There is a social tsunami out there, and its name is social media. How is that tsunami impacting the lives of people that are now so much influenced by the social, mobile, real-time, technology, and how is it affecting the economy and the new trends of doing business? And how to choose the most thoughtful writers that are analyzing such changes? Some like to dismiss this question mentioning how actually nothing new comes out of this. There is an old proverb that says that: “technology changes, people don’t”. But one can take a different look at this by realizing that actually Social Media is provoking new disruptions and new trends appearing in society. Social Media is changing the way people behave and interact with each other as it expands and explodes through the emergence of various new platforms that reach an immense quantity of audience that is extremely diverse in terms of background, age and interests. Social media questions various old truths that were taken for granted and shapes societies and people in a new way. Who are the authors that are describing all these changes particularly in the field of marketing and business? And how to define and select the best ones that are thoughtfully bringing new insights concerning the field of social media connected to business? An author is influential not just because of what books he wrote, but because of their unique insights on a particular field. An author is still a producer of unique content, as it brings us an original visible value: its unique stance on a particular matter.
If that author is interested in social media, it is important as well to analyze how the author reaches their audiences: what are the platforms that he or she uses? What are their various social media profiles in Slideshare, Scribl, YouTube, Instagram? It is precisely the way these authors use all these different platforms that shapes the concept of authorship in a new way, as these authors now connect with their audiences in an intimate and novel way. Nowadays an author can distribute their content by using the immense multitude of platforms provided by social media tools and the new technological devices. Now It is also possible to measure the influence and reach of these authors through platforms such as Klout, PeerIndex, wdyl. These new social media analytic websites helps social media contributors assess and score their influence and benefit from the social capital they have built. Klout, for example, is a website and mobile app that uses social media analytics to rank its users according to online social influence via the “Klout Score”, which is a numerical value between 1 and 100. In determining the user score, Klout measures the size of a user’s social media network and correlates the content created to measure how other users interact with that content. What makes a top social media digital author and what are the best metrics to define it ?
In this article I will present a group of digital authors whose contributions have brought important reflections to the field of social media. These authors have been selected due to their key influence in analyzing digital trends, but also due to their strong presence online through via the various social media platforms
1. Brian Halligan is an American executive author that co-founded HubSpot, an internet company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Halligan is a senior lecturer at MIT. He has co-authored two books on marketing: Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media, and Blogswith HubSpot co-founder Dharmesh Shah and Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead: What Every Business Can Learn from the Most Iconic Band in Historywith David Meerman Scott. Halligan’s book referred because people now block marketing that interrupts them, such as advertisements and spam, companies need to provide information that is useful to prospects, who will then self-identify. His second book, Marketing Lessons, was co-authored with David Meerman Scott. It uses the marketing activities of the rock band The Grateful Dead as an example of this.
Brian HalliganInformation about Brian Halligan:
Blog / website: , PR 6
Twitter: , 9,097Followers,1,116
Linkedin: , 500+
Facebook: closed profile
Klout:http://www.peerindex.net/bhalligan, 53
PeerIndex:http://klout.com/bhalligan, 57
2. Brian Solis is a well-known digital analyst keynote speaker and bestselling author. He is the principal at Altimeter Group, a research and advisory firm. He wrote the bestselling books The End of Business as Usual, Engage! and What’s the Future of Business (WTF).
Brian SolisInformation about Brian Solis:
Blog / website: , PR 6,
Twitter: , 96,494 Followers, 12,119
Linkedin: , 500+
Facebook: ,
Klout: ,
PeerIndex: , 78
3. Charlene Li is the Founder of Altimeter Group and the author of the New York Times bestseller,Open Leadership. She is also the coauthor of the critically acclaimed, bestselling book Groundswell, which was named one of the best business books in 2008. She is one of the foremost experts on social media and technologies and a consultant and independent thought leader on leadership, strategy, social technologies, interactive media and marketing.
Charlene LiInformation about Charlene Li:
Blog / website: , PR 5,
Twitter: , 56,691 Followers, 4,915
Listed Linkedin: , 500+
Facebook:
Klout: , 57
PeerIndex: , 57
4. Chris Brogan is an author, journalist, marketing consultant. He has co-author of Trust Agents, and a featured monthly columnist at Entrepreneur Magazine Role. Chris Brogan is Publisher of Owner Magazine, a business magazine helping you improve your worth by growing your capabilities and connections. He is CEO & President of Human Business Works, a publishing and media company.
Chris BroganInformation about Chris Brogan:
Blog / website: , PR 6,
Twitter: ,
Linkedin: , 500+
Facebook:
Klout: , 79
PeerIndex: , 74
5. Clay Shirky is an American writer, consultant and teacher on the social and economic effects of Internet technologies. His teaching address, among other things, the interrelated effects of the topology of social networks and technological networks, how our networks shape culture and vice-versa. He has written and been interviewed about the Internet since 1996. His published book include: Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations (2008) and Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age (2010).
Clay ShirkyInformation about Clay Shirky:
Blog / website: , PR 7
Twitter: , 140,525 followers, 7,096 listed
Linkedin: not visible
Facebook: , 947
Klout: , 63
PeerIndex: , 71
6. David Meerman is an American online marketing strategist and author of several books on marketing, most notably The New Rules of Marketing and PR with over 250,000 copies in print in more than 25 languages. The book was inspired by an accidental discovery (made when he was vice president of marketing at NewsEdge) that creating useful content oneself and publishing it on-line at virtually no cost was consistently more effective than expensive profession public relations programs. His published books include: The New Rules of Marketing and PR; Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead, What Every Business Can Learn from the Most Iconic Band in History; Real-Time Marketing & PR: How to Instantly Engage Your Market, Connect with Customers, and Create Products that Grow Your Business Now, and others.
David MeermanBlog / website: , PR 5,
PR 6
Twitter:
Facebook:
Klout: , 71
PeerIndex: , 68
7. Gary Vaynerchuk is co-founder and CEO of a social media brand consulting agency, a video blogger, a renewed author and speaker and the co-owner and director of operations of a wine retail store, and an author and public speaker on the subjects of social media, brand building and e-commerce. He is the one behind Winelibrary.com, Wine Library TV, VaynerMedia. His published books include: Crush It! Why Now Is the Time to Cash in on Your Passion (October 2009), The Thank You Economy (March 2011).
Gary VaynerchukBlog / website: , PR 6,
Twitter: , 889,627 followers, listed 14,190
Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/garyvaynerchuk, 500+
Facebook: ,
Klout: , 73
PeerIndex: , 89
8. Guy Kawasaki is a Silicon Valley author, speaker, investor and business advisor. He was one of the Apple employees originally responsible for marketing the Macintosh in 1984. He was also a co-founder of Garage Technology Ventures and a news aggregation site called Alltop, an “online magazine rack” of popular topics on the web. He published various books including Enchantment, Reality Check, The Art of the Start, Rules for Revolutionaries, How to Drive Your Competition Crazy, Selling the Dream, and The Macintosh Way.
Blog / website: , PR 6
Twitter: , 371,394 followers, listed 26,872
Linkedin: , 500+
Facebook: , 54 446 like
Klout: , 85
PeerIndex: , 35
Maria Fonseca is the Editor and Infographic Artist for IntelligentHQ. She is also a thought leader writing about social innovation, sharing economy, social business, and the commons. Aside her work for IntelligentHQ, Maria Fonseca is a visual artist and filmmaker that has exhibited widely in international events such as Manifesta 5, Sao Paulo Biennial, Photo Espana, Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Joshibi University and many others. She concluded her PhD on essayistic filmmaking , taken at University of Westminster in London and is preparing her post doc that will explore the links between creativity and the sharing economy.
