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New York, NY—L2 ThinkTank, a digital research, education, and advisory firm focused on the prestige sector, on Tuesday released its 2012 Facebook IQ study results. The rankings identify 100 luxury marketers who are using the social media site best. Of these, more than one-fourth of the firms on the list are luxury jewelry or watch makers.

Three firms in the jewelry and watch category placed in the top 10: IWC watches was the top-rated jewelry or watch firm, in fifth place, Swarovski took seventh place, and Pandora tied for 10^th place with cosmetics giant Estee Lauder. But four of the five bottom-most rankings for Facebook IQ also were jewelry and watch firms: Patek Philippe came in last place at number 100, De Beers ranked in 98^th place, Baccarat in 96^th, and Rolex in 95^th.

Overall, the “jewelry and watches” category came in second place with 27 firms making the Top 100 list of best Facebook practices. It’s a notable achievement, given that only one year ago, L2 founder Scott Galloway delivered a harsh lecture to the industry for its overall digital ignorance at the GIA International Gemological Symposium.

Luxury fashion firms still dominated the Facebook IQ Index, with more than one third of the total list falling into that category. But the jewelry and watches category ranked ahead of both the beauty and specialty retailer categories in its innovative and successful use of Facebook for marketing. (Editor’s note: The study did not look at independent jewelers, and also this ranking compared only fashion, beauty, jewelry/watches, and specialty retail, and no automotive or spirits brands.)

The Facebook IQ Index methodology assigned 35% of a firm’s total score to its size and growth on the Facebook platform, including number of “likes,” global community, growth rate, and so forth. Engagement; i.e., fan reaction and interaction with the brand, comprised 35% of the score. 20% of the score was based on programming; i.e., content, frequency of postings, brand photos and videos, innovative campaigns, and so forth. The final 10% of the score was ascribed to how well the brand integrated its Facebook presence across multiple digital platforms. Included in this score were attributes such as promotion of Facebook page on other digital media, search engine visibility, shareability of site content, and more.

Low-scoring firms typically still use Facebook as a broadcast channel, rather than encouraging two-way dialogue or user interaction and creating a strong community of brand fans and advocates.

From highest to lowest place, these are the jewelry and watch firms named in the index and where they ranked on the list:

• 5-IWC
• 7-Swarovski
• 10-Pandora (tied with Estee Lauder)
• 12-Bvlgari
• 18-Tiffany
• 26-Cartier
• 32 Baume et Mercier
• 39-Tag Heuer
• 49-Jaeger-LeCoultre
• 55-David Yurman
• 57-Montblanc
• 60-Chopard, Omega (tie)
• 64-Movado
• 69-Harry Winston, Piaget (tie)
• 72-Hublot
• 74-Vacheron Constantin
• 81-Officine Panerai
• 83-Longines
• 86-Audemars Piguet
• 90-Raymond Weil
• 92-Van Cleef & Arpels
• 95-Rolex
• 96-Baccarat
• 98-De Beers
• 100-Patek Philippe