My friend and colleague Jon Samsel, SVP of Interactive Marketing at BofA, played around with the Heardable tool in private BETA and wrote a nice piece on his findings earlier this month, including a bit on how some of the top global agencies rank based on their Heardable score.

It's interesting that this list should come out now, considering all the recent talk about how agencies should practice what they preach, particularly in their social communications efforts.

To reiterate, Heardable scans more than 20 on-site and 20 off-site variables (meaning outside of the main site but across the digital landscape) to provide a holistic purview of a brand's online visibility. We look at the primary areas of portability, shareability, measurability, sociability, actionability and searchability to assess a brand's score, as well as how it might compare to others in a particular category.

One other important thing to note is that while we start the process by scanning in a URL, we look at a brand's website as a conduit for its overall presence, meaning that in today's consumer environment, content must be syndicated and hyper-targeted to individuals and groups where they share and consume, when they share and consume. In this way, brands have effectively become publishers, and people follow good content (as well as engage with it), so those who serve up the best stuff in the best of ways will capture loyalty... plain and simple ;)