In this month’s article, Wickus Bester analyses the trendsetter rating, which shows how brands have been performing over time – and how this will influence the winners in the upcoming Stockies Awards.
Following up on last month’s article in News in the Channel (which, if you missed it, can be read here) we can now explore an evolution of the discussed trending metric known as the trendsetter rating. This metric is specific to brands in the channel and is based on two questions about their trending products – how many and how high?
This metric is interesting because it analyses the brand by parts – a statement to a brand’s ability to provide products that gravitate towards the top. We incorporate measures such as the highest trend reached by the brand during the interest month and the average searches across the top trenders for the brand.
Let’s examine how brands have been performing in the past year on Stock in the Channel to get an idea of their trendsetter rating. In this article, our data is based on top 50 trending products per month across a category.
Trendsetting laser printers
Top two brands by trendsetter rating (laser printers, April 2023)
1.Kyocera
2. HP
This metric is firstly based on the number of products that a brand has trending during the month. As we can see in the barchart below, HP takes home the largest slice of the laser printer pie each month, which is due to it having nearly double the amount of trending products than the runner-up. Now you might have done a double take to the table above but rest assured – the difference between trending and trendsetter is logically coherent. It is due to an equal weighting being given to the second question of importance – how high the products are ranked.
Thus, in the case of laser printers, although an HP product has taken the number one trending spot every month for the past year, in April the company was knocked out by a Kyocera printer taking the top spot and being the top trendsetter of the month. This ‘memoryless’ aspect adds an element of bias reduction and enhances our insight, as brands whose products perform well are rewarded, regardless of their usual market share.
Inkjet printers – a busier time at the top
Not all categories have such a dominance structure in trending as observed for laser printers. For example, the inkjet market gives products a much more competitive time to rank the highest.
Top two brands by trendsetter rating (inkjet printers, April 2023)
1. Canon
2. HP
Looking at the top 10 positions for inkjet printers, we can see that these three brands dominated the list, with each reaching the coveted number one position at least once.
This is a very different dynamic to observe and keeps this category interesting.
This metric thus allows us to see which brand is popular during the month. When the time comes to determine the best brand within a category at the Stockies Awards, the trendsetter rating complements – but does not copy – the trending metric.
When we look at this metric over the entire year before the awards evening, the more competitive a brand behaves, the higher trendsetter rating it garners, which improves their chance to be awarded the Brand of the Year award.
