Wetpaint and Altimeter just released their ‘Engagementdb Ranking the Top 100 Global Brands’ report. As the title suggests the report scores or ranks the social media engagement of the world’s 100 most valuable brands as measured by BusinessWeek / Interbrand “Best Global Brands 2008” rankings. The goal of the study was to measure how deeply engaged the top 100 global brands are in social media channels. The report offers great glimpses into the social media culture at such brands as Starbucks and Dell; however I question the conclusion the authors have drawn.

“While much has been written questioning the value of social media, this landmark study has found that the most valuable brands in the world are experiencing a direct correlation between top financial performance and deep social media engagement. The relationship is apparent and significant: social engaged companies are in fact more financially successful. “

The assertion is that social media engagement is tied to financial performance. As the report states “…what we do find is a financial correlation between those who are deeply engaged and those who outperform their peers…. Companies that are both deeply and widely engaged in social media surpass their peers in terms of both revenue and profit performance by a significant difference.”

However this seems to be a classic causality dilemma – or a good old fashion case of chicken and egg. Wouldn’t financially fit companies be more likely to have the resources to engage in social media to begin with? Therefore to say that these companies are outperforming their peers because of their engagement in social media seems to induce a little circular logic.

While I question the conclusion drawn by the report, it is definitely worth a read. It highlights excellent case studies and best practices of those companies who are social media mavens / early adopters.Full report can be found here http://bit.ly/2OX2uF