Michelin Top Online Brand – 2007

Michelin and Bridgestone are the dominant online tyre brands, according to the latest research. The report, exclusively published in Tyres & Accessories for the last three years, was conducted by Cambridge-based online brand monitoring specialists, Envisional and found that Pirelli was the biggest faller in its unique online brand ranking exercise. The analysis shows that the Michelin brand, as observed in previous years, continues to stand well clear of its rivals. Envisional found that this brand achieves the greatest degree of “online prominence” by a significant margin, though this lead has narrowed again since 2006.

The top six most prominent brands are the same as those observed in 2005 and 2006 and there is still a sharp drop between the six leaders and the chasing pack. The biggest gain in 2007, in terms of relative prominence, was made by Bridgestone, which succeeded in pulling ahead of both Dunlop and Continental (the second placed brands in 2005 and 2006). Pirelli sentiment falls The second of Envisional’s two key brand penetration measurement tools, the “Sentiment InDex score,” shows that in 2007 the online buzz favours Michelin and Bridgestone.

Envisional’s analysis shows the online mentions of all 12 brands were much more positive than negative (on average) with every brand achieving a positive overall Sentiment InDex score. The top six most positively referenced brands in 2007 remained the same as in both previous studies, though Pirelli fell back considerably in the sentiment rankings from first to fifth place. Michelin surged into the lead as the most positively referenced brand (as well as achieving the highest overall prominence), while Bridgestone’s sentiment ranking improved substantially, taking it up into second place.