Klout
Encyclopedia
Klout is a San Francisco based company that provides social media
analytics
to measure a user's influence across their social network. The analysis is done on data taken from sites such as Twitter
and Facebook
and measures the size of a person's network, the content created, and how other people interact with that content. The company has been subject to substantial crticism, both for its business model and its operating principle.
True Reach is the size of one's engaged audience and is based on those of their followers and friends who actively listen and react to messages. Amplification Score is the likelihood that one's messages will generate actions (retweets, @messages, likes and comments) and is on a scale of 1 to 100. Network score indicates how influential one's engaged audience is and is also on a scale from 1 to 100. The Klout score is highly citation correlated to clicks, comments and retweets.
The final Klout Score is a representation of how successful a person is at engaging their audience and how big of an impact their messages have on people. The accuracy of Klout Score has been questioned several times by different researchers however Klout Score is being used by most social media marketers as a barometer of influence.
/dead accounts are following you, how influential the people that retweet you are, and unique mentions. This information is blended with Facebook data such as comment, likes, and the number of friends in your network to come up with a "Klout Score" that measures a user's online influence.
has described Klout as "the internet equivalent of herpes", saying that his analysis of Klout's terms and conditions reveals that the company's business model
is "flat-out illegal" in the United Kingdom, and "strongly advis(ing)" that members delete their accounts and opt out of Klout services.
John Scalzi
has described the principle behind Klout's operation as "socially evil".
Social media
The term Social Media refers to the use of web-based and mobile technologies to turn communication into an interactive dialogue. Andreas Kaplan and Michael Haenlein define social media as "a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0,...
analytics
Analytics
Analytics is the application of computer technology, operational research, and statistics to solve problems in business and industry. Analytics is carried out within an information system: while, in the past, statistics and mathematics could be studied without computers and software, analytics has...
to measure a user's influence across their social network. The analysis is done on data taken from sites such as Twitter
Twitter
Twitter is an online social networking and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters, informally known as "tweets".Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched that July...
and Facebook
Facebook
Facebook is a social networking service and website launched in February 2004, operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. , Facebook has more than 800 million active users. Users must register before using the site, after which they may create a personal profile, add other users as...
and measures the size of a person's network, the content created, and how other people interact with that content. The company has been subject to substantial crticism, both for its business model and its operating principle.
Klout Score
The scores range from 1 to 100 with higher scores representing a wider and stronger sphere of influence. Klout uses variables on Facebook and Twitter to measure True Reach, Amplification Probability, and Network Score.True Reach is the size of one's engaged audience and is based on those of their followers and friends who actively listen and react to messages. Amplification Score is the likelihood that one's messages will generate actions (retweets, @messages, likes and comments) and is on a scale of 1 to 100. Network score indicates how influential one's engaged audience is and is also on a scale from 1 to 100. The Klout score is highly citation correlated to clicks, comments and retweets.
The final Klout Score is a representation of how successful a person is at engaging their audience and how big of an impact their messages have on people. The accuracy of Klout Score has been questioned several times by different researchers however Klout Score is being used by most social media marketers as a barometer of influence.
Methodology
Klout measures influence by using data points from Twitter, such as: following count, follower count, retweets, list memberships, how many spamSpam (electronic)
Spam is the use of electronic messaging systems to send unsolicited bulk messages indiscriminately...
/dead accounts are following you, how influential the people that retweet you are, and unique mentions. This information is blended with Facebook data such as comment, likes, and the number of friends in your network to come up with a "Klout Score" that measures a user's online influence.
Criticism
Charles StrossCharles Stross
Charles David George "Charlie" Stross is a British writer of science fiction, Lovecraftian horror and fantasy. He was born in Leeds.Stross specialises in hard science fiction and space opera...
has described Klout as "the internet equivalent of herpes", saying that his analysis of Klout's terms and conditions reveals that the company's business model
Business model
A business model describes the rationale of how an organization creates, delivers, and captures value...
is "flat-out illegal" in the United Kingdom, and "strongly advis(ing)" that members delete their accounts and opt out of Klout services.
John Scalzi
John Scalzi
John Michael Scalzi II is an American author and online writer, and president of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. He is best known for his Hugo Award-nominated science fiction novel Old Man's War, released by Tor Books in January 2005, and for his blog , at which he has written...
has described the principle behind Klout's operation as "socially evil".
Notable events
- February 2011: Klout receives Series B funding from Kleiner Perkins
- May 2011: Klout launched v3 of klout.com
- May 2011: Klout integrates with Facebook
- May 2011: Klout re-brands Klout Perks
- June 2011: Klout introduces +K
- June 2011: Klout integrates with LinkedIn
- July 2011: Klout integrates with Foursquare
- July 2011: Klout partners with SpotifySpotifySpotify is a Swedish-founded, UK-headquartered DRM-based music streaming service offering streaming of selected music from a range of major and independent record labels, including Sony, EMI, Warner Music Group, and Universal. Launched in October 2008 by Swedish startup Spotify AB, the service had...
for their U.S. launch - August 2011: Klout integrates with YouTube
- September 2011: Klout integrates with Google+
- October 2011: Klout changes its scoring algorithm lowering many scores and creating complaints
- November 2011: Klout adds an "opt-out" functionality