Can Klout Really Measure our Influence on Social Media?

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There are a lot of tools available to help businesses and entrepreneurs measure their social influence. Some are free and others are for a fee. Do we need a tool to measure our influence? How does one measure social media influence anyways? Even if we use a free tool, our time isn’t free. Our time is valuable and any effort that we expend needs to evaluated. Whatever our goals are, we need to ensure that what we’re doing is achieving the results that we want.

Social Media Analytics:

So how exactly do these tools work? How is influence measured? Are we measuring it with sheer numbers of followers? Do we measure it by who is following us? By how many followers they have? Are these numbers important at all or are they merely numbers?

Klout Score “Measures Influence Based on your Ability to Drive Action.”

The above is a direct quote from the about page on the Klout website. Now, I’m not here to review Klout. I’m writing this because I can’t seem to be online for more than an hour or so without being klouted, klouting someone or reading about Klout. There has been a lot written lately about measuring social influence and a lot of very knowledgeable people are on both sides.

I visit Klout (almost) on a daily basis and my score hovers around 60. Personally, I don’t know if Klout can accurately measure my influence. I don’t know if there’s any tool that can. I don’t participate in Klout because I’m trying to increase my score. My score is of less value to me than the opportunities that participating in Klout affords me. So am I wasting my time? (I’m sure some of you think I am.) I don’t think so. I believe that Klout is just one more tool in my arsenal.

3 reasons I pay Attention to Klout:

1.)    By looking at the topics that Klout says I’m influential in, I can see if I’m building awareness in the niches that I’m targeting. Ideally, I’d want to score high in entrepreneurship, business strategy, social networking and blogging. When I look at my score, I can see that I’m not ranking in business strategy at all but I am ranking for American Idol. (For those of you who remember, I wrote a post on lessons bloggers can learn from watching that show.) So, I need to start tweeting more about business strategies and make sure I’m using the right hashtags.

 2.)     Klout is an easy way for me to reward influential people in my circle of influence and to attract new people to my blog. When I give someone a +K, I send out a tweet which often gets RT’d. The recipient of the +K feels good about what I’ve done and often will reciprocate. It’s a win-win for both of us and it’s a quick and easy way to build awareness. (I’ve been klouted by bloggers who I didn’t even know knew me. If I look at their profile, I often see that they’re a follower of someone I gave a +K to.)

 3.)     When someone gives me a +K, the hash tag of the topic is tweeted along with my twitter name (if they choose to tweet it which I believe most people do). So, it helps me to build awareness and establish me as an authority in the areas that I’m scoring well in.  Since I spend about 5 minutes a day on Klout, we’re not talking a big investment of time here.

 ROI – Return on Investment

One of the reasons that I am active on Twitter is that the ROI for me is very good. On average, I spend roughly 15 minutes to a half hour a day on Twitter (occasionally more). In return, it has been my number one source of referral traffic consistently for the last eight months and the percentage of traffic that it is generating is consistently increasing.

By incorporating Klout into my Twitter time, I have a fairly streamlined process that hasn’t really altered what I was already doing. Not only am I driving new traffic to my site, I am attracting readers who are genuinely involved in conversation and the exchange of ideas. So, for me personally, I intend to continue building relationships using tools and networking sites like Twitter and Klout.

What do you think? What is your take on Klout? Do you think it’s a waste of time or do you think it’s worth a shot? Have you paid any attention to it at all and if you have, what is your experience with it? If you haven’t and don’t intend to, please feel free to share that too. I can practically guarantee you’re not alone feeling that way.

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Author: Sherryl Perry

Welcome! If you're looking for help building an Internet presence that fits your needs and works for you, you're in the right place. I blog common sense articles about WordPress, social media and SEO. My goal is to help small business owners and entrepreneurs understand their core business. Together, we can develop and implement business strategies that make sense to you.

123 thoughts on “Can Klout Really Measure our Influence on Social Media?”

  1. Klout is interesting but its opinion of my activity often hurts my feelings. Klout recently described me as a “dabbler.” Ouch. Perhaps I am not all that active on Twitter but it’s kind of like a friend telling me, “That outfit makes you look fat.” True, sure, but a friend could be a little more supportive and maybe say, “Have you considered vertical stripes?”
    Astro Gremlin recently posted..Comment TreasureMy Profile

  2. Lately I have been seeing a lot of complaints about people offended at Klout compiling scores about them. But if your tweets are public record then how can you fault a company for rating them? I think that this can be good if used the right way. Klout shoul doffer the option for account deletion though and as of yesterday they removed the option to do so. Not good. For now I will use it and see where this goes. thanks for the post and info.

  3. Hi there, I am hoping to have a chance to check out Klout in the near future so it is interesting to read what you think of it. Now I am curious what my score might be… !!
    – Sharon

  4. Hi Erica,
    Great! I always appreciate knowing when someone picks up tips they can use from my blog. Thanks for letting me know. Are you on Twitter? Klout and Twitter really go hand-in-hand. One thing you may want to do is go to http://gravatar.com and create a globally recognized avatar with your profile pic. Seeing your picture helps people to connect with you. Another tip is to enter your Twitter ID the next time you leave a comment here. There are a lot of really helpful bloggers who comment here and there’s a good chance that you may pick up a few followers.
    Sherryl Perry recently posted..Create an Online Presence – Be Seen Out ThereMy Profile

  6. I agree Klout is a great service, I can see it and services like it being extremely important in the future, even when it comes to search engines determining the authority of your articles and your website. My Klout score isn’t very high but it’s something I’m working on I bet the next time I go for a job the employer will look at my Klout score (hopefully this is a long long time in the future!)
    Dan recently posted..My top 3 SEO strategies and how I implement themMy Profile

  7. Hey Sherryl – Great write-up on Klout. I do like using Klout just to get an idea of what topics I’m involved in. It’s surprising sometimes!

    I like looking at it every now and then. I don’t do too much +K’ing; I probably should but I don’t remember to do it daily or anything. It seems like just a way for Klout to drive more traffic. 🙂 I wonder how much +K really matters to the score.

    1. Hi Tia,
      I believe Klout states on their site that giving +Ks will not improve your score. I actually have a reminder set on my calendar to Klout daily. I’m on Twitter anyways, so I Klout throughout the day until I hit my maximum of 5. (I user Buffer to schedule the tweets that I’ve klouted someone.)

      I also keep track (in a spreadsheet that I keep open all day anyways) of who I’ve received +Ks from. I try to reciprocate +ks (as long as they’re a blogger that I want to be associated with). I read somewhere that klouting people who are influential is better for your score than people who have a lower score but I really don’t care about my score. I’m using Klout to build community. Some bloggers are truly grateful and they RT the tweet that they were +K’d by me. I’ve also noticed that some of those bloggers interact with me more after the +K. So, it’s become a habit for me and I believe it’s worth the time that I spend on it.
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..3 Steps to Develop a Branding Strategy for Social MediaMy Profile

  8. I started using Klout, probably 3 months ago, reading a post on my friends blog. Since then the metrics and new options are so many. Combining Klout metrics and GA for example can really undercover much more about ROI and the whole picture of how exactly to benefit from social media.

  9. Hi Sherryl,

    I actually never tried Klout but I wanted to give it a shot in order to determine my social media influence. Thanks for letting me know this application. 🙂

  10. I still have very mixed feelings about Klout. I’m like you, my score floats around 60. But what does that actually say about me? I am very active on my blog and my 2 FB pages which aren’t included in the scoring. I try to keep active on Twitter and am doing quite well but I don’t get any business whatsoever from that platform. I like to regularly give K+ to my friends and others I know and regularly receive back too. I loved hearing how the topics are decided on as I’ve often read the list and thought – What??? That comment about words in blog post titles explains it all. 🙂 I’m going to experiment a bit more with hashtags too and see where that leads. Thanks for a great post.

    1. Thanks for your input Fiona. The topics on Klout can be strange for sure. I honestly can’t say for a fact that I’ve acquired new clients directly from participating on Twitter but I do suspect that there is a correlation there. Since Twitter is my number one source of referral traffic, I am definitely getting new readers to my blog through it and some of my blog readers have contacted and hired me. So, it’s difficult to attest that some of my blog readers (who have hired me) were influenced by Twitter or not. I do believe that tweeting content that brings value does help to build your online reputation.
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..20 Tips to Help Protect Your Online PrivacyMy Profile

  11. The main problems I have with Klout are one, it doesn’t take blogs into account, and two, if you happen to be away for a few days for whatever reason your score nosedives.

    On the first I’m not sure how they’ll ever measure it fairly, but it’s strange that someone with a few thousand followers that doesn’t participate on Twitter much would be said to not have much influence.

    On the second, it’s hard to imagine that someone with high influence would drop so fast from people’s minds if they went on vacation or had to tend to a personal matter. If they’d written blog posts in advance and had those posts show up on Twitter & other retweeting it, you’d think that would be enough for Klout to say “oh yeah, even though they’re not doing anything else they haven’t lost any influence”, but it doesn’t work that way.

    So, for me it’s just a tool to use whenever needed, but I don’t give it much consideration when looking at influence overall.
    Mitch Mitchell recently posted..29 More Black Social Media InfluencersMy Profile

    1. Hi Mitch,
      Thanks for sharing your thoughts. It would be nice if Klout could weigh in interaction on blogs but I have concerns on how they would achieve that. I think simply counting the number of comments could be unfair. Bloggers looking to game the system could approve low-quality comments like “nice post”.

      As for our scores being affected by our being away, I may have just lucked out but I’ve been out of power and without Internet access for 2 1/2 days. So far, my Klout score hasn’t budged from where it was a few days ago. (I am relieved because I did fear it would drop. I haven’t been online once in all that time.) I realize that it could still drop. I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on it.

      As for people with thousands of Twitter followers not having much influence, if they’re not interacting with their followers by tweeting and RTing, they may not be influencing anyone. I think I’d like that. I do agree with you that it’s just a tool. Since it’s easy and takes so little time, it’s a tool I’m using for now at least. Thanks again for sharing. This is exactly the kind of discussion that makes the comments interesting! 🙂
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..3 Steps to Develop a Branding Strategy for Social MediaMy Profile

  12. I agree with you and I think Klout is best used in conjunction with twitter. It’s that feeling of appreciation and reciprocation that can boost your exposure driving plenty more visitors to your site with just a few clicks.

  13. Hi, Sherryl, Your post on this topic was very helpful. I am on Klout but my score is low (I do give +K to others but not regularly) and the topics I am “influential” about don’t have anything to do with what my main message is (I’m influential about vegetables and haircuts??). I get where that came from but wonder why they surpass other topics (like epilepsy, caregiving or writing). I’ll try using more hashtags to see if that changes things. Anyway, jury is still out from this corner! 🙂 Also, would posting my blog to my FB page help increase my score? Right now, the blog posts to my “Robert’s Sister” FB page, not my main page under my name.

    Trish
    http://www.robertssister.com
    caregiving. family. advocacy.

    1. Hi Trish,
      You’re active on social networking sites, so, I’d expect to see your Klout score gradually grow. I just gave you a +K and (as of right now), you’re no longer influential in haircuts! 🙂 I gave you a +k in epilepsy. Your other 3 choices now are blogging, business and klout. That’s kind of funny to me because I’m not influential in klout at all. However, I am showing up as influential in multi-level marketing – which I have no knowledge of and am not involved in at all. I’m wondering if that topic may be showing up for me because I am socially connected with quite a few bloggers who are involved with mlm. Do you follow a lot of hair stylists? 🙂
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..20 Tips to Help Protect Your Online PrivacyMy Profile

      1. Sherryl, Using your tips (and you +Ks! — Thank you), my score increased several points over the last few days. I deleted the topics that it thought I was influential in but were just a fluke (haircuts – I wrote a blog post about taking Robert for a haircut and “haircut” was in the title. It actually was about epilepsy and miracles but Klout picked up on the haircut.). I’ve linked to my blog and am trying to use key words in titles and tweets. I’ve also been giving away +Ks to other people. Appreciate the help!

  14. Hi Sherryl,

    great review! Thanks for sharing. I use Klout and I check regularly (but not too often). While I am on my profile anyways, I always give my klout recommendation to others. Sometimes, I am wondering though how they choose the terms that I am supposed to be influential about like “Texas”?!
    I don’t overrate it but overall, it’s a good tool,

    Franziska San Pedro
    The Abstract Impressionist Artress

  15. I find Klout interesting. It definitely has some flaws though. For example, I can tweet at someone with a couple questions, and they answer me back. Next thing I know, Klout says they are influenced by me, which is clearly not the case.

    However, for the reasons you state above, it can be useful for recognizing other people in your niche and possibly building a bit more awareness for yourself. Also, it could very well continue to grow as a site and develop into something bigger down the line.

    1. Hi Anthony,
      That’s an interesting observation. Thanks for sharing it with us. That makes sense that this is happening. That’s why I don’t think a lot of people are putting much value on the actual score at least for now. As you say, it could develop into something bigger in the future.
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..Have You Been Innovative Today?My Profile

  16. Hi Neil,
    Thank you for telling me about my G+ icon! I just fixed it. I was having an issue with Google and my Ids. It started with not being able to access my Analytics and went downhill from there. 🙂 Thanks for letting me know and joining us here.
    Sherryl Perry recently posted..6 Reasons to NOT Build a WebsiteMy Profile

  17. Any time I see sites offering you the ability to add a widget to your site with a number on it you know that all that matters is that little number. I’ve seen these badges start to appear on blogs around the web and it’s effectively saying look how important I am and look at my influence. People with real influence are never going to add a Klout badge to their site.

    1. Robert,
      I’m not an advocate of badges either. I do think there’s value to voting and numbers because people are influenced by the opinions of others. What’s been working well for me is adding the Facebook social plug-in to my sidebar. It does display the number of people who like my FB page but more importantly, it shows their faces. I’ve only been using this plug-in for a little over a week and the number of people liking my page is steadily increasing. I’m actually pleasantly surprised. (Now, I have to step up my game on FB to make sure I’m adding value there too.)
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..Can Bloggers Learn a Lesson From Watching American Idol?My Profile

  18. Sherryl,

    Thank you and I am thankful to Susan for doing the interview. I hope that it will help people see that content and social marketing and help grow their businesses. As for Klout, I am really going to have to look into it tonight.

    Thanks,
    Jenn

  19. Sherryl,

    Great article as always. I have to admit I really do not pay much attention to klout, but I will take another look at since reading your article. I would love to know that I have some klout and influence among my readers.

    Jenn

  20. From my experience of Klout, it seems to be based a lot on guesswork and I’m not sure how far back it actually analyses your data. Also, it said I was influential about “Hawaii”, which is something I’m certain I’ve never even tweeted once! So flakey, but the idea is good.

  21. I like Klout, can’t say I love it because it does drop my score now and then, lol! I think you can use it to youradvantage, being seen as an expert in your field helps, influential about topics is good too. Wish I knew more about how it makes its calculations (best kept secret…as they add more social media sites to the mix)….but I know if you are not tweeting, your score is dropping! Thanks for the information here:

  22. I too have been paying a lot more attention to my Klout score recently, not in a statistical-monkey type of way, but it gives me a good idea of how my actions are affecting my stance on Twitter. I think it’s an excellent measure of how well you are engaging with your audience. I’ve slowly seen it rise as I’ve been made an active effort to build up my Twitter presence and likewise I’ve seen it fall when I’ve taken time away.
    Dave Clements recently posted..Completely Remove RSS Feeds in WordPressMy Profile

    1. I’ve been experiencing the same thing with my Klout score Dave. It serves as a reminder that I can’t slack off on my interactions. I’ve recently started tracking +ks that I’ve received to make sure that I reciprocate (as long as it’s from a blogger that I respect of course). I was trying to do this before without actually tracking it but I thought it was time for me to take Klout a little more seriously.
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..Google+ Social Network – Part of Your Business Strategy?My Profile

  23. This is so timely for me, Sherryl! I keep getting folks tweeting that they’ve given me a k+ etc & didn’t really begin investigating until a couple of weeks ago. I suppose I should be reciprocating 🙂

    I think you mentioned this in a response to a comment above, but my twitter acct is attached to a different email than my facebook acct, hence all those “likes & shares” aren’t counted. Do you know how to rectify that? or are you tied into just one email acct per Klout? make sense?

    Thanks!

    Heidi & Atticus
    http://www.atticusuncensored.com
    “commentary to give you paws…”

    1. Great! I’m glad the timing worked for you. I do think reciprocating +Ks is a good idea. It helps to build good relationships with other bloggers

      Is there a reason why you don’t use the same email account for both Twitter and Facebook? Do you have more than one website that you’re trying to promote? If not, I’d suggest changing your email account to whichever you consider to be your main account. I use an email account that is branded with this domain name for my Gravatar and all of the social networking sites that I join.
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..20 Tips to Help Protect Your Online PrivacyMy Profile

      1. Thanks Sherryl. I just tried to change my twitter email to my mail email account but it says it’s already taken — which doesn’t make sense since I only have one twitter account. strange… I’ll continue to fool around with it. thanks again

  24. My Klout has dropped recently and i think it is because for some reason i cannot tweet to a hashtag (again)..this keeps happening to me and eventually it gets fixed by Twitter but meantime my score drops. I use the hashtag a lot as it helps me converse with like minded people. Klout said I was influential about Elmo..which I really am not but I did used to tweet about working from home in Elmo slippers so it is funny how it decides “influence’ I think perhaps if you were to just tweet the word “blubber” many times, Klout would summize you are influential about blubber. However i do like some of the features Klout uses to help us to help others and vice versa like the K+

    Julie Labes: The Fun-Loving, Feisty, Fearless, Frisky, Fierce Over 50 Traveler

  25. The Klout +1 is like a virtual pat on the back. I added it to my advertising page so that people can see ‘the measurer of influncers’ say I’m influential about this or that. What I find useful about the platform is it’s ability tell you what your ‘true’ reach is, which is a very valuable stat indeed.

    1. Hi Ivin,
      A “virtual pat on the back” – I really like that. 🙂 Thanks for mentioning the “true reach”. That is an interesting piece of information. I was just looking at a comparison of my score to another blogger and my score was quite a bit higher than hers yet her reach was quite a bit higher than mine. So, it’s definitely something I should pay more attention to.

      I just checked out your blog and read the part 1 article on SEO. It is very well written. I’ll be back to your blog for sure.
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..3 Steps to Protect Your WordPress Blog from HackersMy Profile

  27. Don’t doubt that publishers and companies have started using it. But the measurement is severely flawed. Hopefully it’s mainly in the US they use Klout?:-)

    Facebook fan page I have heard about people being turned down for not having.

    Richard Branson scores 79. That would mean that he is less than twice as influencial as you and I are. Wish that was true for both of us but it clearly shows there’s something very wrong here.

    Have some fun and check out people you know have no influence on social media and you will sometimes find that according to Klout they do.

  28. The advice here has been tremendous — from Sherryl and all.

    I’ve now given Klout access to my Linked In account as well as my Blogger account, where I have my writer’s blog. (Hope to upload a new post to that within the next day or 2.)

    Will see if that makes a difference in getting my score past 60. It’s traditionally been in the mid-high 50’s range.

    Thanks again for the advice!
    Doreen.
    Doreen Pendgracs recently posted..Blog Jog Day: Round 3My Profile

    1. Thanks for letting us know Doreen. There’s a great group of bloggers here and there’s always something to be learned by reading the comments. 🙂

  29. Sherryl, it suddenly occured to me that there’s something fundamentally wrong with how Klout measures influence.

    When I gave them access to Linkedin my score went straight up about 10 points. So I decided to find out more.

    Klout exclude the influence your blog has. Seth Godin hence only scores 73 (you have to check a bit before finding him since it goes under this blog).

    Decided to check out how a friend of mine who tweets A LOT but seriously has 0 influence on social media scored. He scored 38 thanks to all his tweets to about 150 followers.

    According to Klout my friend has half as much influence as Seth Godin which is completely wrong. Seth Godin’s influence is about 100 if not 1000 times as high.

    Really think we should be aware of this when it comes to Klout.

    Could write much more but I will leave it there.

    1. I don’t disagree that the way Klout measures influence may be flawed. It’s assumed that people will find ways to manipulate it. However, it is what it is and I’m using it as a tool.

      Did you notice Louise Edington’s comment? She knows an author who was working with a publisher who checked out her Klout score before they would agree to publish her. I’ve heard stories before regarding authors. Someone else was turned down by a publisher because she didn’t have a Facebook fan page.
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..Google+ Social Network – Part of Your Business Strategy?My Profile

  30. This is a subject that I know nothing about. Thanks for the education. I doubt that I will ever need to have this knowledge but nice to know it’s out there if I ever do.

  31. The thing about Klout is that I have quite a few people klouting me yet my score remains practically the same. I think it’s because they tend to klout me for the same couple of topics rather than varying it up and selecting different ones. I’m not sure how it works exactly, but I do believe that if people tend to klout you for the same areas of influence, your score will not change much.

    1. Renee,
      I know that Klout says that it doesn’t help your score to klout other people but I didn’t realize that it didn’t help to get klouted. I do know that the higher your score, the more difficult it becomes to get it higher. My score has been fluctuating 2 to 3 points for the last week or so. I really think we all need to stop worrying about the actual scores and instead concentrate on if we’re noticing any other tangible results. Are you RT’ing your scores on Twitter and making sure to acknowledge each tweet with the #klout hashtag and @klout ID? I don’t know for sure if that helps but I do believe that doing that is helping me.
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..How Did Kathy Ireland Build a Brand Worth Over 1 Billion Dollars?My Profile

      1. No, I think it does help to get Klouted, however, I think the true value lies in getting klouted for different areas of influence. I’m not ‘worried’ about klout scores as much as I am trying to understand how their metric works. I never retweet my score…I do however, tweet when I have klouted someone or will retweet when someone klouts me. The only score that I truly value at this point in time is my Google rank and I don’t worry about that either.

        1. I wouldn’t say I’m “worried” about my score either but I can’t help but get a nagging feeling every time my score goes back down under 60. I guess it’s the competitive nature in me. I don’t think anyone knows how the Klout metric works. I don’t look at scores either. The only thing I pay attention to is a few things on my Google analytics. That’s it. I try not to pay attention to Google page rank either.
          Sherryl Perry recently posted..3 Steps to Protect Your WordPress Blog from HackersMy Profile

  32. I love Klout – check in there every day. I love to see that I’m influential about the things that i want to be influential about and I’m afraid I do get a bit obsessed with my score as I’m competitive lol. I too love giving +K as another way of interacting with people. But then I’m a complete geek…..I do have a friend whose publishers were very interested in her Klout score and profile before they would agree to publish her book so yes, Klout is influential. I tell all my clients to sign up and measure their progress.

    1. Louise,
      Thank you so much for letting us know that publishers are interested in Klout scores. This is the first time I’ve heard of a case where it’s been taken into account. I remember reading somewhere that an author was told that they needed to have a Facebook page to be taken seriously. Have you heard of that also?
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..20 Tips to Help Protect Your Online PrivacyMy Profile

      1. I haven’t – but everyone I know that has been published has a Facebook page so it wouldn’t surprise me at all.

    1. Wow! That’s a real possibility. You’re the first person that I’ve heard mention that. It makes a lot of sense.

      Thanks for the follow on Twitter. After following you back, I looked for a post that I could RT and found your article on planning for Twitter. (I would have left a comment if they hadn’t been closed.) I’m always talking about having a social networking strategy. So, of course I loved your article. I’m sure I’ll be back to your blog. Nice to meet you here!
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..3 Steps to Protect Your WordPress Blog from HackersMy Profile

  34. Thanks for this discussion, Sherryl.

    I’m very new to Klout, but I echo a previous commenter’s remarks that my Klout score has dropped over the past few days as I’ve been away from the computer and not tweeting, etc.

    I’m trying to gain a higher profile in the world of chocolate as I’m writing a book about chocolate & travel, and so have been attempting to broaden my influence by publishing an li-paper on chocolate. It’s happening … slowly but surely.
    Doreen Pendgracs recently posted..Montreal has an important place in my heartMy Profile

    1. Hi Doreen,
      I think your Klout score is good and travel and chocolate are both listed as topics. (They’re definitely not the ones you’re scoring high in though.) I took a quick peek at your twitter account, your site and your two blogs. (My mind immediately started churning!) I noticed that you own your own domain name. Have you thought about building a new website using WordPress? (You could still have a static home page.) That way, you would be directing all of you traffic to one place. Since you’re already paying for hosting, you should be able to start building a new site while keeping your existing site intact. When it’s ready to go, it would be an easy transition.

      Oh… that’s right, we were talking about Klout. 🙂 Seriously, I love brainstorming. I don’t know how much of a techie you are but if you’re interested in some of the thoughts that are now racing through my head, contact me. I’d be happy to share some ideas with you.
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..3 Steps to Protect Your WordPress Blog from HackersMy Profile

  35. Hi Catherine,
    I’m not sure how I was introduced to Klout. I think either someone klouted me or I read a post about it. I’m always looking for easy things to do to help build awareness of my blog. I honestly have added roughly 5 minutes to my day by klouting and I am seeing my twitter numbers grow. I think the exposure is worth the time.

    Thanks for the link about Twitter analytics! This is absolutely the kind of info that I’m interested in. I’m going over to checkout your post on LinkedIn too. 🙂
    Sherryl Perry recently posted..Google+ Social Network – Part of Your Business Strategy?My Profile

  37. Hello Sheryl.

    I’ve been using Google Analytics instead of Klout. Actually I’ve never heard of it before. Most people use Google Analytics since it is more comprehensive and detailed. Yet, I think I might consider using Klout because of your first hand experience with it.

  38. Hi Kristina,
    I think a lot of us are curious about what (if any) impact social measuring tools like Klout will have. So far, I’m not putting a lot of value on my actual score and I’m not getting too overly concerned with the topics. I am going to make an effort to use hashtags and incorporate the business strategy tag in my tweets and posts to see if I can get that topic to appear. Some bloggers ask before they Klout me to see if I have a preference in what I want to be Klouted in. If I can get that topic to appear as a choice, I can ask for klouts there. As you say, we need time to see where this goes.
    Sherryl Perry recently posted..The Buzz about Google+ Do You Love it or Hate it?My Profile

  39. To tell the truth, I hadn’t even heard of Klout until about an hour ago…

    I think we all realize that Google now takes into account how much/often your content is shared on social media in ranking your site in SERPs. I don’t know what Klout’s metric is all about, but it would be cool if it somehow measures the leverage your site receives in Google results due to your content’s “share” factor.

    1. Hi Sonny,
      Klout is fairly new and it’s certainly not the only tool that’s being used to “try” to measure social influence. I started using it about 2 months ago. Since it’s free and not very time consuming, I think it’s worth checking out. As you point out, Google is taking into account sharing on social media. Klout is definitely something easy to do and being able to easily tweet from their site is a plus.
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..20 Tips to Help Protect Your Online PrivacyMy Profile

      1. I think you’re right about the word “try.” If its figures are anything like Alexa rankings or PagePank, a reasonable approximation is about all we can hope to expect from them…

  40. Great and useful article Sherryl. Checked what topics I’m influencial in and turns out they are politics, Investing, economics and business mainly. Makes sense.

    But listens to this it really makes me laugh Sherryl my influence on you is 59, 45 on you Susan and 38 on Julie.. Whatever that means?

    Agree with Susan that it would be really interesting if someone knows of a study that’s been done and shows if Klout is used as a reference for hiring a company.

    1. Hi Catarina,
      Those are definitely topics that suit you well. The Klout scores that you’re seeing when you look at our Klout pages are our scores. Today, your Klout score is 34. I just gave you a +K in business. I didn’t see politics or economics as an available topic to Klout you in today but I’ll be back.

      I looked for research today to answer Susan’s question but I really couldn’t find any research showing how Klout is being used as references. I think that we’re in the early stages of seeing quantifying results with Klout. I plan on keeping up to date with this. So, I will probably write another post about measuring social influence in the future.
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..Google+ Social Network – Part of Your Business Strategy?My Profile

      1. Thanks Sherryl. Am not convinced about Klout, but I may be wrong? Let’s see what happens.

        1. I’m not totally convinced of the value of having a high Klout score but I can certainly attest to the value of using it as a tool to interact with other bloggers. Since I started paying attention to Klout, I’ve noticed that the number of people who are following me on Twitter has risen significantly. I can’t prove that there’s a direct correlation but I believe it’s safe to assume that it’s my interactions with Klout combined with tweeting and RT’ing about those interactions.
          Sherryl Perry recently posted..Can Klout Really Measure our Influence on Social Media?My Profile

          1. Interesting Sherryl. What I would like to know though is what someone interested in buying your services would be able to find out from Klout. What they claim I’m not convinced of.

            Alexa on the other hand you can show more or less how many visitors your site has and your rating. Am aware that there are tricks some bloggers use to get higher score but all in all it shows that you are, like in my case, amongst the top 1.34 percent of web pages in the world when it comes to number of visitors.

            Let’s see what happens. Will be interesting. By the way added you to my circles on Google +:-)

            1. Catarina, The logic I’m following is that by increasing the number of Twitter followers that I have, some of these followers will end up readers of my blog. Oftentimes, my readers engage me in conversation and several of them have become clients. It’s also entirely possible that a new reader to my blog could share a post with someone who I could help. Who knows for sure? I just look at it as an easy way to help my blog grow organically.

              My Google+ is a nightmare right now due to an issue I’m having with Google. I ran into a problem accessing Google Analytics and Google randomly assigned a new gmail account to me (making it the primary account). I ended up losing over 300 connections in my circles. So, I’m reluctant to grow my circles now until I can get this resolved.

  41. That’s another good point John. A higher Klout score could certainly help someone who is trying to build a reputation as an “authority” or resource. Having said that, I really need to start using the keywords business strategy in more of my posts.
    Sherryl Perry recently posted..Have You Been Innovative Today?My Profile

  43. Sherry, on the plus side, I do find Klout a nice way of rewarding talented people who are helpful and relate well to others.

    I do find, however, if I’m not active on Twitter or Facebook for a few days, all of a sudden my Klout score drops. I find myself saying, don’t bother doing social media *just* to get the Klout score back up. But that competitive temptation is there.
    Leora Wenger recently posted..3 Reasons to Know about RedirectionMy Profile

    1. Leora, You sound so much like me! I’m not really competitive but I hate to see my Klout score drop too. A few days ago, it was 60. I would have so much preferred to have been able to capture that for this post. 🙂 I agree with you that I am not going to start changing my social networking strategy just for a measurement that I am not completely convinced has that much impact. Time will tell.
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..20 Tips to Help Protect Your Online PrivacyMy Profile

  44. Hello, thanks for a great article!

    I truly believe that Klout will become more and more important to us all and not only those very involved in social media. I must confess to getting a little concerned when my Klout score drops or although I know I shouldn’t, fluctuation shows that you’re alive!

    I’m very excited about all the new connections and this is clearly encouraging other companies to connect more. Social media is growing at such a pace now, it makes sense to be as connected as possible for companies like Klout and PeerIndex.

    To me Empire Avenue is also a great way to judge people’s social media influence and I’ve ask Klout if they’ll connect with Empire Avenue. That would be interesting!

    A great article, thanks a lot, best regards, Peter

    (I recommend Hoverme Hovercard in Twitter too, it lets you see people’s social media connections)

    1. Thanks Peter. I really appreciate your comment that “fluctuation shows that you’re alive!” 🙂 My score dropped from 60 earlier this week and I was disappointed. (My disappointment lasted about 30-seconds before I shrugged it off.)

      I joined Empire Avenue because of an article that I read (it may have been yours) but I honestly didn’t stay around long enough to figure it out. All that talk about shares discouraged me. Hearing that you find value in it makes me want to take a second look at it. 🙂
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..The Buzz about Google+ Do You Love it or Hate it?My Profile

    1. I read your blog Julie and I don’t remember you ever blogging about that either. You can delete that topic if you don’t want to be associated with it.

    1. Thanks Julie. I just wanted to share my strategy. I think my Klout score reflects how active I am on Twitter. I haven’t changed anything I’m doing with the intention of increasing my Klout score. It’s happening organically. Actually, my number of tweets has increased because of Klout but that’s simply in correlation to the number of Klouts I’ve been getting and receiving.

      BTW – Klout says it doesn’t help to give +Ks but I’ve learned that it certainly does engage people which is what social influence is about. 🙂
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..6 Reasons to NOT Build a WebsiteMy Profile

  48. Hi Sherryl,
    Really great Klout review. I do pay attention to my score however am lacking big time using hashtags. Thank you for the insight and advice, I’ll be including those #hashtags in the future!

    Of all the social sites, Twitter is my favorite and where I’ve made the most connections. I’m sure that’s why my score is improving, along with the many new connections I’ve encountered.

    I read Klout will be adding a Google+ connection. There was a great deal of conversation on the subject.As I recall about half the comments thought Klout was baloney. I disagree. In my opinion that would be a big advantage for Klout and it’s users.

    Have a great week!
    kathleen@midlife recently posted..Google+ First Impression | Top Women Bloggers 2011My Profile

    1. I read that Klout is adding the Google+ connection too. They’re recently added several social networking sites that we can connect. Unfortunately for me, Google created and assigned a gmail account to my main Google account. So, I’m left with no way to tie my Google+ account with everything else that I do on Google. I’m totally frustrated trying to get this straightened out. So, I’m not spending much time on Google+ right now. I already lost about 300 connections in my circles and I’m afraid that could happen again. So, if anyone notices that I’m not building a presence there . . . that’s why.

      Thanks for sharing Kathleen. It’s good to hear that other people find Twitter to be their favorite source too.
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..3 Steps to Protect Your WordPress Blog from HackersMy Profile

  49. Thanks, Sherryl, for writing such an informative post. Congratulations on your high Klout score. While many people question the accuracy of Klout, you can’t underrate its importance. If companies are evaluating a consulting firm on their Klout score when seeking social media services, then your score is very important. I personally need to do more to increase my score — I’ve been ignoring it but that is probably not smart. I wrote recently about another controversial service, Alexa, that ranks the popularity of websites and the people behind it. My blog reported the results of a question I asked on LinkedIn and wrote about in the Blogger’s Bulletin. Here is the link if you are interested in reading what people think of Alexa http://bit.ly/pjS9vU.

    1. Thanks for the link Jeannette. I checked it out (and tweeted and dug it for you). I honestly don’t spend any attention on Alexa. I have to admit that I tend to look for things that I can do that are quick and easy. That’s why I’m paying attention to Klout. I just open another browser window while I’m tweeting and Klout a few people. It takes me longer to correspond with the tweets that I get about Klout than it takes to Klout. 🙂 As for my score, it had been 60 up until a few days ago. They say that the higher your score is, the harder it is to get it to go up. (I can attest that it’s harder to keep it there too.)
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..Low Cost Resources Small Business Owners and Entrepreneurs Can AccessMy Profile

  50. Sherryl, aloha. An excellent review of Klout and effective use of it. Of course, as it happens I agree 100% with what you say.

    Your point point #1 is so important that I want to talk about it a little. Understanding how Klout selects your topics of influence, makes a big difference. When Klout gave me my topics of influence, I thought “what on earth is this?” Then, like you discovered with your American Idol post, it turns out I had written a very popular post that triggered similar results. Because of my post, “Seduce your Lizard Brain,” I was influential on lizards. Thank heavens, Klout has now changed my topics of influence.

    Happily, 9 out 10 of my new topics are fine with me. The 1 is a result of another post: “What do Social Media Marketing and Riding Bicycles have in Common?” You guessed it, I am now influential on bicycles. Naturally, I blocked it so no one can +K it in fun and perpetuate the error.

    Sherryl, using appropriate hashtags is an excellent piece of advice to give people. Quite honestly, I don’t do that nearly as much as I will be doing in the future. Prior to my new topics of influences, I was listed as influential for each of the chats in which I participated. Why? Because of exactly what you are saying, Sherryl, the hashtags. At the end of each tweet on a tweetchat, the hashtag for the chat is automatically included.

    All of your points above are well taken. Like you, Sherryl, I agree that the small investment of time is well worth the returns. Even though people say Klout doesn’t matter, it does because people know that it exists and they look at it.

    As always, well done. Best wishes for a terrific Wednesday. Aloha. Janet

    1. Thanks so much for adding your insight Janet. Personal stories like yours are so helpful. I remember your lizard-brain post. That’s funny that you had a Klout topic of lizards but that was such a popular post, it makes complete sense. I’ve actually left the American Idol topic on my Klout topics. I was hoping that it may peak someone’s interest and that they may come here to see why I had influence about a TV show. 🙂

      Tweetchats? OK – I confess that I haven’t participated in those yet. (Note to self: check out tweetchats – starting with Janet’s.)
      Sherryl Perry recently posted..Can Bloggers Learn a Lesson From Watching American Idol?My Profile

    2. Terrific insight here in the last bit by you, Janet. Definitely worth taking away this little bit from your comment – even though people say Klout doesn’t matter, it does because people know that it exists and they look at it.

      This actually triggered a brainstorm/idea for me in a different direction, but what you said applies on several levels. 😉 And it’s a great point about Klout and whether or not it matters. Look at the numbers. Yes it can.

        1. LOL, well thank you. 😉 I signed up for Klout immediately after reading this post and the comment above, haha. I’m still getting plugged in everywhere I want to be. 😉

          I like using hashtags I just can’t stand when it’s overdone. If I can’t understand what you’re saying or it looks like a blatant ad, #I #Wont #Click #Your #Link.

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