China Mobile and Sohu are top two Olympics brand in China

My last Olympics related post can be found here:

http://chinese-net-gaming-stock.blogspot.com/2007/09/battle-of-olympics-part4-conclusion.html

Just came across this news today.

http://article.pchome.net/content-533746.html

According to a Baidu's report, China Mobile is number 1, Sohu 2nd, Lenovo 3rd, and Samsung is the 4th most respected Olympics brand.

Others like Mcdonalds is 15th, Adidas 18th and Microsoft can't even crack the top 20.

Baidu compiled the report based on four categories, press coverage, government help, individual users’ respectability, and composite score. The final composite score is a composite of the first three scores.

China Mobile is number 1 in both press coverage and government help. It is the 2^nd most respected brand by average individual Chinese.

For Sohu, it has a composite score that gives it the number 2 ranked company regarding Olympics. It is only number 5 in both press coverage and government help. But its strength comes from the average Chinese users. Overwhelming individual Chinese users regard Sohu as the number 1 most respected brand with respect to Olympics. That catapults Sohu into the number 2 ranked company in China (regards to Olympics).

For Lenovo, it is number 3 in all three categories. Thus it gets a composite score of the 3^rd ranked most respected Olympics related company in China.

According to the Baidu report (can be found in http://2008.baidu.com), among all internet sites and portals, Sohu did a much better job in brand awareness for Olympics-related activities.

Sometimes, research reports from China can be deceiving or can be paid for by individual company. But I think this is different. Baidu is a direct competitor to Sohu (through Sogou), there is no reason for Baidu to pump Sohu's success. Thus, I believe the authenticity of this report.

As we get closer to Olympics, average Chinese users will gravitate toward the brand they respect and trust the most and that is Sohu (in Internet) and China Mobile (in Wireless). I think we are going to see acceleration in ad revenue from Sohu as the Olympics gets closer. Sohu is going to grab market shares from the likes of Sina, Netease, QQ, and Baidu. In the wireless area, we are probably going to see the same thing. That is China Mobile is probably going to gain more market shares from its competitors.

For the first three quarters in 2008, we are probably going to see some shift in favor of Sohu and China Mobile.