Emirates, Almarai and Whatsapp Top the YouGov Brandindex 2020 Women’s Choice Rankings in MENA

The 2020 YouGov BrandIndex Women’s Choice Rankings reveal Dubai’s flag-carrier airline Emirates, leading food conglomerate Almarai and global messaging service WhatsApp are the top ranked brands by women in the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Egypt, respectively.

The rankings were compiled using the Impression score from YouGov’s daily brand tracker, BrandIndex, by asking respondents, “Overall, of which of the following brands do you have a positive/negative impression?” over the past 12 months.

Emirates has dominated the rankings in the UAE since 2017 and continues to appeal to the women in the country.

In Saudi Arabia, Almarai has regained its top position. The last year saw the brand continue a host of sponsorships, events and campaigns to engage consumers. The news of Almarai appointing a female Head of Investor Relations created a lot of noise around breaking workplace gender boundaries. All of these events are likely to have strengthened the brand’s appeal amongst women and helped it claim back the top spot in the annual Women’s Choice Rankings.

Notably, a number of brands in the top 10 in all three countries have seen their net Impression scores decline amongst women year-on-year.

In the UAE, the story of declining scores is true even for brands who have seen their ranking place improve this year, such as Carrefour and Samsung. Both have moved up one place each, to third and fourth in the 2020 rankings, despite their Impression score declining over the past year. The reason for this is due to other brands in the top 10 list declining at a greater rate.

The appearance of weakening scores is the strongest in Egypt where almost all the brands in the top 10 (with the exception being YouTube) have witnessed a decline in their Impression scores over the past year, including this year’s leader- WhatsApp.

One of the most affected brands in the region in terms of declining Impression scores and subsequently declining ranks was Apple and its smartphone brand- iPhone. In the UAE, Apple fell down from fourth to sixth while iPhone remained in the same spot- eighth, but with a decreased Impression score. In Saudi, Apple moved down from top to second while iPhone witnessed the worst decline among the top 10 brands and fell down from second to eighth in this year’s list.

Likewise, in Egypt, iPhone continues to show declining scores year-on-year. After falling from sixth in 2018 to seventh in 2019, it has made the greatest decline among the top ten brands this year and has descended to the tenth position in the 2020 rankings.

On the contrary, YouTube enjoyed a good year in the region with the launch of YouTube Music and YouTube Premium. In the UAE, it has noted maximum improvement amongst the top 10 brands and moved up five spots from tenth to fifth in this year’s list. Similarly, in Saudi, it has climbed up three places from seventh to fourth in the 2020 rankings. In Egypt, it remains in the same spot- at fourth, but its Impression score has increased slightly over the past year.

YouGov also revealed the 10 brands that made the largest improvement to their Impression scores over the past 12 months. Netflix’s original content may be one of the factors making it the most improved brand of the past year among UAE women with a change in score of +11.7, going from an Impression score of 23.4 in 2019 to 35.1 in 2020.

In Saudi, mada is the most improved brand of the past year among women, yet again, with a change in Impression score of +7.8. Increasing from 34.7 in last year's YouGov BrandIndex Women's Rankings to 42.6 this year.

In Egypt, Majid Al Futtaim is the most improved brand of the past year, with a change in score of +8.0, going from 17.6 in 2019 to 25.7 in the 2020 YouGov Women’s Choice Rankings.

Among women in the region, food and beverage brands seem to be resonating well. In the UAE, four of the leading brands belong to the country’s top 10 improvers list. Similarly, in Saudi and Egypt, the improvers list is comprised of some of the leading food and beverage brands, suggesting a fairly good year for the overall category among women consumers in these three countries.

Notably, even Chinese handset manufacturer Huawei seems to be witnessing a surge in its popularity with women. In Saudi, it is the second most improved brand and in the UAE, it is placed in sixth in the list of top 10 improvers.