There I was, happy as a clam with my Klout ranking of “Thought Leader” and a Klout score of 62 when suddenly my Klout score plunged to 1. On a one to hundred scale that put my social networking influence slightly below the neighborhood cat. It turns out I wasn’t the only one. All of Klout’s millions of users had had their scores reset to 1.
Now you think “What nonsense! Who cares what your Klout score is!” I’d agree… until a few months ago when I was in the early stages of a book deal and the publisher insisted on knowing what my Klout score was.
So what is a Klout score? I quickly found out that, according to Klout, that the Klout Score is the measurement of your overall online influence. The scores range from 1 to 100 with higher scores representing a wider and stronger sphere of influence. Klout uses over 35 variables on Facebook and Twitter to measure True Reach, Amplification Probability, and Network Score.”
I soon discovered that many companies, and not just publishers, were using Klout scores to determine if they want to work with social networking “experts,” public relations people, marketers, and, oh yes, writers and journalists.