifth respectively.

Nokia, which occupied top slot in BTR 2013 is now down to fifth position, below LG which is at fourth spot, according to the report released on Thursday.

Interestingly, Hewlett Packard has jumped 14 places to become the sixth most trusted brand.

LG, ranked fourth in this year's list, followed by the three-year leader Nokia at fifth place. Hewlett Packard moved up fourteen ranks over last year to become India's sixth Most Trusted Brand and Hero leaps seventy-nine ranks to become India's seventh Most Trusted. Honda is at rank eighth,  followed by Reliance at ninth. Mahindra betters its last year rank by sixty-nine places to get ranked as India's tenth Most Trusted brand.

The study is the fourth in its series and the result of research conducted on the proprietary 61-Attribute Trust Matrix of TRA (formerly known as Trust Research Advisory). This year's study involved 2,500 consumer-influencers across 16 cities in India and generated 5 million data-points and 20,000 unique brands from which the top 1,200 brands were culled. The brands have been classified in 284 different categories against 213 categories in 2013.

A look at all the reports shows Samsung steadily climbing from the fifth spot in 2011 to its current position. 

Another key finding of the report is that Hero has clearly emerged as a brand distinct from Honda. The former has leapt seventy-nine ranks to become India's 7th most trusted brand. Honda is at No 8 followed by Reliance and Mahindra & Mahindra. Mahindra has shown a huge jump – it was in 69th position last year. 

Another interesting revelation from the report is that all luxury four-wheeler brands have taken a big hit in this year's ranking. "BMW is at No150 compared to No. 4 last year. Audi has fallen from 14th to 323rd positions this year. Skoda tops the category at 56th rank, though it was 29th last year and Mercedes has climbed 249 positions to the 90th rank this year," said N Chandramouli, chief executive of TRA.

"The survey was conducted with salaried participants in companies with a minimum of 50,000 crore turn-over. Criteria such as their active online purchases and durables owned were taken into consideration," said Chandramouli.

Among the top 100 most trusted brands, 75 were net gainers while 25 took a fall. Mostly major brands have performed well jumping to top most positions while a couple of them slipped downwards.

TRA is in the process of releasing the list of top political parties next week, which should be an indicator of the mood of the country ahead of general elections this year.