You may be aware that there is a big debate going on in the social media blogosphere about ?influence? (and you can see links to several blog posts at the end of this one for examples of these discussions).
How we need to leverage influencers in our communities in order to get the word out about our causes, brands or services, etc. And that makes total sense from a generating-word-of-mouth point of view.
But hold on.
If you?re trying to do this, what if you don?t actually know who your industry influencers are? Perhaps because you?re not really immersed in your own open community, or because your community is too large or public-facing to be able to list your champions in an organic way, you?re just not seeing it?
So you begin to use some of the tools out there that purport to measure influence, and you start to think, ?This isn?t as easy as it sounds.?
Maybe you?re starting to think that influence is not about how many followers someone has on Twitter. ?Maybe you?re starting to think that ?influencer scores? are totally meaningless for your goals and objectives.
So what is influence, really?
Can it be measured (and if so, how)? How can you find the influencers in your industry? Do apps?like Klout or Twitalyzer really work to automate this? Or?is this all bunk?
A group of us are going to be talking about Internet Fame and the True Impact of Influence in a new BlogTalkRadio show on Wednesday February 9 at 10pm ET.
This new show is the brainchild of some really smart social media practitioners and consultants from various industries, and the purpose of the show is to debunk some of the social media bubble/hype around various issues. The tone will be irreverent, but the conversation and concerns around the topic are very real.
I hope you?ll be able to join us (expect the accompanying chat to be lively and extremely snarky!), or listen to the podcast afterwards (bookmark this page and come back to listen!).
I?ll be hosting this inaugural episode (uh-oh!) and Tamsen McMahon, Lisa Thorell, Allyson Kapin, Rich Becker and Olivier Blanchard will be chatting live with me on the night. But, as it?s BlogTalkRadio, anyone can call in and ask the panel questions. Lots of other people with thoughts on the topic will be listening in and participating by chat.
In preparation for the radio show, here are some of the blog posts the group may be referencing.
- 4 Things You Need to Know About Influence ? Tamsen McMahon, on Brass Tack Thinking
- It?s About Impact NOT Influence ? Allyson Kapin on Frogloop
- The Influence of Trust ? Danny Brown
- Artifacts of Influence: grassroots movements, familiar strangers and the power of the social media daisy chain. ? Olivier Blanchard
- Flipping The Scale: Influencers Are The Most Influenced ? Rich Becker on Copywrite, Ink.
- Klout & Critics: Time to Close the Door or Kick it Wide Open? ? Lisa Thorell on Digital, Ink.
- Strength of Community Supersedes Influence ? Geoff Livingston
- Why I?m 10X As Influential As Ashton Kutcher On Twitter* ? Chris Yeh, Adventures in Capitalism
- The Holy Grail of Online Influence vs Our Current Measurement Limitations ? Beast of Traal
- How do you evaluate influence? ? Jeremy Porter, on Journalistics
So put the kids to bed, grab your tipple of choice, and join us on Wednesday evening!
This post is derived from Maddie Grant and SocialFish.