Sony top in annual ‘Best Brands’.

Sony tops the list in the annual Harris Poll of “best brands” for an impressive seventh consecutive year. Dell retains its No. 2 spot, while Coca-Cola, previously in the fourth position, moves up to No. 3.

These are some of the results of a nationwide Harris Poll of 2,351 U.S. adults surveyed online by Harris Interactive between June 7 and 13, 2006. Survey responses were unaided and a list of brand names was not presented to respondents. The results from this survey cannot be compared to results of the Harris Interactive 2006 EquiTrend Brand Study results, as the methodologies for the surveys differ.

The other places on the top-10 list of best brands are taken by Ford (No. 5), Honda (No. 6), Hewlett Packard (No. 7), General Electric (No. 8), Kraft Foods (No. 9) and Apple (No. 10). Two brands dropped out of this list this year, General Motors and Microsoft.

Other brands that receive a substantial number of mentions but not enough to make the top-10 list include Chevrolet, Panasonic, Pepsi Cola, Nike and Maytag.

Analysis by industry

Half of the top-10 brands are for electronics products; three are for automobile and two for consumer and packaged goods.

Changes since last year

Most of the brands in this year’s top-10 list have not moved up or down substantially. The most notable changes are Kraft Foods, falling from No. 3 to No. 9 and General Motors which dropped from No. 8 to No. 17.

“We would like you to think about brands or names of products and services you know. Considering everything, which three brands do you consider the best?”

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