How to raise your Klout score

After my last post on How to use Klout (and why you should), I had many people ask me, “so how do I raise my Klout score?”

Pretty simple, really. You raise your Klout score by becoming more influential on Twitter and by remembering that Twitter is, at its core, about connecting people. If you keep this philosophy in the back of your mind, the following tactical recommendations may just help you raise that score:

First and foremost…

• Follow people – Klout measures your number of followers and more importantly, your number of active followers. And sadly, no matter how many followers you have, or how interesting you are, people get bored of you. That’s why you have to consistently be following new people. Hopefully these people will follow you back and they may just RT, respond, etc to the things you tweet.

So how do you get them to follow you back? Well, the next 7 recommendations aim to help you gain active followers.

• Say thank you for RT’s, mentions and lists – If you want people to continue to RT, mention and list you (all things that raise your Klout score) then you need to show them that you are paying attention, and that you appreciate their interaction. If you can, add something besides the “Thanks”. Take 10 seconds, look at their last few tweets and respond with a thanks + a response to whatever they’ve got going on. It’ll help you remember them in your mind, and show them you are paying attention.

• Talk to people outside your comfort zone – We can all talk to our friends and colleagues all day, however, these people will support you regardless. I’d recommend spending time talking to people you don’t know in order to build a relationship with them. Over time, some may just become your twitter regulars, who you can depend on for good conversation and maybe a RT or two.

• Refer to people by their name - “Thanks, Callan.” “Great post, Carrie.” etc… On the other end of that Twitter handle, is a person and using their real “human” name will go a long way to building that relationship and expanding the circle of people who respond to you.

• Work on that credibility – Want people to be influenced by you? Then tell them why they should, starting with your bio. Your bio doesn’t have to be all dry and business-like, be sure you have something in it that tells people *why* you are influential. I sure as heck, put in my bio that I wrote for Mashable and Hubspot. This automatically lends at least a little credibility to my title of social media account executive.

• Evaluate your Twitter profile regularly - Take a look at your stream anytime you are about to go out and follow new people. What do your last 10 tweets say about you? If it isn’t what you want it to portray, then wait and do a few more “on-target” tweets before following people. If I want people to follow me because they are into social media, then having my last 5 tweets about Bachelor Pad is probably not the best strategy.

• Even out your Following vs Followers - if your ratio is too far off, one way or the other, it can hurt people’s perception of you. If you are following too many people, you can look a little desperate. And if you have thousands of followers and are only following 7 back, many will view you as elitist. Check out Friend or Follow to find an easy way to see who you follow that doesn’t follow you and vice versa.

• Get on lists - Twitter lists lend credibility and also classify you in your area of expertise. AND they are a factor in your Klout score. To get on more lists there are two things you can try. One, make a few lists of your own. People may return “list” you. The second is try following people who make a lot of lists about the things you tweet about. If you are doing your Twitter job right, they’ll follow you back and add you to their list or lists.

In truth, this post could also have been titled “How to be a Good Tweeter” but for some reason, no one ever asks me that. As it turns out, the secret to having a high Klout score and becoming a Twitter influencer is as simple as being nice, being actively involved, and sharing good content when you find it. Crazy right?

Now shhh, don’t tell anyone. We can’t all be Twitter influencers…

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