With so  many people/brands online these days how do you determine who to trust or listen to?  Do you look at followers, fans, likes, amount of activity, people they follow, Klout score, or any of the other online influence tools?  I admit, I do keep track of my Klout score not to see how high I can get it but to see if people find the content I am putting out there relevant.  While not perfect (none are) sites like Klout and Kred at least give you some sort of insight on what people thing about what you are putting out there.  The worst thing you can do is say “hey this guy has 25k followers and 1MM likes, he must know what he’s talking about”.  Remember these can all be bought.

Don’t get me wrong, I do not think any of these tools provide the full picture.  To my knowledge there aren’t tools that provide you with a value of a conversation, not sending a link to a blog or video but a conversation with a person that helps you make an informed decision or solve a problem.  If I look at your online activity and see a stream of links with no personality, I am probably going to ignore what you say.  I will sometimes look for shared contacts or peer recommendations.  The most important thing to me is, I want to know I can trust what you are saying,

Here are a few sites I use:

• Klout
• Kred
• PeerIndex
• CrowdBooster

As I have always said, “if you use common sense be honest and be yourself, people will find what you say valuable”.

With that being said, how do you measure influence?  I ‘d love to hear your thoughts.