If you’re not using social media to promote your business, you’re missing out.

A recent study by Wetpaint and the Altimeter Group, called the ENGAGEMENTdb study, ranks the “world’s most valuable brands based on how they leverage social media to interact with customers.” Able to measure and monitor brand engagement, ENGAGEMENTdb is the first of its kind. Essentially, Wetpaint and Altimeter Group are measuring social media’s financial value. For example, how does a Twitter account actually pay off — or does it even pay off at all?

So the study took the world’s 100 most valuable brands (as measured by BusinessWeek/Interbrand “Best Global Brands 2008″ rankings) and looked at their social media use — how well the brands are engaging their consumers and how that affects their revenue and profit. What the study found was that those 100 brands are “experiencing a direct correlation between top financial performance and deep social media engagement.”

What exactly does that mean? Simply put, companies engaging in social media are more financially successful.

At Get Page One, we’re firm believers in the power of social media marketing. But you can’t just sign up for accounts on Twitter, Facebook, etc. and hope for it to pay off. You have to work hard at it and be consistent in the way you use it — you can’t just sign up and leave. Successful social media marketing involves signing up for social media accounts and actually being social — interacting with other users, regularly updating and participating.

Engage in social media, be consistent and see it literally pay off.

Last week, MAGNA, Mediabrands’ global media forecasting and investment strategy unit, put out a social media “forecast.” After exploring the question “What IS social media?”, they delivered their definition by socializing in public as well as on the Wikipedia page for Social Media. They also posted a Facebook note with the information.

So why deliver the information this way? Advantages of social media, they said, were that “anyone can add to the conversation,” while its limitations are that “most people still consume most social media content in a passive manner — which begs the question of whether or not our social media content was in fact social in nature, or more akin to traditional media.”

The other definitions of social media MAGNA collected were quite interesting. “The facilitation of word of mouth with technology,” “trackable conversational content about brands, products or anything,” “consumer generated content that influences perceptions” — these are just a few, but it’s easy to see a theme with these specific examples.

What MAGNA deemed their preferred definition is what they wound up adding to the Wikipedia page on Social Media: “a set of technologies, tools and platforms facilitating the discovery, participation and sharing of content.” They make a point to say at the end of their forecast that the definition of social media will change as the industry evolves, and they’re still refining their own definition of it.

If you want to add your thoughts to MAGNA’s forecast, they welcome input at their Facebook discussion.