Two years ago, the American brand was considered the strongest of any country in the world. Not anymore.
Last year, the US dropped to the sixth spot in the Anholt-GfK Nation Brands Index. The latest version of that index, released on Oct. 25, keeps the US in sixth place tied with Italy. Brand USA now trails Canada, France, the UK, Japan, and Germany, which retained the top spot this year.
Anholt-GfK’s annual ranking of 50 countries is gleaned from interviews with over 20,000 individuals in 20 countries. The Index measures perceptions of countries based on six factors: tourism, exports, people, culture, governance, and immigration and investment.
Sociologist Vadim Volos, the Index’s global director, explains that the US’s fledging popularity is the most dramatic decline he’s observed since the index began ranking country brands 13 years ago. He tells Quartz that the negative reviews are coming in from across the board. “Respondents who gave lower rankings to the US came from both allied and contending countries,” Volos explains. “The US was ranked number 15 by both Canada and Russia. Germany and Mexico—both key trade partners to the US—ranked it number 20 and number 16, respectively.”
Volos reports that though the US clung to sixth place, its overall score fell more than any other country. Canadians in particular brought the US scores down—their rankings of the US represent the largest decline in perception captured in the NBI. Respondents from China and Egypt also gave the US poorer grades for the first time. Mexicans, though still largely critical of US policies, reported a “lesser degree of negativity than a year ago,” the report states.
In last year’s report, NBI founder Simon Anholt blamed the decline of the US brand squarely on president Donald Trump and his “America First” philosophy. “The USA’s fall in the ‘governance’ [category] suggests that we are witnessing a ‘Trump effect,’” Anholt said in a statement. “A similar fall in global perception of the USA was seen following the re-election of George W. Bush, when the USA fell to seventh place. Previously, America has never stayed outside the top ranking for more than a year at a time.”
The Anholt-GfK Nation Brands Index is one of several studies that measure global perceptions about particular countries. The Futurebrand Country Brand Index ranks 75 countries using the same methodology it uses to evaluate consumer or corporate brands. Futurebrand’s latest survey of 2,500 respondents, published in 2015, put the US in seventh place.