What is Klout all about?

21 May 2012

Do you want to talk to everyone or jump to the front of the queue and go straight to the influencers? Of course, the people who already have a big reach with an interested and engaged audience are the ones to connect to. It appears to be the new holy grail for marketers, sales people, politicians, brands and many more.

 

There are a few companies who “measure influence”. The one I’ve heard of and used the most is Klout, but mainly due to it being bundled in with Hootsuite (which I adore and use daily). Plus they have the old “What’s in it for me” issue worked out with giving “Klout Perks” to people with high Klout scores. Although my “Klout Perks” have politely been worth the square route of nothing so far!

 

I fall in and out of love with using Klout, currently out! Recently they changed an algorithm and lots of peoples scores have crashed. Adding multiple social networks doesn’t seem to make a jot of difference! They don’t measure blogs or LinkedIn Groups – which I also don’t appreciate. But maybe the biggest reason is, I recently went on holiday, unplugged for a week and my Klout score dropped through the floor.

 

“So what?” you’re thinking. “I don’t have an account, so I’m not on the radar, right?” Wrong! If you have a Twitter or Facebook account, you have a Klout score too and anyone with a Klout account can look it up. (Which is quoted from here.)

 

A few brands are using Klout in campaigns… I read of one campaign around a fashion week (I think in the states), where the agency ran a competition to allow people with influence (High Klout) a ticket to a free glitzy party. They picked a good sounding/high number like 60 or 70 but Klout then had to explain that such a few number people attain that high of a number and gently persuaded them that 40 was actually a very good! It did push people with lower scores to start engaging (gaming the system) to increase their scores to grab a free ticket.

 

Or here’s a discount with Gilt based on Klout Score: http://blog.compete.com/2012/03/13/gilt-looks-to-score-sales-from-klout-promotion/

 

Klout is just one of many influence measuring sites that you can log into with Facebook or Twitter. There is Kred, PeerIndex and I’m sure others too. They are really easy to set up as shown here with mine: http://kred.com/danieldoherty which seems to give points for every interaction so goes into more detail. Plus I have met their CEO Andrew Grill who is a thoroughly nice guy.

http://www.peerindex.com/danieldoherty I have listened to someone pitching Peerindex too.

 

These thoughts came because I saw this tweet by ‏@BrennerMichael The Clout of Klout http://goo.gl/b4Sda via @candacemountain

 

I.E. blog http://blog.candacemountain.com/?p=380 and I felt I had to reply.  Which probably proves this lady, Laura was right when she tweeted this (to me last week)…

 

@tentontroll486/4486/4486/4 Isn’t this Klout obsession a bit OTT? RT @danieldoherty: How to Cheat at Klout via Social Media Today at me last week.

I have to give Kred some Kred.

I have to give credit where it’s due. This started off as a reply to a blog about Klout, but after watching this video and signing upto Kred (for this post) I am really starting to like Kred and I love the widgets they offer (there are lots!). I used the biggest one I could find below.

I just downloaded the chrome browser so I’ll see how that does, plus noticed they take into account blogs, LinkedIn group and can add offline achievements to your profile too. I will be playing with Kred more often now I have gone off Klout. Now if I could just integrate with @Hootsuite Andrew I’d be delighted!