Posts tagged klout scores
Keep your hands off my Klout
Jun 21st
The whole idea of assessing social influence is fascinating to me. Klout and other companies are popping up to reduce people to a single number … which evokes delight in marketers and loathing in those being rated! An evil genius could have a lot of fun with that scenario : )
This trend also taps into people’s sense of competition and it’s easy to be knocked off center when a cat or an inanimate object has a higher Klout score than you. Hey, I admit it – when Klout first came out, yes … I compared my score to other bloggers to see where I stood. I’m competitive, too! I think you have to enjoy competition to be good at business. We just have to keep it in perspective. Today, my score kind of stays the same under most circumstances so it’s not at the top of my hit parade!
But when people start getting obsessed with personal scores and measuring against “the competition,” it may drive the wrong behaviors. In the past month I’ve seen no fewer than six posts with Klout-enhancing strategies to game the system. I could really care less about how other people spend their time, except when it starts to affect me. You see, all these posts include something along the lines of finding ways to troll for people with high Klout scores and trick them into engaging with you. They suggest something like this:
- Research and follow people with high Klout scores.
- Retweet and reply to Tweets from these “influencers,” in an attempt to elicit a response.
- Find ways to support and promote influencers, hoping they will support and promote you.
So I am the perfect target. I have a relatively high Klout score and I engage a lot. But this seems a little creepy to me. Plotting artificial engagement to hike an artificial score? It just seems well, artificial!
I sense that there are people enacting this strategy on me now. I just had somebody follow me called @kloutbait. Hmm … subtle! Of course I can never really know a person’s intent, but I also don’t want to spend my time being part of a plot to game the system.
I believe that increasing your influence in any social environment — offline or online — can be supported in the long-term by following the simple formula that is also at the heart of my book, The Tao of Twitter:
- Surround yourself with meaningful people who have a probability of caring about you and what you do (regardless of their Klout score)
- Provide meaningful content that will naturally create value and act as a catalyst for connection
- Nurture and sustain relationships by being sincerely, authentically helpful to people.
These online scoring systems will come and go. Their algorithms will change constantly. Instead of trying to figure out the system, I think that by consistently following this path, your social score will take care of itself. And more important, personal and business benefits will accrue no matter what your score may be.
Does this make sense? What does this trend toward measuring social influence mean to you?
Klout will introduce detailed new analytics (video)
Mar 13th
I had the fortune of interviewing Klout CEO Joe Fernandez at SXSW and hope you’ll enjoy this short video.
While I only had a few minutes before we were literally being kicked out of the room, Joe discloses plans for a detailed new website. Joe participated in two panels here in Austin and was quite open about the opportunties, and the problems, of his social scoring system. “Can you remember what Google was like in 1997?” he said. “That’s where we are with Klout, that’s the mission we’re on. It’s almost a ridiculous challenge.”
In addition to the short comments I captured on video here, Joe mentioned that Klout has been on a hiring frenzy to keep improving his service. The four prioirities he articulated were:
- Addressing spam and bots
- Focus on better defining influence by topic
- Aligning his service with the goals of brands
- Looking at different languages and countries.
He also mentioned several recent successes with Nike, HP and Clairol. “With Clairol, we targeted users of lip gloss and and found passionate bloggers who loved the product and the brand. Even I was surprised that we could have success with lip gloss.”
He also hinted that the actual Klout score we see publically is just ”the tip of the iceberg” of analytics he is bringing to brand managers.
Joe has been a frequent visitor on {grow} — primarily to address controversy — and acknowledged that when he planned his product offering, the “ego component” was something he had not thought through. ”It’s been interesting to say the least,” he said. “But we keep improving the experience as best we can.”
Hope you enjoy the video. Let me know your thoughts on this latest information from Klout.
On Twitter, no one can hear you scream
Mar 8th
I had the strangest call from Charlie Sheen yesterday.
“OK man, I’ve got 2 MILLION freaking people following me on Twitter and my Klout score still sucks. Ya gotta help me!”
“Charlie,” I calmly replied, “Klout scores really don’t tell you much of anything. Don’t worry about it.”
“But Mark,” he stammered, “This is all about WINNING my friend. And I am NOT WINNING if I have a Klout score lower than you. That is just pathetic. My tiger blood is raging here. What do I do???”
Sadly, this type of celebrity Twitter rant has become (yawn) routine for me. And every bit of that conversation is absolutely true, except the part about Charlie Sheen calling me.
Well, I do get requests from folks asking for Twitter help every day … usually to re-tweet a notable blog post or perhaps in support of a charity. I’m glad to help where I can but I’ll let you in on a little secret: It doesn’t work.
Some people look at the number of followers I have and a relatively high Klout score and imagine that I can be their gateway to social influence. I’ve been around long enough to know that these factors do not translate into influence at all. Even when I ask people to take action on something I really believe in, typically very little action occurs. This is not a matter of being humble or gracious. It is simply the truth. When I tweet something, it rarely results in tangible action.
Sorry, there is little true influence on Twitter
This phenomenon was also noted in Tom Webster’s fine Brand Savant blog. (It seems like I am quoting him a lot lately!) In an extraordinary measure, he personally contacted every Klout-infested A-list blogger he could think of to help him with a New Zealand earthquake charity appeal.
Tom calculated that the “reach” of his message easily exceeding 600,000. Out of that number, his appeal received 389 clicks and 10 submissions to his cause. Tom admits there were some complications that could have depressed the number but he pithily states that this conversion rate — compliments of some of the world’s greatest Twitter “influencers” — was significantly lower than what would be expected from a random pop-up ad.
In a post on the Networked Nature of Twitter by Megan Garber, she reported that actress Alyssa Milano — with a Klout score of 84 — sent out a tweet to her nearly 1.2 million followers: a link to the Amazon page of a book called Connected: The Surprising Power of Our Social Networks & How They Shape Our Lives.
Can you imagine the influence of a tweet from one of Twitter’s biggest stars? Wouldn’t that really help the author’s career?! Well, the impact was zero. Literally zero. Not one additional book sale resulted from the tweet.
I’ve also had my blog posts tweeted by Alyssa and other Twitterati, and while it definitely sends a short-term spike in page views, it has never resulted in any measurable difference in new blog subscribers. In fact, after Guy Kawasaki tweeted my post five times in 24 hours, my blog reader subscriptions went down.
For those swooning over Twitter-derived influence scores like Klout, this should be a wake-up call. It’s true. On Twitter, no one can hear you scream.
But blogs are another matter …
Marketers should be looking for influence in blog communities. That is where the real magic is happening. Tom Webster made an insightful point in his post — The people who finally took action on his request were strong connections nurtured through his blog-oriented relationships.
I have had the same experience. I KNOW I can move my blog community to action and they can move me to action, too. The connections built through a blog community are extremely strong compared to the weak ties on Twitter.
Curiously, blog activity is not accounted for on most of the popular social scoring measures. In fact, Klout is only looking at those weak Twitter ties right now. One measure that seems to at least take a crack at blog influence is Post Rank. Post Rank is one of the milestones used by AdAge to rate the world’s marketing blogs. What does it really measure? Nobody knows for sure … it is certainly an amalgam of tweets, comments and other forms of online engagement taking place between the blogger and the community. I actually hired a CPA to try to de-tangle the formula for this article and she couldn’t do it!
Nevertheless, if you buy into the notion that blogs nurture strong connections that lead to influence, wouldn’t this elevate a measure like Top Rank ahead of something like Klout?
I think REAL influence is taking place in the smaller, stronger groups found in passionate blog communities. I plucked out the top-rated bloggers via Post Rank and yeah, these people certainly exhibit thought leadership and influence on their communities and beyond.
By explanation — most blogs on the AdAge Power 150 are run by companies, have a staff of bloggers, or aggregated content. I left them off. So while Brian Clark is most associated with Copyblogger, his name is left off because the site is populated by a staff of writers.
Another observation as I looked at this list — there were a few names I did not recognize. How do those names stack up for you?
Any way, something to think about. Does this make sense to you? Are you forming strong ties in blog communities, on Twitter, Facebook or elsewhere? What form of online engagement influences YOU?
The Problem with Klout: An Infographic
Feb 22nd
My friend Steve Farnsworth aka @Steveology brought this Twitter account and resulting Klout score to my attention. I really don’t need to say another word.
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