Emirates flies high in brand rankings

Emirates airline, Saudi’s payment network mada and iPhone are the most recommended brands by consumers in the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Egypt, according to YouGov’s 2019 Brand Advocacy Rankings in the Middle East.

The Advocacy Rankings, produced by YouGov’s daily brand tracking tool BrandIndex, considered how much current and former customers endorsed brands over the past year by asking respondents, "Would you recommend the brand to a friend or colleague?" or “Would you tell a friend or colleague to avoid the brand?”

iphone and parent company Apple’s fortunes have been mixed as they witnessed their greatest decline year on year in Saudi Arabia, with the former slipping from third to fourth in 2018 and now seventh in 2019, while Apple fell from second to sixth in 2018, and to ninth in 2019 rankings.

In the UAE iPhone retained its position as fourth most recommended brand, its parent dropped from fifth to tenth.

Only in Egypt does iPhone continue to hold the top spot, although its parent doesn’t feature in the top ten.

This year’s rankings saw a lot of new brands enter the list of top 10 brands in each country. In the UAE, Carrefour has made a re-entry at sixth after falling out of the list last year while Singapore Airlines has made a fresh entry into the rankings at eight.

The study also showed which brands have the most improved level of customer advocacy over the past 12 months. In the UAE, Pakistan International Airlines has seen the biggest improvement in its recommend score this year, changing its score by 18.1 points. In Saudi, Mobily has recorded the greatest improvement, up 10.5 points, and in Egypt Barclays Bank has achieved the biggest uplift of 11.1 points and has become the