Hi, my name is Kevin, and I’m a kloutaholic. Today, as I write this post, my Klout score is a respectable 67. You’d think I’d be proud, but I’m not. I’m far from proud. I’ve traded my dignity for true reach and sacrificed my pride for network influence. And Amplification, hah. It’s my metric of choice. I fiend for it. I crave it. I wake up in the morning and push out content until the RT’s come pouring in.
It hasn’t always been this way. I haven’t always been this way. The real cravings started about three months ago, when SoMeGo launched ‘The Ultimate Klout Contest.’ A five-day, four-night all expenses paid trip to Las Vegas. Yes, VEGAS. I didn’t stand a chance. They had me. Hook, line, and sinker.
The competition ended less than 24 hours ago and I lost by half a point (thanks a lot for adding decimal places, Klout). All of which has lead me here. Rock bottom. As part of my recovery process I wanted to share some of the deplorable acts I’ve committed during these past three months (and beg your forgiveness of course).
Trim the fat – Almost all of my friends that I spend time with outside of the streams are causal Twitter users. Meaning they have shit Klout scores. So I unfollowed them. Every single one.
40 or more – If you don’t have a Klout score of 40 or higher chances are I’ve been ignoring you. Purposely.
Note – There’s a fantastic Google chrome and Firefox plugin for twitter that allows you to see everyone’s Klout score next to their handle. This made skipping over ‘unimportant’ people that much easier.
Tweet Orgies – You know those tweets that mention 6 other people and say something stupid like ‘good morning my favs.’ Painfully annoying, yes. But they’re an easy way to get an influx of mentions and RT’s. Guilty.
24/7 – There are some really great tools out there for scheduling tweets; Hootsuite, Buffer, Timely, Crowdbooster, CoTweet, etc. What’s really fun is using ALL of them. At the same time.
Stroke egos – There are certain narcissists online who love nothing more than to RT nice things said about them. Find them, find amplification heaven.
Shameless self-promotion (begging) – As the contest became tighter and tighter I became desperate. So I did what any one in my position would do, I begged. I wrote emails to close friends with high klout scores and blasted an email out to the entire DC Social Media Club, (I’m VP of Marketing – see I can’t stop!) shamelessly asking them to promote me. Then, I went on Facebook and guilted my friends into ‘liking’ an update I posted.
I’m not proud of what I’ve done and I’m sorry to those of you I’ve hurt along the way.
To everyone else suffering from this terrible disease, please leave a comment and we can help get you on the road to recovery too!
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