Seems like everyone these past few weeks has been coughing, sniffling, running a fever – which makes sense, because it’s flu season.
And apparently, according to National Geographic, this flu season could be the longest and worst in years. So far 18 children have died from flu-related symptoms, and 2,257 people have been hospitalized.
One way to fight it? Twitter.
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Did you know that 79 percent of Inc. 500 CEOs have a social media presence, while 70 percent of Fortune 500 CEOs are completely absent on social media?
And will this matter in years to come?
Since Twitter first opened its doors to the public back in July 2006, pretty much everybody has been obsessed with a single number – namely, how many followers do you have?
Attractive as large follower counts can look, they are, and always have been, a false metric. Easily gamed (or bought), follower counts are, in many cases, indicative of nothing, and they certainly do not tell us anything about a user’s actual influence.
So there has to be a better way to do this… right?
Did you know that the first recorded advertisement, a Boston newsletter announcement seeking a buyer for an estate, dates back to 1704?
How things have changed. And how they’ve stayed the same. In today’s social media world, influence, and the perception thereof, is still a big deal. Big enough, in fact, for marketers and brands to be willing to pay for and reward influencers in their niche, and with good reason: peer recommendations drive sales. A recent survey showed that 70 percent of Facebook users were influenced into making a purchase based on a recommendation from a friend or family member on the social network.
Klout is taking another go at measuring influence – this time for brand pages, with a focus on how users interact with the page. “Brand squads,” according to the announcement on the Official Klout Blog, are “currently in beta, [and] are Klout’s way of giving influencers a place to be recognized and have a direct impact on the brands they care about most.”
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As the use of social media has grown in the United States, so too has students’ appreciation for the First Amendment, suggests a new study by Knight Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting journalism and supporting communities across the USA.
However, teachers aren’t quite as positive about the merits of platforms such as Twitter and Facebook as their students – almost half believe that social media actually harms the learning process.
The number of followers you have on Twitter has always been a dubious and highly-debatable measure of success. Your level of engagement (mentions, retweets, clicks) is a much better indication of true influence.
Moreover, when you consider that at any one time the actual number of people paying attention to you on Twitter is frighteningly small, then one thing becomes crystal clear: you always need to be on your A game.
If I had to pick a single movie that had the biggest influence on my life, it would have to be 1987’s Wall Street.
I was 16 when that film was released, and it made a big impression on me. I must have watched it a dozen times, and even now can effortlessly recall huge chunks of dialogue (with all the appropriate nuance). And yes, while Oliver Stone’s closing message made his desired point, it couldn’t in any way compete with the force of nature that was Gordon Gecko. Like a gazillion other impressionable teenage kids, I was drawn into his web. By the time I was 21 I was working as a technical analyst for a small firm writing reports on global currency movements. A few years after that I became a government bonds trader. And from there, I took the inevitable, almost cliched bridge towards professional blogging, specialising in social media, via a brief interlude as a club doorman.
But I digress.
The quantification of influence within the social space is a hot topic, and a potential goldmine for the development team that properly cracks it.
Platforms such as Klout and PeerIndex have given it a good shot, but they’re far from perfect. Part of the problem is nobody can really answer what appears to be a simple question, but is actually incredibly complex. Namely: what is influence?
New York Times magazine The 6th Floor have worked with Twitter analytics website Twitalyzer to study this question, and the results are both surprising and interesting.
Counting followers on Twitter is like counting pennies – sure, they’ll add up, but how much are they really worth? Follower count doesn’t mean much unless it’s attached to other stats about how influential you are on Twitter, like how often you’re retweeted or replied to. As any Twitter veteran will tell you, influence is a much better measurement of your Twitter effectiveness than follower count – and we’ve got 5 of the best tools to measure your Twitter influence for you.
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