People power

For many companies, social media does more than boost their sustainability profile, it is a necessary tool to manage their brand. Social media is a powerful way for consumers to speak out against corporate actions and for companies to engage with their dissenters. Companies that don't manage their brand perception on these platforms can quickly become a target of consumer backlash, like what BP experienced after the Gulf oil spill when a Facebook group "Boycott BP" formed and drummed-up 791,000 likes.

Now that companies have embraced social media for their sustainability initiatives, has it boosted their CSR performance? There may not be a direct correlation, however many of the leading companies on the Social Media Sustainability Index are performing better in general when compared with their peers on CSRHub, such as IBM which has an overall score of 66, higher than its industry average.

Whether or not social media will improve companies' CSR performance in the immediate future is still uncertain, but it certainly will be a driving force in how sustainability programs develop in the future. From what we've seen so far, it is likely that increasingly more companies will incorporate social media into their sustainability strategy in the future hoping to convert their consumers into loyal brand advocates.

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Kimberly Wilson comes to CSRHub from Northwestern University where she recently completed her Master’s degree in business journalism. In her downtime, she enjoys running along Lake Michigan, going to concerts, and weekend brunches in downtown Chicago.

CSRHub provides access to corporate social responsibility and sustainability ratings and information on nearly 5,000 companies from 135 industries in 65 countries. Managers, researchers and activists use CSRHub to benchmark company performance, learn how stakeholders evaluate company CSR practices and seek ways to change the world. CSRHub rates 12 indicators of employee, environment, community and governance performance and flags many special issues. We offer subscribers immediate access to millions of detailed data points from our 140-plus data sources. Our data comes from six socially responsible investing firms, well-known indexes, publications, “best of” or “worst of” lists, NGOs, crowd sources and government agencies. By aggregating and normalizing the information from these sources, CSRHub has created a broad, consistent rating system and a searchable database that linkseach rating point back to its source.