At Page One PR, we have defined influencers as those who discuss a company’s products, markets or services and who have large social networks with a high level of online activity.  Influencers can be individuals, or even locations such as Facebook Pages or LinkedIn Groups. Because they can amplify and spread client messages, we can target promotional campaigns more effectively when we identify these influencers at the start of a social media audit.

Although they often live in multiple social media channels simultaneously, we generally tackle influencer analysis channel-by-channel as follows:

Twitter: Employing various tools, we search for users on Twitter who have either listed a keyword in their Twitter biography or who tweet about a keyword frequently. We then rank those users by level of influence, which is determined primarily by number of followers and also by the viral spread of their Tweets as measured by @replies and re-tweets. Tools that automate influence and impression measurements can also be useful.

Blogs: Just as with Twitter, we use several tools to identify influential blogs, with influence typically measured by some combination of web traffic and link-backs. Through the use of keywords, we can search for bloggers already considered influential and who write on certain keywords frequently (ITDatabase for tech bloggers) and blogs that mention a keyword, ranked by frequency of mentions (Radian6) or ranked by relative approximate influence (Sysomos and Google). We rely on free third-party sites to verify the amount of traffic and link-backs generated by a blog.

Forums: Finding forum influencers requires two steps.  First, we use Radian6 or Sysomos to identify and build a list of forums discussing a client, its product and services or its market. Second, we read through the top forums to find the individuals most active in conversations about a client, product, or market. We use publicly available data – such as visitors to a forum, number of threads or conversations, and more qualitative information, such as the depth and length of discussion – to gauge the importance of a forum.

Facebook and LinkedIn: These two channels function like forums and searching for influencers is nearly identical.  First, we use the search functions within Facebook and LinkedIn to find pages and groups that match a keyword based on our client.  Then, we identify group administrators and other individuals who are most active on those pages and groups.  The number of fans or members, as well as the frequency of comments and discussions determine the influence and importance of a Facebook page or LinkedIn group.

Once we identify an influencer within one channel, we always perform a cross-reference check to see if the influencer is active on another channel.  Sometimes, the profile that they list on one channel (e.g. Twitter) will link directly to their profile on another channel (e.g. a blog), but if not, Google search works well in locating profiles on alternate channels.

Unfortunately, many of these tools require a high level of human review and remain very manual. For example, if a search turns up too many results (i.e. too much “noise”) or results that are imprecise, we vary the keywords and otherwise fine-tune the parameters of the inquiry.  In addition, we comb through all results that appear to be relevant to confirm that the individual or space identified makes sense for our client.

However, just as with the three types of monitoring-and-analysis that we introduced in our September issue, the work invested early in influencer analysis pays huge returns over the course of a social media campaign. Together, the analyses of a company’s competitive landscape and market, current social media activities, and influencers establish the “where,” “what,” and “who” of a social media audit and ultimately answers the question of “why” a social media campaign is necessary, as well as informs the strategy – i.e. the “how” – behind the campaign.