Yesterday I sent an email to help@klout.com to disable my account.
I received a nice automated email back from them saying that they will get back to me in 3 days if my question isn’t on their support site, which it isn’t, because I didn’t ask them to disable my account there.
Click to see the lovely automated emails
We’ll see what happens in three days. But until then…
In this post I’m going to explain exactly why I did it. And I’ll tell you this, it ain’t for the PR my friend.
Here’s the skinny.
First Things First Though
Before getting deep into it I want to express my thanks to you for gaving me +K on a variety of marketing and business topics on Klout. That shows me that I am helping you with the information I publish here, and I appreciate your showing me thanks. I understand it can be daunting to post a comment on a blog post – we’ve all been there.
I want to urge you to read this post in it’s entirety and read the posts I link to as well as other posts on both sides of the Klout topic. Be your own person and make your own decision.
Now lets bring some thunder!
If You Aren’t On Top, You Aren’t Getting There
When I joined the NISM I talked with you about the distaste that I got for certifications while being in the world of Agile development consulting/teaching. Well it’s happening again only this time with a company named Klout.
I have made countless friends and connections thanks to blogging and seeking people out on Twitter and other social networks. I’ve run Twitter searches for keywords, used Twitter profile searches to make new connections, and asked other people who they recommend I follow and connect with. When someone said something interesting I’d strike up a conversation and get them on Skype if I could. In 2007 it was a great way to meet people, and now that Twitter and other platforms have millions of users it’s an even better way to meet new people from all over the globe.
Never did I look to see how influential any of these people were online before deciding whether or not to connect with them. I let their actions and the knowledge that they shared dictate my decision to connect with them.
Some might say that that’s a naive way to go about things and isn’t the way you “play the game” or some other drivel. I say it’s the way you do business, and the way that I do business. It’s how I built my last business and how I’m growing Dempsey Marketing. It takes a lot of time and effort, and it works.
And then here comes a company that’s telling us that someone their application says isn’t influential isn’t good for us to engage with on social media because they have a “low score” that will bring ours down.
Exhibit A – An Email From Klout
I submit for your reading pleasure (or horror) an email that Jure Klepic received from Klout concerning a question he had about his score:
You have to read this one to believe it
That email is embedded in an excellent post from Jure titled, “Have you been put in Klout timeout?”
The way I read that email is like this:
If you are engaging with less influential people then your influence is lessened as a result.
So basically if you’re not being retweeted, reshared or re-whatever by top dogs you aren’t influential.
But perhaps I’m not reading that correctly. Let’s look at a comment from the same Megan of Klout of the above email. This comment was on the same post from Jure. We’ll call it Exhibit B.
Exhibit B – A Comment From Klout
Another must-read email. What does this say to you?
Allow me to quote part of that comment:
As for the example you bring up here in particular — your network impact score was going down, which does indicate that fewer highly influential people were engaging with you. If you are regularly getting your content retweeted by top influencers and that stops, yes it will impact your Score — but it’s not because you are being penalized for the engagement from others (any action driven based on your content helps your Score), it’s because of the lack of action from top influencers.
The emphasis was added by me because I want to point that particular part out.
In this comment what I read is that you can engage with people with lower Klout scores however if you’re talking with top dogs and that stops you are no longer an influencer.
Combining this comment with the email from Exhibit A we can see that:
- In order to gain more influence and therefore a better Klout score you need to connect with people that already have influence
- In order to maintain that high influence you need to continue to engage high influencers
Sounds like a big old influencer clique to me.
So would the advice be to never engage people of influence so that when you speak with the “less influential” – the 95% we always talk about here that you must nurture around your business because they make up the largest percentage of your community – your score won’t be impacted?
But perhaps I’m being a bit harsh. Poor Megan is being bombarded across the Internets about the non-transparency transparency post Klout published when they updated their rankings and many people’s scores dropped by 10 or more points. And you have people of actual influence doing great work like Geoff Livingston and Pam Moore urging everyone, especially companies, to ignore these flawed pseudo-metrics.
[Some MBA programs aren't listening to them...]
So I submit to you Exhibit C.
Exhibit C – Klout Login Message
This is the last message I saw when I logged into Klout to disconnect all of my social media accounts before sending the “please disable” email:
No influence for you!
I blurred the names of people that Klout says lost influence. One of the people on the list influences me greatly, has helped me increase revenues, and has had enormous impact on many small business owners.
And this dear reader was the final straw.
So I Man’ed Up And Disconnected Everything
Merely disconnecting your social media accounts from Klout isn’t enough. You need to go into each site and revoke the access of Klout, or any app for that matter, so there is no way they can get back into your social network data. My friend Jure Klepic has a post on how to do that. It was greatly helpful.
Frankly I’ve been feeling a big hypocritical about this Klout score thing. One one hand I’m railing against how their score is attempting to measure the impossible – online influence. I’ve found that the people that never comment on my blog or “engage” with me on Twitter are the people that become my paying customers. Obviously I’ve had enough influence on them that they’ve decided to pay for my assistance.
How do you measure that?
And what of the person in the “lost influence this week” list Klout gave me that has a major impact on many small businesses that are now profitable and thriving?
How do you measure that?
And what about the person who reads your tweet, or Facebook update, or blog post, and makes a change in their life that impacts the lives of those around them? What if they never mention you?
How do you measure that?
You don’t. You can’t.
I’ve thought about this for days, read tons of posts, had many conversations. The arguments for this are thin.
The “But Google…” Argument
I’ve read a number of arguments comparing the Klout score algorithm to the Google PageRank algorithm. Here’s the holes in that argument:
- Google gets absolutely zero benefit from any website being ranked on any page of their results
- If you try to game Google you will get beat down. Panda did a nice job of that recently
- Google is not claiming that they are the standard anything
And this is one I’ve heard used in a lot of cases.
The “I Don’t Have Time To Figure It Out” Argument
This argument comes in many formats but comes down to one thing – shortcuts. Our brains naturally create association shortcuts for us, so why not use them with everything? It’s just so easy to use a number given to us even though we really have no idea what it means:
Why spend time getting to know people when I can just use a number...
To which Geoff replied:
I understand this dilemma, but I also feel like companies that aren’t wiling to invest in learning a community and only want to invest minimal resources, don’t really care about a community. There are other forms of marketing that may make more sense than social for them. – Geoff Livingston
What Geoff is saying is that you and I have a choice. We can choose to go for meaningless mass or we can choose quality of interactions.
Which are you afraid to choose?
It’s Dangerous To Create Accounts For People
I’ve got to hand it to Klout, they have created an application full of game mechanics and psychology. Well played.
One thing that’s hard not to notice is how if Klout believe you influence someone not only do they suggest you invite that person they have a profile already waiting for them! This reminds me of another company that created profiles for people called GetSatisfaction.
GetSatisfaction is a social support site I’m familiar with from my web development days (not too long past). The long and short of it is this – GetSatisfaction created accounts for a number of companies, without their knowledge and without their consent. One such company was 37Signals (37S), founded by Jason Fried and also for a web framework that changed the development world – Ruby on Rails.
Well GetSatisfaction decided that they would both create an account for 37S and use their logo. What happened next is that people thought that 37S had created the account and started logging support tickets. After their requests for assistance went unanswered they started to complain publicly about it online, which is when 37S found out about it.
Needless to say GetSatisfaction was publicly slammed for creating these accounts and using the logos of companies without their consent and had to reverse course.
That was 2009. History it seems is repeating itself.
Now you can argue that a Twitter account is publicly available and I’m no attorney so I’m not sure what the legalities are of Klout using your Twitter profile picture and creating an account on their service without your consent. Perhaps someone will find out for us.
Either way, even if you’re not signed up for Klout, you might be there and people might be noticing. Not cool at all.
But what do you expect from a system that needs mass to work? After all, if you don’t have a lot of people using the system how can you rank them?And if you can’t rank people then you can’t say who is most influential? And if you don’t have that then how can you get revenue from advertisers looking to improve (buy) more word of mouth marketing?
Hrm…
Opting Out Of The Game
Mass is an outdated and dying notion. Quality and meaningful interactions is the future. If the Occupy Wall Street movement, Middle East rebellions against dictatorships, and protests around Europe have showed us anything, it’s that people want change, and are coming together to help make it happen. And there are people that are very much fighting against that change, be it with words or with force.
What that change will look like is anyone’s guess, but this much is clear – people do want change.
Klout is not change. Klout is more of the same – the same outdated and dying notion of mass.
I for one am opting out.
Will you join me?
UPDATE – LEAVE KLOUT
Thanks to Erica Allison for pointing me to a blog post written by Kat Caverly where she provides instructions on how to opt-out of Klout.
Here are the steps:
- Sign into Klout as usual
- Go to your Profile Settings
- At the bottom there is a link to Opt-Out. Click that.
- Go to step two, skip all their yadda yadda and click the link to continue opt-ing out
- Finally on the last page you have to digitally sign that you want to leave. Do that and then click the final opt-out button.
After all that you see a message like this one telling you it will take quite a few days for your account to be removed from their system:
And finally my account is removed, kind of
An even BETTER version of these instructions have been written by Martijn Linssen, a reader of this blog, in his post: Completely drop your Klout account in 30 seconds. Lot’s of great pictures walk you step-by-step on completely removing your Klout account.
UPDATE #2
A number of commenters here and on social media have asked why I don’t simply ignore Klout. I’ve outline why in this post – Why I Won’t Simply Ignore Klout.
As a product review blogger (aka mommy blogger), I only signed up for klout because I saw that most of my fellow bloggers had one. I still can’t figure out what it does…except I know that some companies ask for my klout score in making their decision on whether or not to accept me to review a product. I don’t know what perks are either. It’s all very confusing to me and irritating that if I opt out of it I may lose sponsors just because I don’t use it…even though my alexa rank, page rank, and google analytics seem to be more accurate of my influence. Stumbleupon is another one I’m not too keen on either. And I’ve noticed that it always tells me whose “engaged” me on my personal fb profile but never on my blog fan page…so I don’t see what good it’s doing for my blog or how it accurately reflects my influence as a blogger. All I know is that in my blog networking groups everyone is always trying to trade +k’s and then adding +k as an entry option into giveaways…in hopes of improving their klout.
It seems Klout has seeped into lots of places. I logged into tweepi.com to see the last line of the Premium service:
Cleanup users with Klout Score less than 20 points (out of 100). -You can adjust the number.-
Why would businesses take this so seriously as to embed this nonsense in their apps?
Red
Robert,
We’re with you! Just opted out across the board. I’ll be curious to see if any numbers come out regarding the potential backlash of their latest move. I can’t imagine they’ll be very forthcoming with that information.
Congratulations John! And no I don’t think we’ll see these numbers. If we did I’d be pleasantly surprised.
Any progress on the opt-out? I have not seen anyone actually disappear from the site by request or otherwise.
Hi Ann – a number of people told me via Twitter that they have opted out of Klout. The movement continues.
I was quite neutral towards Klout – I have an account but I don’t really care how my score moves – but after reading your thoughts I’m rethinking my account, definitely.
The only point I didn’t agree with was this one: ‘Google gets absolutely zero benefit from any website being ranked on any page of their results’ – well, yes it does if the pages that rank higher have tons of Google ads on. I get your point though, I think it’s just the phrasing that didn’t come across fully.
Great point on the wording Jenni. From what I’ve seen from affiliate marketing though Google gives no preference to a site laden with Google AdWords. In fact if a site has too many ads people leave very quickly which knocks them down SEO wise. So it’s just bad form
As for your rethinking your score I applaud you for doing that. At the end of the day it comes down to whether or not you’re okay with the issues I’ve brought up here and whether you think having a score benefits you and your potentially your business.
For me business ethics overrules any benefit I thought I might get. I don’t want to be part of it so I opted out.
I might be a bit thick here but I have absolutely no idea what Klout is meant to do, apart from show off how many Twitter and Facebook followers you have.
It’s positioned itself as the “standard” in online influence Dean, however I don’t see that happening.
Never have I been so grateful to work with human slaves against human masters, instead of technological masters forging chains humans put on themselves.
Poor analogy I know, but at least those in my field have a chance of liberating and enlightening people, while this appears to be floundering on a treadmill that doesn’t actually exist.
Robert, I’m in the Dark Ages, using your early days method of contacting people (on LinkedIn), from top foreign and US influencers on down to local level. I even look up email addresses directly and write to people and *gasp* they write back! Amazing.
Everyone has a reason why they’re special and simpler methods wont work for them. An ancient problem. Bravo for breaking your own chain.
Cheers,
Jacqueline
Amazing how well those methods work and continue to be used Jacqueline. As humans we are looking for the relationships.
Business is trending back to creating those relationships. Some people are on board and the rest will simply be left behind.
This is a trend that’s gaining massive momentum and isn’t slowing down.
There will always be companies and people looking for shortcuts, and others making money from providing them. Klout is a case in point on that score.
I echo the sentiments of Tom Ewer above. I signed up on the recommendation of a friend, saw high Klout scores from some people that I happen to know are morons, and decided this wasn’t really something in which I was going to invest my time. Thus, I have not even looked at it since I signed up.
Case in point. The next step Robert is to then opt-out. No need to support a company like Klout.
Interesting take on Klout. Do what you ‘gotta’ do
If Klout is not entertaining to you, or adding enough value for you, then you made the right decision by opting out.
It’s not jus that Darren. It’s that there’s a company creating profiles for people without their knowledge, giving them a score, calling themselves a standard and getting people to then use these scores.
We know where we rank in search engines. We know what our credit scores are. We choose to create Facebook, LinkedIn and Google profiles.
Klout has gone too far in creating the accounts for people and making the scores public and telling people they are valid and should be used.
That’s highly irresponsible behavior for a company.
I don’t agree with their ethics and have opted out. I’m happy to see more people taking a stand against this type of behavior and doing the same.
Thanks for writing this. I didn’t even know that it was possible to opt out of Klout!
I can see the value of keeping Klout if you’re heavily into social networking and have a good score, but if–like me–you’re a full-time Web publisher whose influence is best measured in terms of traffic and audience demographics (as measured by Google Analytics and Quantcast), the effort required to boost or maintain a Klout score is about as useful as the effort required to game Alexa.
I’m heavy into social media Durant, used it to build my businesses, had a “good” score, and still opted out.
I measure my online efforts as you do, and as you say there’s no reason to increase activity simply to improve a score.
Connecting with the right people is the goal of a business, not trying to bring in “everyone.” If everyone is the customer of a company there’s a problem, or they better be very well funded.
All of your points are valid except that Klout cannot possibly measure online influence. It does not measure ALL influence, but it is measuring one thing increasingly well — an ability to move content through a system and how people react to it. It will also be connecting the dots to offline behavior (i.e. Facebook timeline and get glue). This is very, very important. In fact, for an online marketer, this is the Holy Grail.
My more detailed thoughts on this are included here: http://www.businessesgrow.com/2011/09/12/why-klout-matters-a-lot/
This is a pretty important point. If you are going to be a professional online marketer, it is going to be impossible to ignore this trend.
There is a significant “icky” factor to being rated, compared and even demeaned by Klout and I honor anybody’s decision to quit on priniciple. But let’s face it, it has the same impact of quitting Facebook on principle. What impact have you had? None. By disconnecting from Facebook are you a less effective digital marketer? I don’t know how you could be effective and not be immersed in Facebook.
And by the way, FB is doing exactly what Klout does. They just don’t make it public. FB is a MUCH bigger threat to privacy than a thousand Klouts.
As a business professional, I prefer to stay connected to the trend, despite the personal distaste for the methodology.
Klout is not the only company working on this and from what I’ve seen other systems are doing this too, without being icky or automatically generating accounts for people without their consent. I’ll stick with them.
There are times when a person should stand up for their principles. For me this is one.
Agree with you Robert.
Klout is not offering independent data.
Klout is offering perks (companies pay them to do this) to users. The user score is a rating system to graduate who is eligible for perks. It has zero to do with actual engagement. If it did, it would allow for the addition of platforms wholly ignored within the social networks it currently chooses to advertise as metrics generators. (i.e. Facebook fan pages)
Perhaps, if Klout were more transparent about mining information on people who are not influential on anything beyond a picture they have shared on Facebook and the correlation between the corporate cost of offering the perk and the Klout rating necessary to earn the perk, users would be more at ease with the recent changes from a mildly opaque algorithm to complete shuttered one.
The clearest part of their methodology is the constant tweeting of +K driving up their own Klout number.
Maybe I’m missing something and maybe you already wrote about it in the comments, Robert, but why do you care so much about deleting your Klout account? Who cares what your score is?
Or, are you more afraid of people judging you because of it?
Great questions Ari. I’m about to record a video for today’s post on this subject.
What it comes down to is that there are people out there that do care about what your score is. And frankly I think it’s high time that we all took a stand for what we believe. I frankly believe that Klout is operating in a very shady manner at many levels, won’t address the issues on any public forum, and is treading in highly dangerous waters billing themselves as “standard” anything and using flimsy arguments to back it up.
I’m not saying that you personally won’t take a stand so please don’t take my comment as such. What I am saying is that I’m taking a very public stand on this issue in the hopes that more people see the problems with this entire situation and act accordingly.
I honestly dont know why anyone would take their Klout score seriously – especially companies and marketing firms. I suppose those are the same people who think 100,000 follwers are the mark of a successful twitter campaign even though 90% of those followers are spam and wont ever knock on your company door or buy your product. It’s all just a game really. When my Klout score drops to nearly half after I block spam twitter followers, I know its hokey.
I agree however people are taking it very seriously. Companies (we are told) are using these numbers as part of their hiring (I’m working to verify that) and one MBA program (verified and mentioned in the video linked in the post) are using it to give special privileges to students.
So while you and I might not take it the score seriously others are.
As for the companies participating in the perks program, they’re just trying to buy word of mouth marketing instead of earning it. Shortcuts abound and relationships go down.
Thanks for these very good points. Bye bye Klout (now off to find better ways to display trends in reach to my clients)
cheers!
Frithjof
Thank you, Frith64 for sharing this post. Robert, your post is a real eye-opener!
I already didn’t like the elitist perks that Klout offers, but the rest of the story is even more disturbing!
Off to begin the opt-out process and to share this post with my networks.
Cheers,
~Teresa~
Thanks for your comment Teresa. I hadn’t heard the perks called “elitist” but that is a very correct definition. I see it as companies continuing to work to not have to develop relationships with the communities around their businesses and buy word of mouth marketing on the cheap.
I just discovered the fact that in my networks, people’ Klout scores impact mine and if Lady Gaga is one of them then I get a higher score than my clients who have almost no score.
I am not a special fan of lady Gaga but I am sure she won’t help me engage with my clients, partners and other like-minded people. !
I am too busy helping clients and developing my business right now to play a ridiculous game so I chose to ignore the advice given by Klout to follow more people with higher klout scores.
My Klout score was 59, drop 13 points overnight and still sinking, eventually my Klout will be closed to zero but I don’t care anymore. I blog, RT, like FB pages and focus on interesting content and wonderful people I meet on social media.
You might as well opt-out completely at this point Anne. You’re pretty much there. Just a few clicks (and a signature) later and you’re gold.
Hi Anne,
I couldn’t agree with you more. I care not for celebrity status. I’m more inclined to want a close relationship with clients and people I VALUE.
Hello Anne, seems we are of the same opinion.
Just annoys me that some companies and individuals use Klout to measure our influence online:-)
Besides, I don’t want to start posting more on FB to score on Klout..
Maybe it’s time to opt out? Just don’t want Klout to rate me without being a member since then I can’t opt out;-)
All the best
Catarina
Great point Catarina. Not only would you have to increase your use of all these networks, and not stop, but you’d have to ensure you’re being mentioned by the “right people.”
Sounds like you’re on the right track there Anne. It’s a short step to opt-out completely.
Great article Robert.
Have for a long time been convinced something’s fundamentally wrong with how Klout measure influence. Am only part of it because blogging friends of mine kept insisting it was a good idea.
Now when they changed their algorithm my teenage nephew suddenly showed up in the list of people I influence and his score was higher than mine. The only thing he does is communicate with his high school friends from the same town on Facebook. His score is actually as high as some bloggers with influence all over the world. Can’t help wondering if Facebook somehow has a finger in this pie?
Had already noticed that Klout punishes you for having connections with people with no influence. Ignored that since connecting with my readers on Linkedin is more important to me.
Am seriously considering opting out like you did. But Klout seems to rank you anyway, which is a problem.
Do you have any idea of how many people have opted out and if it could develop into a mass movement?
Hi Catarina – to completely get out of Klout you can disconnect all social media accounts, run through the opt-out process (at the bottom of the post), and then remove the authorization on your social media profiles.
From what I’m told by people on Twitter and other blogs more people are beginning to go through the entire process of opting out of Klout. Their (almost complete) lack of engagement with a community they created as well as major privacy issues that have been raised is causing more and more people to seriously consider leaving.
I think it will become more of a movement as people decide not to be bought so cheaply or to be tricked into thinking they “need” Klout because they company is positioning themselves as such.
Here’s an excellent post about the privacy issues: http://therealtimereport.com/2011/10/27/privacy-fail-klout-has-gone-too-far/
They are acting very irresponsibly and in my opinion that reflects very badly on the companies engaging in their Perks program.
However someone must think this will go away as they continue to get funding and people signing on for their perks program.
Robert,
Interesting turn of events. It now seems impossible to unsubscribe from Klout. There is no “Opt Out” button. Even when I followed the link that Meagan from Klout provided. So, now I’m in line of with the other people asking to be removed.
We’ll see how Megan deals with this.
I agree that Klout shouldn’t be the tell all for how influential you are about topics you write about. It is just some sort of measure about how well you are connect or how much you influence people. It’s a flawed system just like everything else.
You did a great job of explaining these flaws and how you can be influential far beyond what your score indicates. From a business standpoint, I can understand that Klout may matter to some.
However, why not stay signed up, have your influence be whatever it is, still stay connected to those who like klout and want to interact with you, and just ignore the score? It’s what I do. Maybe I am looking at this from a small site/blogger perspective where I don’t care as much as others might.
Let me put this question to you Jeremy – do you support companies you don’t agree with? If you found out that a company is in direct violation of your ethics and you believe them to be harming people do you stand up for what you believe and opt-out (not purchase or use their products or services) or continue as if nothing is going on?
I definitely understand what you are saying from that perspective. I am just looking at klout from what they do and how they measure things. If we are talking about how klout does things and measure influence, I don’t see why people care that much.
From the perspective of ethics of a company and whether you can support them or not, I can’t argue with you on that one.
Companies care and are using it. Someone on Twitter just told me (http://twitter.com/#!/Garza_Girl/statuses/132318974594654208) they used the score to qualify candidates.
THAT is why I’m taking this very seriously, because others are too, only in my opinion the wrong way.
Robert,
Great informative post. There are so many people that I find influential that dont have high Klout scores. Just because someone is not as active on Social Media as another, just not mean they are not influencing others in big ways in their online networks. Klout is flawed and I don’t feel right supporting it. I just opted out. Thanks for sharing the new opt-out option. Greatly appreciate it!
Congratulations Joanne!
Isn’t the trick to simply not take these things seriously. I signed up with Klout after seeing a contact tweet their score. I was curious and had a look.
I get the odd email but usually ignore them. I log in about once per month and look at the score. It is a bit of an ego stroke if it is up, and a bit irritating if it is down.
Then I get on with my life, and my business.
It is 30 seconds out of my month. I’m sure within 6 to 12 months most accounts will be similarly dormant – people will pop in in the hope of a quick bit of self gratification, then move on.
It’s easy for you and I to say to people “don’t take it seriously” however with larger companies jumping on board to buy word of mouth marketing via the perks program and it being reported that companies (and schools) are using the Klout score in some decisions it’s not so easily ignored.
Also as long as Klout has a score for you whether or not you are active on the site they are still scoring you. That’s how they achieved mass in the first place – they created accounts for people and assigned them a score.
A company like TwitterCounter keeping track of your follower account is one thing, a company scoring you without your consent under the guise of being “the standard” when they are actually attempting to make themselves the standard is another.
So how about Connect.me where people vouche for you and others you know and trust basically create *your* profile using keywords? It seems connect.me addresses your concerns. Have you had a look?
Hi Marco – I removed the links from your comment as they were unnecessary. Your name will link to the URL.
As for connect.me no I haven’t seen that however you can get recommendations on LinkedIn. And in my opinion client testimonials trump all of it.
Yes, Linkedin recommendations are very usefull indeed. What connect seems to do is build a network on top of that (a trust network). If other people vouche for your qualities the trust in your capabilities grows. (They use trust levels). I don’t work for connect but if you’ll let me here’s a short video explaining the concept:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCFHoxKayoI If I understand correctly they’re working with SWIFT right now (international banking) to add trust to payments and what not. A trust API if you will.
Awesome blog Robert – you really nailed it! Also bravo for having the balls and being honest to confront and clearly define the Klout BS. You ROCK!
Thanks Sebastian. I feel the entire thing is a load of BS. The more I read about gamification, combined that with my reading of psychology and added a dash of business knowledge I realized what they were doing. I don’t like it at all and I choose to not participate.
I hope many make the same choice and stop being gamed.
Come on Klout… Do we really need to have you telling us who to hang with? I’m so over it. I feel like I’m back in high school. I hated it then and I hate it now!
I never thought it was about the masses and instead focused on developing real relationships with people I enjoyed. I’m not sure I will ever want or need someone or something “critiquing or censoring” people for me. But thanks anyway, Klout.
Robert, thanks so much for a super enlightening post. You know I’ll be opting out.
I apologize for inviting you to Klout in the first place Lauri. Glad to see you joining me in opt-ing out. And real relationships are what count today more than ever before.
Robert,
No harm done. We try things and we share them with others. I have learned and grown so much from you, I never expected to have found someone so willing to share with others. I can’t thank you enough for all your support. The concept seemed to have started well but the execution may be off.
I look at it like this, we’re mobile and we speak through our actions. We have given Klout power and we can take it away. I’m leaving with you.
Thanks again for all you’ve done for me and my group. We couldn’t appreciate it more.
When the algorithm changed, I was more taken aback by the scores which increased than those that decreased. I saw the scores of connections from FB jump from 10 to 35. People I know for a fact have a single account (FB); 35 friends (all family) and only interact through the “like” button or apps posts. One is a 70-something who only looks at, likes and shares the posts of her great-grandchildren.
I loved the retro aspect of the change, which showed I had a massive dip in my influence in the week before I was invited to Klout, intimating until I engaged Klout, I was losing influence. More proof the entire thing is a game.
Who has time to waste playing a game when there are connections to be made which turn virtual relationships into cash deposits? Most companies fire employees for playing on the Net when they are to be working.
Bravo on a well-developed post…the true influencer of the average Net user.
Fantastic point Ann on how you were “less influential” before you started using Klout. Unreal.
And I agree – we don’t have time nor should we waste time worrying about these scores. There are two groups of people in the community around our business:
1. Your potential ideal customers – small percentage of the total
2. The people that will help spread your message, share your content, engage with you, and more – the much larger percentage
These are the people that we influence and that matter. Time spent engaging with these folks is never a waste.
Thank you for adding your experience to the conversation Ann.
Hi Robert,
You might be able to disconnect your social media accounts from Klout but you can’t stop them keeping score.
I disconnected from Klout, but here’s the thing, they still keep a record of public information like your Twitter account and allocate you a score based on that. This is something you can’t see if you don’t have a linked Klout account but others can.
Try it out by searching for me. They will still have data and I will still have a score, despite asking to be removed.
Here’s what I asked Klout;
“What I would really like is for my image, name, score and all details of me to be taken down from the Klout platform.
I don’t want my profile to be found on Klout even though I need my Twitter profile to be public.”
The response;
“When you create a new account on Twitter, your Twitter profile is public by default. Unless your account is changed to protected from your account settings, your Tweets are publicly visible on your profile page, in Twitter search, and through the Twitter API. As soon as they have been made publicly available, third parties (such as Google, ourselves, and other search engines) have access to these publicly visible Tweets—like other information on the internet.
If you want your Tweets to only be available to approved followers. you can set your account to protected. Tweets posted by a protected account are only visible to approved followers and not otherwise publicly available to third parties. Twitter has a help page with more information about public and protected accounts here: http://support.twitter.com/articles/14016.
Once you’ve set your account to protected, please feel free to contact us and we’ll make sure to remove your name from Klout.”
That’s the problem I have with it and one of the main reasons I voted with my feet.
Hi Bernadette – as of today (or yesterday) you can now opt-out of Klout and not be in their index. So are you saying that even by opting out of the system they’ll continue to score me even then?
That’s new then, how exactly do you opt out of the index? My email from them was dated September so maybe they have updated their policy following complaints.
I think they added that within the past 24-48 hours as it just appeared. Instructions for opting out are at the bottom of the post. But the short of it is it’s a 3-step process that you can begin under your profile settings.
I think the most important part to consider about that e-mail isn’t about them giving you a score, it’s about them farming your tweets to score you. Whether they publish it or not, they are still going to score you and use it as a metric for scoring others.
According to their latest update you can opt-out from inside of Klout and they will remove you from their index, after weeks. But it will happen.
I’ve already requested it so we’ll see if they follow through with it. I hope that they will.
I wonder how they decide who has influence to being with. If we are being ‘penalized’ for connecting with ‘less influential’ people, how do we ever reach the level of ‘influence’? I mean, surely it must be possible. People in influential positions were not always there, so why are they there now and why do I need them to talk to me in order for me to be at their level? I should be able to converse intelligiently with [keyword] anyone and my content and reach should judge how ‘influential’ I am.
I may just decide to leave Klout as well…
That’s a great question Christina. Someone or some number has to be the benchmark.
In discussions with other marketing peeps I’ve been told them think Klout limits the number most can achieve and then have a bell curve in place to ensure most don’t go above that number. However that is speculation.
Also Klout doesn’t take into account (at least not yet) niche influence. I’m not trying to be influential for the entire internet of people. That’s nuts. But that appears to be how it works based on the comments given and that the +K isn’t used in scoring (as you could game the system even better) but is used to determine who gets access to what perks.
Excellent discussion thanks for ‘bringing the thunder’ I appreciate your candid approach and presenting the facts. Now it’s my opportunity to “Be MY own person and make MY own decision.”
Cheers to dialogue!
Rock on Roger. Great to see your independence. Don’t let someone else tell you what you’re worth. We determine that for ourselves.
Robert, you raise an interesting question about the issue of whether Klout can use information about you or your profile photo without your knowledge or permission. It depends upon what kind of relationship Klout has with Twitter. When you sign up for Twitter, you grant Twitter a sublicenseable license to use/display/etc. any content you place on Twitter, which gives Twitter the right to display the content and to let others use it. Whether Klout can use the photo would depend on whether Klout is a sublicensee of Twitter. I do not believe the publicly available information would require a license, as long as it was not being copied, only used as information for purposes of an algorithm.
Short version: It is possible that Klout’s use of user photos without the knowledge or permission of the copyright holder is a violation of the holder’s rights.
I know Danny Brown was talking about Klout and privacy concerns the other day. I’d have to find the article.
Hi Erin,
Here are a couple of posts and a comment from Facebook you might be on about:
http://dannybrown.me/2011/10/27/is-klout-using-our-family-to-violate-our-privacy/
http://therealtimereport.com/2011/10/27/privacy-fail-klout-has-gone-too-far/
http://www.allfacebook.com/facebook-privacy-violation-klout-2011-10?t=1319814103#IDComment213152593
Thanks for continuing the convo, and solid stuff, Robert.
Here it is Erin: http://dannybrown.me/2011/10/27/is-klout-using-our-family-to-violate-our-privacy/
Thank you for reminding me of that post.
Great point Kelcey. However does the Twitter license allow Klout or any third party to crete an account on their system without our knowledge? In some cases we might be alright with it but in the case of Klout I am definitely not.
For instance, showing the number of Twitter followers and friends I have over time is one thing. Giving me a score and then telling people it’s THE standard of influence online and that this score is meaningful is another. It’s irresponsible behavior on the part of the company and I don’t think anyone should stand for it.
Robert, you make some great points regarding Klout and their unsavory practices. Thanks also for the details on unsubscribing.
I don’t see any mention of PeerIndex, a Klout competitor of sorts. The basic aspect of measurement and your comments regarding relationship building would still apply with PeerIndex. However, given there may be instances where some system of measurement would be appropriate, do you feel the same about PeerIndex as you do Klout?
Hi Phil – to be frank I haven’t gotten much into Peer Index so I’d have to look a bit deeper at that service. That will be next on my radar to check out as I created an account there and never went back.
Scoring people along these lines isn’t even close to accurate or measurable as it requires everyone to participate. My clients never retweeted any of my tweets or commented on my site before becoming clients. I see this as typical across my peers as well. I argue that we have influence to get clients, but that’s not measurable. And at the end of the day for a business that is what matters a great deal. It isn’t the entire equation, but it matters a lot.
I have enabled (or whatever the correct term is) my Klout account, but it doesn’t affect with whom or how I interact. There are no shortcuts to learning how to use a medium or to building relationships, regardless of what Klout says. I find the game aspect of Klout ridiculous. I’m sure it strokes some egos, but it’s wasted effort on me. I was reading an article from TechCrunch that compared Klout to high school. If you want to be popular, you have to spend time with the popular kids. If you don’t spend time with the popular kids…well, you’re out of luck. The funny thing is that the unpopular high school kids often turn out to be the most interesting people. I would take interesting over popular any day.
A huge +1 to your comment Erin and all of the comments made by Klout employees point exactly to that. And that makes it unreliable and more of a game than a “standard” for anything. It’s highly irresponsible behavior on the part of a company and frankly I don’t think it benefits the businesses providing perks.
Now let me say that I had considered providing a perk myself a few weeks back. However, the more conversations I had with people and the more I learned about gamification and saw how they are using it, and not truly benefiting any side, the more I came to realize how much of a game it really is. The problem is that people are taking it very seriously and using it for decision making.
That is seriously not good.
No, it’s not, and I’ve heard of businesses asking people for their Klout scores before deciding to hire them. That’s very scary.
That’s irresponsible behavior on the part of those businesses. Buying word of mouth marketing via perks is one thing, making hiring decisions based on an unquantifiable score which you have no understanding of how it works is ridiculous.
Congratulations for the article. My question is: is Klout strong enough for being the real “standard” and people will agree or not?
They certainly are trying to be Abel. However creating accounts for people without their knowledge is to me unethical. Also their privacy actions inside of Facebook are being questioned as well.
The system seems to rely on people seeing that they have a score and then beginning to use the site because they seemingly have to be. Then we hear stories of companies giving away stuff or giving access or making hiring decisions based on Klout scores.
If a company hires based on a score that isn’t transparent, meaning an HR professional can’t measure the person based on the full data (which Klout of course won’t give), then that HR person should be fired. That’s irresponsible.
Robert, The problem I find is that it’s very easy for businessmen just to check one item and then make a selection. Klout gives this chance, so it can be a kind of “LinkedIn”, but with just one number, quite easy for them.
That’s part of the attraction and part of the problem Abel. It’s a false shortcut.
Abel, I would like to also introduce you to the National Institute for Social Media. Robert’s post here: provides more information about the standardized certification program for social media strategists that we are developing. I believe it will be a much more effective tool for social media and HR professionals to understand & measure knowledge and skill vs. a Klout score.
Sorry… here’s the link to the article I was referring to above: http://dempseymarketing.com/journal/social-media-certification/
I had been noticing the score drop and had earlier thought it was mine, though saw so many people affected by this. In-fact I have seen them get angry, frustrated and saddened by the drop. I guess it maybe as they had worked really hard to reach where they did.
However, for me it was and has been just an interaction to be with readers and bloggers. And of course those who truly do deserve it, ought to get it a good score as well. Other than that I don’t think we can have much influence on how Klout handles and manages things.
I love the elaborate explanation here and the reviews and comments of people.It is indeed strange to know that your score increases only if you have influential people in your circle. Though I prefer to have a few handful friends- more quality than quantity!
For me, I remember Klout only when someone gives me a score- to be very honest- otherwise it does remain out of site- out of mind! But yes, I do respond back and if they are worthy ( which most of the contacts are)- I do return the favor.
Thanks for sharing
Thank you for your take on it Harleena. Some people take it very seriously and I don’t see that as a good thing at all. I don’t see how the system is set up to help anyone frankly.
That might seem “koombayah” to people reading it but seriously. Klout uses a very healthy dose of game mechanics and psychology, and while it can (and will probably be) argued that Klout helps people to be rewarded as influencers (with perks or what not) the way they go about it I simply don’t agree with.
If I have to play nicey nice with “influential” people in order to *appear* influential myself then I’ll just refuse to play the game.
There are better uses of all of our time and the advertising dollars of companies. They should spend time learning how social media really works rather than paying for word of mouth marketing.
Thanks Robert – I’m definitely in the ‘I haven’t got time to figure it all out’ category. What that translates as is that it isn’t really a priority for me right now to figure it all out! I have a couple of media where I like to be active and I like to know what works, and then a couple pending further investigation – mainly google+ right now but klout would definitely fall into that category as well!
thanks for encouraging me to figure it out one way or the other sooner rather than later
Cathy
I wouldn’t worry about Klout too much Cathy. The key on social networks is look at the demographics, see if your ideal customers are there, and start making connections. Then it’s sharing your content with them and helping them spread theirs too. Creating a win/win relationship from the get-go.
It can definitely work. If you have any questions about managing time to get it done let me know and I’d be happy to answer them for you.
Good for you Robert.
I joined Klout some time ago, however I certainly don’t measure my influence on their score.
Onwards and upwards I say…
Many people I know don’t pay any attention to their Klout score and many others don’t even know they have one. It’s the latter issue that’s a real problem.
Hey Rob,
I signed up to Klout a few weeks ago and haven’t even looked at it since. It just doesn’t interest me.
Having said that, it makes sense to me that you would be considered more influential if you interact with other influential people. It wouldn’t make any sense if your score was negatively impacted by communicating with less influential people, but that doesn’t seem to be the case.
Cheers,
Tom
In a certain respect the “talking with high influencers” make sense, however you could influence a ton of people and not be talking with other “high influence” people. So to me that doesn’t make sense.
Also I see a fundamental flaw being that not everyone you influence online necessarily shares your content or comments on your blog. That covers all of my current clients. I’d say I influenced them. But there’s no way for Klout to know that. And it’s that kind of influence that’s helping me grow my business as well as those of my clients.
I agree with both of your points to be honest. Do you feel it is a case of Klout trying to achieve the impossible?
In one instance yes and in another I think it’s a very well done marketing ploy.
The Klout system needs mass to work. Without a large user base you can’t attract advertisers to the perks program. So they create accounts for people, score them, and then say “everyone has Klout.” I’d add “whether they like it or not.” Then when they have a lot of people scored they can get perks providers.
Once they have perks providers they can then say they are legitimate and get people to buy into the system. Add in a very healthy dose of game mechanics and psychology (which I commend them on) and people are hooked. Get others to say “well people are using these scores for this and that” and you have more credibility.
The entire thing was quite well done, however it’s extremely irresponsible of the company. Yes Twitter information is public, however saying you’re “the standard” for online influence is crap. It’s a marketing ploy I’ve read about many times. And now more people know about it and see it for what it is.
I applaud everyone that is choosing to opt-out.
To be frank, to truly measure “online influence” would necessarily mean associating with those with a lower score. If you influence the grassroots, you get a better yield. This sounds too much like “trickle-down-economics” to me.
Red.