Klout, the startup that’s attempting to create a social media credit agency, quietly added two new features to its platform last night. Answering calls for bulkier lists and more social graph measurement, Klout now lets users import Twitter lists and it finally links up accounts to Facebook Fan Pages.
The Twitter list feature is good, but the Facebook Fan Pages should excite people manning the desks at brands and agencies. They’ve been clamoring for more functionality – and legitimacy – with Klout.
“Klout has a bit of a steep hill to climb to gain credibility in our industry with their scoring algorithm,” says Lisa Gerber, chief content officer of Spin Sucks, a blog geared toward digital marketing and PR professionals. “It can only help to diversify the channels they factor in. They’re too weighted on Twitter right now, and being popular on Twitter does not make you an influencer.”
Fan pages often have some of the highest levels of engagement. Some of the biggest social media campaigns, like the Old Spice The Man Your Man Could Smell Like videos, depend on high levels of fan engagement on Facebook. But it’s hard to measure the success of those campaigns beyond the number of new fans.
“This is the start of understanding engagement at more of a deeper level than just how many fans you have and how much money you spent on a campaign,” Klout CEO Joe Fernandez says. “It’s now about how much they care [about the brand] and who are these people, specifically.”
The fan pages connection is one in a series of steps that Klout is taking to further its ability to provide functional data to brands and agencies in a social graph environment that often tips toward opacity and vagueness, says Fernandez. Earlier this month the company begin integrating Foursquare data.
