The online magazine, brandchannel.com, has released its 2006 survey on top brands. It should be no surprise that Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) got the top spot – even beating out Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL), which was #2.
Then again, it helped that Google bought the super-hot brand, YouTube. Actually, this was ranked #3 on the list.
As for #4, it's another upstart: Wikipedia.
No doubt, the internet world is getting lots of mindshare. And, these top brands are fairly new companies. What's more, for companies like Wikipedia and YouTube, there was minimal advertising dollars.
In other words, it was really the loyal users that helped to build the brand. It's also notable that Wikipedia and YouTube rely on user-generated content.
You can read more about the brandchannel.com survey at Reuters.
Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including the Complete M&A Handbook and the EDGAR-Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements.
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