Comments on: Analyzing Influence in Twitter http://www.newinfluencer.com/analyzing-influence-in-twitter/ A blog about social media, culture and technology Fri, 14 Oct 2011 16:17:44 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: Frank Strong http://www.newinfluencer.com/analyzing-influence-in-twitter/comment-page-1/#comment-64842 Frank Strong Fri, 05 Feb 2010 05:39:21 +0000 http://www.newinfluencer.com/?p=364#comment-64842 Intersting post, Jiyan. I was a bit skeptical at first - the economy of influence you opened with in the first paragraph made me think you had missed the point. But you brought it home in the end, with the conclusion about conversation for the sake of interest and connection, which is what the gurus (that you noted, based on research I might add, are generally ignored) tell us is the purpose of social media. As the saying goes, what comes around, goes around, and you never know when the little guy gets big. A piece of advice I heard early in my PR career was to treat every reporter like they are from the Wall Street Journal -- because you never know when they'll wind up working for that publication. This is true in social media, espeically if considering Twinfluence's concept of velocity. The irony of my disclaimer aside, the allure of influence, and more importanly the ability to accurately analyze it, certainly represents and area of profit for social media companies. To that end, Klout's concept of amplification is the one that I find most interesting. This combines with the influence of a network, seems to solve the problem of one Twitter accout having a following of millions that really don't act, vice the Twitter account with 100 that act on each post. This isn't unlike the concept of the executive assistant to a CEO. Or the assignment editor working the desk at a local broadcast channel. That person is a gatekeeper. They may have few connections than a marketing manager, or a reporter, in the case of TV news, but they do wield tremendous influence. Finally, and since you raised the topic of SEO, there is a glaring hole in these measures of influence: i.e. how to account for those who retweet, for retweet's sake. Maybe they are trying to build their own following -- or get on the radar of an influential Twitter users. What's missing is the the so-what factor. In other words, what's the click-through rate on any given link that's Tweeted? Can we obtain time on page? Uniqe visitors? Bounce rate? Or any of the other standard SEO metrics? Ultimately, can we tie a click to a sale? Or membership in the case of an association? Or a donation in the case of a non-profit? Or a signature on a petition in the case of a political organization? For me the Holy Grail of influence on Twitter would be the confluence of Bit.ly, Google Analytics, Klout and Twinfluence. Something that would tell me from end-to-end, what attracted a buyer, where they came from, what pieces of content attracted them, and the last point they loitered before making a purchase. I suppose we'll have to settle for far less for a few years, but your post at least gets us to thinking about it more clearly. Intersting post, Jiyan. I was a bit skeptical at first – the economy of influence you opened with in the first paragraph made me think you had missed the point. But you brought it home in the end, with the conclusion about conversation for the sake of interest and connection, which is what the gurus (that you noted, based on research I might add, are generally ignored) tell us is the purpose of social media.

As the saying goes, what comes around, goes around, and you never know when the little guy gets big. A piece of advice I heard early in my PR career was to treat every reporter like they are from the Wall Street Journal — because you never know when they’ll wind up working for that publication. This is true in social media, espeically if considering Twinfluence’s concept of velocity.

The irony of my disclaimer aside, the allure of influence, and more importanly the ability to accurately analyze it, certainly represents and area of profit for social media companies. To that end, Klout’s concept of amplification is the one that I find most interesting. This combines with the influence of a network, seems to solve the problem of one Twitter accout having a following of millions that really don’t act, vice the Twitter account with 100 that act on each post.

This isn’t unlike the concept of the executive assistant to a CEO. Or the assignment editor working the desk at a local broadcast channel. That person is a gatekeeper. They may have few connections than a marketing manager, or a reporter, in the case of TV news, but they do wield tremendous influence.

Finally, and since you raised the topic of SEO, there is a glaring hole in these measures of influence: i.e. how to account for those who retweet, for retweet’s sake. Maybe they are trying to build their own following — or get on the radar of an influential Twitter users. What’s missing is the the so-what factor. In other words, what’s the click-through rate on any given link that’s Tweeted? Can we obtain time on page? Uniqe visitors? Bounce rate? Or any of the other standard SEO metrics? Ultimately, can we tie a click to a sale? Or membership in the case of an association? Or a donation in the case of a non-profit? Or a signature on a petition in the case of a political organization?

For me the Holy Grail of influence on Twitter would be the confluence of Bit.ly, Google Analytics, Klout and Twinfluence. Something that would tell me from end-to-end, what attracted a buyer, where they came from, what pieces of content attracted them, and the last point they loitered before making a purchase. I suppose we’ll have to settle for far less for a few years, but your post at least gets us to thinking about it more clearly.

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