How to Score Big on Klout
Most people interested in social media will have heard about Klout. For those of haven't, here is a quick reminder.
According to the Klout website, "the Klout score is the measurement of your overall online influence." Basically, this means that Klout measures how much influence you have within your social networking groups and on social media applications in general. Based on a number of criteria, a score between 0 and 100 is calculated by a complex algorithm. The higher the score, the more influence you have.
Skeptics say that Klout isn't a useful tool and should be treated as a fun toy to play with. Well, everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but it would seem that Klout is playing an increasingly important role in the social media world. Klout is able to track your statistics from Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and Foursquare. It has also recently added Google+ to that list.
One of the major advantages of Klout is that when you have a high score, even more people will start to follow you because they see you as being "influential". This means even more clicks on, for example, your tweets, and this in turn will further increase your Klout score. As it happens, social media marketers are actively looking for these "influencers", and they are only too happy to pay them for "dropping a link" to a certain website to their followers.
Sometimes, when trying to increase their Klout score, users make the mistake of thinking that quantity is just as good as quality, so they concentrate on gathering followers and tweeting a large amount of banal messages. That approach won't work with Klout because they do pay attention to the quality of the information that is shared. So don't start following other people like crazy, in the hope that they will return the favour. How you are getting your followers is more important than how many followers you actually have. The more you count on follow-backs instead of spontaneous followers, the slower your score will rise.
The number of times your messages are re-tweeted is important, but the number of different accounts that are re-tweeting your messages is even more so. That is why it is crucial to broaden your niche as much as you can. For example, if your area of interest is social media, don't just post about new developments like Google+. You could also tweet about the current state of Hyves or about the effect of social media on daily life. That way you will appeal to a broader audience.
The logic of Klout dictates that one mention of an account with a high score is much more valuable than 10 mentions of accounts with low scores. So it is very important to start conversations with influential Tweeps (short for Twitter peeps, meaning your followers). You can check their scores on hootsuite.com.
Much of the same goes for how you interact on Facebook and LinkedIn. Although, it is worth mentioning that it is the comments and the importance of the person who makes the comments that is most significant here. In short, quality and a good dose of common sense will help you to climb the Klout ranking. At the same time, quantity and chaos won't do you any favours.
According to the Klout website, "the Klout score is the measurement of your overall online influence." Basically, this means that Klout measures how much influence you have within your social networking groups and on social media applications in general. Based on a number of criteria, a score between 0 and 100 is calculated by a complex algorithm. The higher the score, the more influence you have.
So what is the point of Klout?
Skeptics say that Klout isn't a useful tool and should be treated as a fun toy to play with. Well, everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but it would seem that Klout is playing an increasingly important role in the social media world. Klout is able to track your statistics from Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and Foursquare. It has also recently added Google+ to that list.
Advantages of Klout
One of the major advantages of Klout is that when you have a high score, even more people will start to follow you because they see you as being "influential". This means even more clicks on, for example, your tweets, and this in turn will further increase your Klout score. As it happens, social media marketers are actively looking for these "influencers", and they are only too happy to pay them for "dropping a link" to a certain website to their followers.
Behind the Algorithm
Sometimes, when trying to increase their Klout score, users make the mistake of thinking that quantity is just as good as quality, so they concentrate on gathering followers and tweeting a large amount of banal messages. That approach won't work with Klout because they do pay attention to the quality of the information that is shared. So don't start following other people like crazy, in the hope that they will return the favour. How you are getting your followers is more important than how many followers you actually have. The more you count on follow-backs instead of spontaneous followers, the slower your score will rise.
The number of times your messages are re-tweeted is important, but the number of different accounts that are re-tweeting your messages is even more so. That is why it is crucial to broaden your niche as much as you can. For example, if your area of interest is social media, don't just post about new developments like Google+. You could also tweet about the current state of Hyves or about the effect of social media on daily life. That way you will appeal to a broader audience.
The logic of Klout dictates that one mention of an account with a high score is much more valuable than 10 mentions of accounts with low scores. So it is very important to start conversations with influential Tweeps (short for Twitter peeps, meaning your followers). You can check their scores on hootsuite.com.
Much of the same goes for how you interact on Facebook and LinkedIn. Although, it is worth mentioning that it is the comments and the importance of the person who makes the comments that is most significant here. In short, quality and a good dose of common sense will help you to climb the Klout ranking. At the same time, quantity and chaos won't do you any favours.
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