The world’s most social brands are revealed today in a new ‘Social Brands Index’ that charts the performance of the top 50 brands on social media. The ‘Social Media Reputation’ (SMR) Index has been developed by social media specialist agency, Yomego, and is available from http://www.mysocialmediareputation.com/.

Each brand is given a ranking based on its social media reputation (SMR) score, and a comparison to its position on the Interbrand Top 100 Brands Index is also available.

The index also reveals why some brands have done better than others, and how they have reached their individual SMR scores. It also delves into the performance of brands within a number of sectors, with more sector-specific information scheduled each month. This, together with commentary from brand experts, is available at http://www.mysocialmediareputation.com/.

The social media data and analysis for the index is provided by the social media monitoring tool AlterianSM2.

The top performing brands in social media, based on their SMR scores, are:

1. eBay (at 43 in Interbrand’s top brands overall). eBay is out-performing its brand rank on social media, with an unusually high satisfaction score.

2. Apple (17 on the Interbrand list). Despite Apple’s notorious non-participation in social media, it has the highest satisfaction score of any brand on the top 50 list. Proving that the first rule of social media is to have a great product.

3. Google (4 on the Interbrand list). Google’s dominance continues.

4. Blackberry (54 on the Interbrand list)
Blackberry is another brand which outperforms in social media reputation terms, significantly beyond its brand position on the Interbrand list. A clever marketing strategy to move away from the ‘Blackberry Dad’ image and towards a younger, more social audience

5. Amazon (36 on the Interbrand list). Amazon has always led the way in word of mouth and recommendation marketing, and its social reputation score reflects this.

How the index works
The index calculates the social media reputation of brands by measuring the social media ‘noise’ around a brand (how many people are talking about it) with its popularity (whether what those people are saying is positive or negative). It then adds a ‘recency’ score, which provides a topical adjustment (so a brand that is being talked about now has a higher recency score than one talked about last six months ago). Importantly, human analysis is applied to each score to ensure it is accurate (to take into account sentiment such as sarcasm or slang that could be wrongly interpreted by an automated system) and to analyse relative influence of different channels. The brand is then given an overall Social Media Reputation (SMR) score out of 100.

Steve Richards, MD, Yomego, says: “There are some real surprises in the brand index. Brands that people are talking about online are not always the top value brands. Harley-Davidson , for example, has some of the most loyal fans online, ranking it at number 30 in the top 50 social brands. On the other hand, there are some brands that you might expect to be doing better. Smirnoff does some fantastic social media work but it is really inconsistent, which means it ranks lower than it could in the top 50 list.”

The full list of the Top 50 Social Brands Index, by SMR score, is below. The position of each brand on the Interbrand list is in brackets.

1.eBay (43)
2.Apple (17)
3.Google (4)
4.Blackberry (54)
5.Amazon (36)
6. Gucci (44)
7.Ford (50)
8.MTV (55)
9.Samsung (19)
10.Yahoo! (66)
11.Nokia (
12.Dell (41)
13.Microsoft (3)
14.Disney (9)
15.Nintendo (38)
16.Toyota (11)
17.Starbucks (97)
18.Honda (20)
19.Sony (34)
20.Ferrari (91)
21.Hyundai (65)
22.Nike (25)
23.IBM (2)
24.Coca-Cola (1)
25.Macdonald’s (6)
26.Adobe (88)
27.HP (10)
28.Mercedes-Benz (12)
29.Pepsi (13)
30.Harley-Davidson (98)
31.Burberry (100)
32.BMW (15)
33.Audi (63)
34.Intel (7)
35.Canon (33)
36.Panasonic (73)
37.Volkswagen (53)
38. American Express (24)
39.Porsche (72)
40.Adidas (62)
41.Zara (48)
42.Heinz (46)
43.Ikea (28)
44.Gillette (13)
45.Smirnoff (89)
46.Cartier (77)
47.Louis Vuitton (16)
48.L’Oreal (45)
49.Corona (85)
50.Visa (82)

To see the full list of brands, sector analysis, and commentary from Interbrand, Alterian, Yomego and brand experts, visit www.mysocialmediareputation.com.