By Russ Waddill

In their most recent issue, BusinessWeek Magazine revealed the 100 Best Global Brands for 2009.  The list is the result of an annual partnership between BusinessWeek and Interbrand. Interbrand determines a value for each company’s brand using the following criteria.  To qualify, a brand must:

1. Derive at least one-third of its earnings from outside its home country
2. Be recognizable beyond its base of customers
3. Have publicly available marketing and financial data

Here are the Top Ten:

100 Best Global Brands

As one would imagine with any strong brand, marketing is essential.  In the past year of economic upheaval and turmoil, the word emerging as the most brand-defining is trust.  Businesses, particularly the world’s biggest, have done a great deal to violate their consumers’ trust over the last twelve months.  Actions like taking government bailouts, betting on risky financial securities, and executing elaborate fraudulent schemes have done great damage, even to companies that did not engage in any of those activities.  In a recent survey published with this article, only 44% of Americans said they trust business, down from 58% one year ago.

The marketing directors of the world’s strongest companies are using their marketing dollars to rebuild this trust.  After years of ignoring critics, McDonald’s (#6) Global Chief Marketing Officer, Mary Dillon, is moving towards transparency and openness about some of the company’s biggest challenges.  She is working with PETA to act more humanely in their food sourcing and supply chain.  Aware that many consumers still consider McDonald’s food to be junk, she is directing their marketing and ad budgets to begin talking about food sourcing and inviting website visitors to go behind the scenes and “meet” their food suppliers.

American Express (#22) tarnished their gold-plated image with loyal customers last year due to their decision to partake in subprime investments.  Their advertising now centers on the entrepreneur – the small business owners of restaurants, bike shops, and other “mom and pop” stores - that are the lifeblood of the economy.  Amex’s mission is to not cast themselves as a financial titan, but as a humble service provider who is there to help small business during the recovery.

The bottom line is the biggest and best companies in the world have recognized that they have serious work to do.  Consumers of everything have lost faith in business.  Missions once reserved for big PR departments are now part of strategy and marketing.  Transparency and direct and open dialogue with consumers will reign for the foreseeable future until some trust is regained.  That will most likely take several years.

As Frank and I have written a great deal over the last several months, the environment in which we all operate is different now.  A portion of it was caused by us.  Probably a larger portion of it we had nothing to do with, but the economic environment has shifted nonetheless.

What are you doing to react to that change?

Call us and we will help you answer that question.

Russ Waddill is a partner with Neos Marketing, an outsourced marketing firm helping mid-size, b-to-b companies in the greater Houston & Beaumont areas get more customers. He is also an Adjunct Professor of Entrepreneurship at Lamar University. He can be reached at rwaddill@neosmarketing.com.