online social influenceSearch engines like Google are continuously changing their algorithms to accurately match search queries to page results. With the ever increasingly influence of social media, sites like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are expected to hold even more relevance in ranking online content in 2012. Social influence could be the next big game changer as social media continues to integrate into search engine results, validating individuals and businesses online and giving authority to their content.

In short, online social influence is the impact that an individual has on an online audience. Someone with high social influence has the ability affect someone’s beliefs and drive action online; it determines who to trust and who to avoid within a network of users. Initially, social influence could be measured by how many ‘Likes’ a person had on Facebook or how many times their content was ‘retweeted’ on Twitter. However the increasing popularity and controversy surrounding sites like Klout in 2011, reveal that measuring social influence, and thus its importance, is a growing trend.

Klout is a popular website that scores your social influence by examining the activity on your social media accounts, giving users a score from 1 to 100. According to Klout, the higher your score, the more social influence you have in your online community. It monitors how often people reply to or share your posts, your ‘Likes’, comments, ‘retweets’, re-shares, wall-posts and mentions, which in turn validates you and your content and increases the value you add to your online community. Klout acts as a third party barometer, adding value to you as a brand.

Before we all jump on the bandwagon it is important to realise that Klout also has its flaws in attempting to accurately measure social influence. At this relative age of infancy, online social influence can easily be manipulated if one has the correct tools and knowledge. However the potential is huge when one considers the impact it could have on online marketing, search engine reputation management and brand identity. Similar to how SEO has changed and developed to retrieve organic search results, measurements of social influence will develop to authentically identify and validate the true social influencers, giving authority to great content. It’s a trend to watch closely in 2012.

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