Global investment bank Jefferies has used Onalytica data and insight to inform their latest piece of equity research into brands whose business models leverage the “many-to-many” network of the Internet.
The research explores the growth dynamics and business models of UK comparison sites MoneySuperMarket and Rightmove, as examples of businesses which exploit the many-to-many dynamic in different ways. Our previous work with Jefferies includes research analysing the global Fashion debate and retail markets, which eventually led to a buy recommendation on ASOS based on our insights.
Using our InfluenceMonitor platform, we draw out brand insights from the online debate to see how these sites’ share of influence has developed over the quarters in comparison to their market competitors. As David Reynolds states, our method of analysing brands through the online debate is “The Onalytica Way”!
This article has more information about the importance of weighting for influence when using online analysis as both a reflection and predictor of movements in brand perception and other areas. Copies of our recent co-presentation with Samsung at the WARC Next Generation Research are also available if you would like more information about how our platform can help inform brand strategy.
Jefferies, the international investment bank initiated coverage of clothing retailer ASOS last week with a buy recommendation.
According to equity researcher David Reynolds, the buy recommendation is in part based on the fact that ASOS increased its Share-of-Influence (SoI) of the online debate, when compared to benchmark companies Zara and H&M (SoI is one of many core metrics and indices produced by Onalytica that when trended traditionally acts as a leading indicator for market share, brand reputation and other corporate objectives).
Reynolds said “Their share of influence is growing, more so among the key influencers; in fashion, that's gold dust.”
The thorough (47 page) analysis which leads to the buy recommendation showcases the use of Onalytica InfluenceMonitor and provides a good overview of our methodology; we even got our logo on the front page!
The buy recommendation was initiated at a price of 1850.58 pence on the 7th of September with a price target on 2199 pence. Today, Sep 19th, the stock closed at 2076.88 after trading as high as 2250.18.
Pictures below show the front cover (cobranded Jefferies + Onalytica) and a page with some of the analyses from Onalytica InfluenceMonitor.
I spotted an announcement yesterday in Brand Republic about Peugeot signing an actor by the name John Simm to voice over a 30-second TV spot.
The announcement reveals that this is a multi-million pound campaign to “move the Peugeot brand forward”.
At Onalytica we have a new service called BrandObjective, which, among other things, analyse how similar (or dissimilar) brands in or out of category, are perceived.
By looking at how John Simm is spoken about it is easy to see why Euro RSCG (the agency behind the campaign) picked him.
John Simm represents an attractive combination of street-cred, luxury, premiumness and Britishness.
Using a bit of rocket science maths (I am not kidding – Nasa use this method to classify space debris) you can calculate the probability that two brands are perceived similar.
John Simm is most similar to brands such as Pepsi (Street), Hermes (Luxury), Carlsberg (Street), Downton Abbey (British), Rolex (Luxury), Selfridges (Premium), Burberry (Luxury, British), Harrods (Luxury, British), Dyson (British, Premium), PG Tips (British) and – here it really comes – BMW.
While there is a probability of 95% that the brand properties of John Simm are similar to those of Burberry, there is a probability of 78% of similarity with BMW's brand properties.
In contrast there is a probability of 0% of similarity between the brand properties of Jeremy Clarkson and BMW.
Currently there is a 0% chance that the brand properties of John Simm and Peugeot would be considered similar. If they are to become more similar, the way people perceive Peugeot should focus more on adjectives such as “mysterious”, “funny”, “hardy”, “shameless”, “brilliant”, “ruthless”, “charming”, “giving”, “generous”, “fancy”, “intelligent”, “candid”, “considerate”, “imaginative” and “warm”. These are all brand properties the Peugeot brand is missing when compared with John Simm's.
On the other hand, by becoming more like the John Simm brand Peugeot risk losing some brand properties that on the face of it sounds desirable, such as “smart”, “efficient”, “reliable”, “positive”, “responsible”, “independent”, “friendly”, “active”, “capable”, “confident”, “safe” and “proud”.
In time we will know how successful they will be and of course let you know here.