• by David Goetzl  @dgoetzl, December 7, 2011

At Cisco, social media executive Jeanette Gibson says her company has come up with a social media ROI metric -- tabbed "social media engagement "-- that uses "total response" divided by reach. "Total response" is the number of retweets, comments and shares, etc.

The emerging engagement metric is an evolution of using likes and retweets divided by views.

Still, Gibson said social media ROI doesn't have "a standard yet and that's both an opportunity and a chalnege for large brands."

She added: "We think the value (of social media) is engaging and having a two-way conversation with your customers and your partners."