Socialbakers, the social media analytics company, has just released its Q1 2013 Socially Devoted results for Facebook! The results recognize the brands that provide the best social customer care. Since April of 2012, Socialbakers has used this global benchmark for brands, based on the number of questions responded to.

The study showed that the volume of questions that fans post on brands’ Facebook walls in the UK increased by 37% over the last year. This is a true indication that consumers are recognizing social media as a legitimate channel to contact brands and get information to a greater extent. UK brands have stepped up to the challenge with response rates also improving. In Q2 2012 (April-June) the average response rate was 45%, this has increased to 63% in April 2013. However, it does take UK brands slightly longer to respond to questions than the worldwide average; 25 hours compared to 22 hours, this is despite not having a greater average volume of questions.

As in Q4, Virgin Media and Next ranked as the first and second most Socially Devoted UK brands with EE coming in third (see table attached).

New movers and shakers in the top ten include M&S, Thomas Cook and Kiddicare. Worth a special mention is the online fashion retailer boohoo.com, which managed to respond to a staggering 99.06% of all questions within an average of 21 minutes.

Jan Rezab, CEO of Socialbakers said: “We’re pleased to report that social media continues to gain traction. Fans increasingly expect to be given a response when they reach out through this channel.  Overall, the UK performs very well and has a great response rate. However, fans do expect their questions to be answered in a timely fashion. Brands will have to continue to invest more resources into this important channel and perhaps consider how they can better manage the flow.”