Klout & The Klout Score

Melanie Wahl - August 15, 2011

Klout (www.klout.com) measures a person’s influence in aggregate of all of their social networks (at least those currently integrated with Klout).  The San Francisco based company has scored over 80 Million people since 2008.  The unit of measurement compiled is called The Klout Score and is a number from 1 to 100.  The higher the score, the more influence Klout has computed that you have. 

Your Klout Score is compiled from three factors – True Reach, Amplification, and Network Score.  Your True Reach measures how many people you actually influence. There are safeguards in place to filter out bots and spam to sift down to how many people are actually interacting with your content.  Another way of looking at your True Reach is to think about how many people share your content and how many people are compelled to respond to your messages.  Your Amplification can be thought of as how many times your message is spread. Do your friends want to share your message with their friends?  Your Network Score takes into account not just how many people are in your network, but how many of those people are influencers themselves.  The more influencers you know who react to your content, the higher your Klout Score is likely to be.

The Klout Score Formula

Until recently, your Klout Score was determined from online influence in five social media channels: Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Foursquare and YouTube.  Klout doubled that number to ten by adding Blogger, Flickr, Instagram, Last.fm and Tumblr.

Keeping with the trend of social media companies having their very own buttons, Klout introduced the +K Button in June.  The +K Button is similar to Google’s +1 Button in that you are making a recommendation.  In Klout’s case, you are recommending an individual as a good source of information on a certain topic.  You can read more about the +K Button on Klout’s Blog.