Saturday, May 08, 2010

Followers Don't Equal Influence-->Distribution and Expansion Does

I enjoyed a discussion with local technologist Clint Greenwood this morning at my local Panera. We were talking of the need to be aware of one's personal brand or online reputation and I mentioned that I had recently read a tweet from HarvardBiz that read, "On Twitter--Followers Don't Equal Influence." Interesting read. In short, one of the ideas the post communicates is the need to not just count how many follow you--the real indicator of influence is how many re-tweet your ideas and/or expand on them and redistribute them back into the social-information flow.

The article also stated, "We were surprised by how only a fraction of Twitter users actively tweet. And this small fraction of Twitter users provoke responses (mentions) and initiate information cascades (retweets). I guess many people use Twitter to browse others' messages rather than generating a lot new messages themselves."

As I have often stated, I really have no original ideas. Mainly they are mash-ups and extrapolations of existing thoughts and mental frameworks. Perhaps in the midst of those musings I get threads of new ideas? But then again, I am sure that has been thought of and shared before. Right Clint?

Posted via email from Mark's Musings

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