The latest joint global research, ‘The Brand Value Growth Matrix’, by brand consultancies The Partners and Lambie-Nairn, and research firm Millward Brown shows that branding is a better investment for businesses than advertising in the long term, if marketing budget is limited.

The company that has been analyzing brand value of the top 100 leading businesses for over 10 years and the author of the famous BrandZ ranking, Millward Brown, shares the results of a joint study conducted in collaboration with the two other WPP entities, branding agencies The Partners and Lambie-Nairn. ‘The Brand Value Growth Matrix’ has analyzed how the brand value of the leading brands has changed over a decade through the prism of their spending on brand identity and propositioning or/and advertising in paid media.

Here are the important highlights from the report:

• Brands that invested heavily in both branding and advertising, showed the biggest growth of 168% in brand value.
• Brands that invested neither in strong branding, nor in advertising, showed overall growth by 21% over 10 years.
• Brands that invested in strong advertising gained just 27% on brand value, while those spending on strong branding only, enjoyed 76% growth in brand value.

The conclusions were made based on the financial data gained by the Millward Brown research team for the BrandZ ranking, and data on branding and media spend compiled by the The Partners and Lambie-Nairn. The brand value growth matrix, according to Jim Prior, the CEO of the latter companies, «will help brand owners to prioritize, plan and manage their brand building efforts more effectively.»