surprise! Who has excellent reputation?

When someone asked me, who do you think the most reputable company is? Why, of course, Google, was my guess.

Actually, according to a study conducted by the Reputation Institute, in 2009 Google ranked globally at #23, whereas #1 is....

The Ferrero Group, a chocolate company from Italy, that makes Nutella, Ferrero Rocher, and Kinder chocolates... ranked number 1.

The Reputation Institute ranked companies on how esteemed, admired, trusted and liked each was, based on its surveys of the general public. Ferrero, IKEA, Johnson & Johnson Rank as most reputable companies in the world on Reputation Institute's Global Reputation Pulse Study.

I can totally see IKEA and J&J being up there...IKEA experiences are amazing, simple and clean and approachable...and J&J is just so natural and friendly...no wonder their reputation scores are high!

Studies reveal critical links between reputation and consumer recommendation in driving bottom line results. For example, by improving a brand's reputation score by 5 points, a company can increase recommendations within the general public by 6.75%.

In a competitive situation, increasing recommendations by 2 -5 % can have big impact and dramatically improve bottom line.

With 67 percent of consumers saying they would recommend one of the world's top 20 most reputable companies to others, organizations like Japan's Nintendo, France's Christian Dior and India's Tata showed they have effectively used recommendations to drive business and reputation in their respective countries.

However, reputation and brand is not to be confused as the same, because oftentimes they are mentioned together. A company's reputation and reputation value; and a company's brand value is correlated but distinct.

Take a look at the company's reputation scores:

---- ------- ------- -----
1 Ferrero Italy 85.17
2 IKEA Sweden 83.98
3 Johnson & Johnson U.S. 83.58
4 Petrobas Brazil 82.37
5 Sadia Brazil 82.06
6 Nintendo Japan 81.63
7 Christian Dior France 81.37
8 Kraft Foods U.S. 81.09
9 Mercadona Spain 80.99
10 Singapore Airlines Singapore 80.97
11 Tata India 80.89
12 UPS U.S. 80.84
13 General Mills U.S. 80.80
14 El Corte Ingles Spain 80.80
15 Matsushita Electric Ind. Japan 80.31
16 FedEx U.S. 80.30
17 Grupo Bimbo Mexico 80.22
18 Honda Motor Japan 79.86
19 Whirlpool U.S. 79.86
20 Votorantim Brazil 79.59
21 Walt Disney Co. U.S. 79.44
22 China Faw China 79.35
23 Google U.S. 78.80
24 China Merhchants Bank China 78.72
25 Caterpillar U.S. 78.69

(From Biz Journals)

...now, more reasons to love chocolate and Italy?