Social Media Power Rankings: Whole Foods Nabs Dads

Whole Foods banks on Father's Day to rise in the rankings, BIC knows you like to win, while Zuffa, better known by their UFC brand, got you talking about the free fight night.

The social media sphere is an increasingly noisy place, especially for brands. But hiding somewhere in the static are strong signals from companies reaching their customers in innovative ways. The Social Business Index from Dachis Group provides a (free) real-time ranking of more than 30,000 global brands based on their social performance. Every week we're taking a tally of who's getting heard, what they're saying, and why it matters.

Has the Facebook IPO fallout bottomed out?  It looks like the social network is dangerously close to falling out of the top 20 after its slide last week. The big mover here, of course, is the NBA--with its 13-spot jump. We'll be interested to see if the NBA can keep its momentum now that we're down to two teams. Now let's look at some of the movers and shakers outside of the top 20:

Zuffa is probably better known as the company behind the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) brand. "With over 8.5 million likes on the UFC Facebook page, it is clear that people love a little martial arts and a whole lot of fighting," says the Dachis Group's Kelly Krieghauser. And that numerical achievement is the type of thing you expect from one of the fastest growing sports in the world. And despite a recent spate of injuries to some of the UFC's top fighters, it seems like interest and excitement is still growing. "This week, it was the preparation for the Wanderlei Silva and Rich Franklin fight that drove fans to the page to share their excitement which led to a spike in engagement," says Krieghauser. "UFC posted a photo of Silva and Franklin’s first match, as well as a link to a free viewing of their first fight--much to fans’ delight ... The link to the free viewing of the fight was UFC’s little bonus that scored BIG, resulting in 12,000 likes, 550 comments and 725 shares." And it helps to have a charismatic president like the outspoken Dana White who institutes things like tweet bonuses for his fighters and earnestly believes in the power of social media. White said in a recent interview with Mashable, "How do you quantify billboards? How do you quantify newspaper adds? You can’t quantify it. But let me show you how [expletive] strong this is." And we're not fighting him on that.

Welcome to the top 100 Whole Foods. How exactly did they get here? Well, for starters, they know you and your dad like food. A simple question like  “Does dad like steak?” posted on Facebook "received thousands of likes and hundreds of shares as followers start to plan their Father’s Day activities," the Dachis Group's Ahmed Khamash told us. The company also offered up a $50 gift card to its 2.5 million followers, which also pumped engagement. Of course $50 at Whole Foods is more like $25 at a regular market, but hey, free money is free money. "To round out their busy month, Whole Foods is holding the Fishmonger Face-off on June 16th, a competition to celebrate their in-store seafood experts," Khamash said. "This type of content is always well received by social communities, as it gives consumers an inside look at the brand and their employees."

Thanks to 60,000 permanent markers (and your desire for indelible ink) Bic jumped over 20 spots in this week's rank. The Dachis Group's Joseph Pinaire explains, "Bic Mark-it leveraged Facebook as a channel to promote the giveawaym and the behaviors displayed by their Facebook fans indicate the giveaway has some appeal. He adds that the company smartly used photos to foster more engagement. But we guess the bigger takeaway here is that 105,000 people (and counting) have already installed the contest app--proving a success for BIC and ensuring that and as Pinaire points out, "at least 45k fans who will be colored disappointed once winners are announced."

Methodology: A project of the Dachis Group, a social business professional services group, the Social Business Index analyzes the conversations on social platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and others. The index, which currently covers approximately 25,0000 companies and 27,000 brands, detects behaviors and activities exhibited by these companies and analyzes their execution and effectiveness at driving outcomes such as brand awareness, brand love, mind share, and advocacy. The Atlantic Wire takes a snapshot of the rankings at the end of the day on Sundays.