New data on public perception of cosmetic and personal care brands

18-Jul-2016 - Last updated on 20-Jul-2016 at 02:47 GMT

The research and consulting company YouGov has just released its mid-year BrandIndex, reporting on the skin care and hair care brands that US consumers have a distinctly positive impression of.

BrandIndex interviews people every day to gauge how favorable (or not) consumer buzz is for brands in a full spectrum of industries, including apparel, beverages, oil and gas, retail home furnishing, etc. The company also sorts out data according to select consumer demographics or by “segment”: “Black, Democrats, Hispanics, Independents, Millenials, Parents, [and] Republicans,” according to the site.

Buzz worthy

BrandIndex gives each company a buzz score, determined by comsumers’ positive and negative response to a simple, single survey question: “If you've heard anything about the brand in the last two weeks, through advertising, news or word of mouth, was it positive or negative?”

The mid-year rankings are then set by taking an average of each company’s buzz scores between January and June. Scores for beauty companies seem to fall below 20, but could theoretically be substantially higher. “Buzz scores can range from 100 to -100 and are compiled by subtracting negative feedback from positive. A zero score means equal positive and negative feedback,” explains brandindex.com.

Best so far

The top five brands all come from legacy US personal care companies: Unilever, P&G, and Johnson & Johnson.

Indeed, Dove tops this year’s BrandIndex list of US hair care and skin care brands, with a buzz score of 16.8. Other well regarded brands include, Head & Shoulders, which scored 14.7; Olay, which garnered a score of 14.2; Neutrogena came in at 14.0; and Pantene scored 12.6.

Most improved

Also, as part of the newly released data, BrandIndex compared this year’s mid-year rankings to those from the same period last year, indicating which brands show the greatest improvement in consumer buzz. A few of this year’s top five brands appear on this list as well. But two color cosmetics brands also had a notable improvement in consumer sentiment.

Head & Shoulders saw the greatest year-over-year improvement in consumer perception, with a change of 3.0. Dove’s buzz score rose by 2.0. And, Neutrogena was up 1.7.

L’Oréal Paris saw a gain of 1.7 as well, having had a 6.0 buzz score by mid-year 2015 and a 7.7 buzz score so far this year. While, MAC’s score climbed from 3.6 to 5.1.