What’s more important to you – being popular or being reputable? If you were still in high school, you might be inclined to say “being popular”, as the in-crowd is a formidable social metric at that stage of life. But if you’re all grown up – be it seeking a job, self-employed or someone trying to build their credibility as a topic expert or thought leader – you would most likely answer “being reputable”. Having a favorable reputation opens the door to greater opportunities and helps you build trust with others. It trumps popularity in the business world.

Reputations, however, are no longer centered on face-to-face interactions. Today favorable reputations are predominantly built online, measured in terms of social capital. And right now, one name seems to be synonymous with this status currency – Klout.

If you’re not familiar with this service, Klout “supposedly” measures influence across the social web by collecting data from a handful of platforms including Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Foursquare and analyzing a user’s ability to “drive action”. Likes, retweets, mentions and other similar interactions are considered actionable in this sense. Once data has been collected a user is then assigned a score ranging from one to 100, with higher scores corresponding to a higher caliber of online influence. Keep in mind that all of this is done via a top secret algorithm or two. There are similar services out there, but currently Klout is considered the premier source of influence metrics.

In my opinion these platforms are severely flawed. For example, I compared my Klout score to an “account” that I know has invested into purchasing mass numbers of Twitter followers over the years. This “account” has zero presence on Facebook and does very little on LinkedIn. Yet their Klout score is tens higher than mine. I have spent countless hours building an organic, meaningful online reputation, yet an account that has used questionable methods and has fake accounts following it gives the impression that it is more influential than I am. How misleading and potentially damaging is that?

This is why an algorithm cannot replace building a reputation organically. An organic reputation includes elements that scoring algorithms overlook – offline interactions, referrals, blogging, commenting on news stories and posts, participation on smaller niche social networks and so and so forth. Most algorithms measure so-called popularity (which can easily be gamed), not influence and certainly not reputation.

Until these services improve – if at all possible – people should continue to do their due diligence the old fashioned way. Ask for references, look at portfolios of work, etc. Don’t rely on a string of code to determine who is and who is not reputable.

Back in December Q&A site Quora quietly launched a new feature with a ton of potential – “boards”. According to Quora, boards reflect the broader system they are evolving into: to connect you with everything you want to know about. A board is like a hybrid car, functioning like a cross between an online pinboard (think Pinterest), a microblogging platform (think Twitter) a LinkedIn group and a social bookmarking site. Creating a board on Quora gives you one specific place where all of the interesting or valuable content you find or create – images, blog posts, videos, Quora Q&As and so on – can be stored under a specific topic or theme (i.e. Low-Carb Recipes or Sports Cars). But the fun doesn’t stop there. Boards also allow for interaction, collaboration and sharing with others – both on and off the site.

Here are some other key features and benefits of Quora boards:

Reference: Boards are a great reference tool. The information you collect and store on your boards can be easily located and revisited in a short amount of time.

Reputation Building: Boards are a great way to enhance your online reputation and status as an expert or thought leader in a particular field, industry or topic area. Not only can you bookmark interesting content that you find online and on Quora, you can also create your own content in the form of discussion posts right on your boards.

Participation and Collaboration: Your boards can be followed by other Quora users who will receive your updates in their feeds. You can also adjust the settings of your boards to allow for collaboration and posts from others. This gives people a unique opportunity to engage with you and discuss the information you posted or created. Boards open the floodgate for active discussion and the sharing of ideas. Make sure to follow other boards, too!

Flexibility: Boards can be public, contain private content (“others can find the board and see its name, but not see contents unless they are approved followers”) or be set up as secret boards (“only approved followers can see the contents and the existence of the board”).

Here are some examples of boards that people have created including two of my own:

• Social Media
• Online Community Managers
• Beautiful Websites
• Founders Hub
• Startup Stage

To create a board, follow the instructions found in this Quora Q&A.

Several weeks ago, I set up two new groups on LinkedIn. They are:

• Online Community Management Best Practices
• Social Media Management Best Practices

These industries are still very young and there is so much to share – which is what prompted me to start the groups. They are hubs for pros and amateurs alike to share what they have learned about managing online communities and social media marketing, to discuss best practices (many which have yet to be determined!) and to simply connect with one another in a collaborative atmosphere.

Here are several lively discussions that took place this week:

In your own words, what are the defining characteristics of an online community?

How often do you tweet?

If you are a thought leader in either of these spaces, I would like to extend a personal invitation for you to participate. I know your time is valuable and probably very scarce, but your insight and participation would be so welcomed and appreciated. I hope you will consider sharing your expertise.

Twitter continues to baffle and confuse even the brightest of marketers. What’s it really good for? Where’s the ROI? And who ARE these twits? Okay, so it’s not as clear cut as Facebook or LinkedIn, but do not for one second underestimate the potential of Twitter. There are now over 200 million Twitter accounts in existence with over 280 million tweets daily. And your prospects and existing customers are among the masses.

If you’ve been struggling to find the value, one thing that you can do today to maximize your Twitter presence is to become a trusted expert answering questions that people post on the site. Simply log into your account and access the Advanced Search tool. Search for questions based on relevant keywords and using a question mark (?) in your query. For example, if you are an etiquette trainer you might conduct a search that looks like this:

When the search results pull up, click on the blue dropdown menu next to “Tweets”, changing Top to All.

Now it’s time to scroll through and find some questions to answer. When you’ve found one, place your mouse over the individual tweet and hit Reply.

Copy a condensed version of the question (still needs to make sense but allow you ample room to answer) into the reply box after the Twitter user name and type your answer directly before it as shown below. If there is room, add relevant hashtags and hit “Tweet”.

Make it a habit to consistently answer questions related to your niche. Over time, you will be retweeted, your user name will become familiar to other Twitterers and people will come to recognize you as a valued expert. It’s also a great method for organically building your following and increasing your appearance in search results.

If you’ve spent considerable time and effort building a thriving community around your brand or you run a pure play community-oriented website, you know how difficult it can be managing all the different personalities and keeping things on the up and up.  Disputes are bound to occur and disgruntled community members are sure to wreak havoc on your otherwise happy environment.  While you may be inclined to let things slide or do everything in your power to woo an unhappy individual, it’s not always the right thing to do.  One bad apple CAN spoil the entire bunch or, more appropriately, spoil it for the rest of the bunch.

Within every community, there are going to be chronically unhappy people.  Some fall into the category of divas and divos, thriving off of drama and meddling into any muck they can; others exist to bitch, moan and complain simply for the sake of bitching, moaning and complaining – no matter what you do, no matter how hard you try, you just can’t please them.  And for some crazy reason, they stick around, which is bad for you and your community.

Chronically unhappy people have a tendency to spread poison and drive down the positive atmosphere of a community.  More often than not, they run off other valuable community members – good apples who become fed up with the antics and drama – and fuel other bad apples to start misbehaving.  At the end of the day, despite their contributions and possibly money spent on purchasing your products or services, they cost more to maintain than they are worth.

As a Community Manager, you need to be able to distinguish between genuine complaints and issues and well-orchestrated drama being stirred up in the background.  And you need to have the guts to weed out the bad apples. Don’t be afraid to show people the virtual door, block/ban them from accessing your community platform or ask them to quit behaving in a manner unbecoming of the community. The dynamics are the same as raising a toddler – let the bad behavior continue and it will only repeat and, most likely, manifest into something out of control.

Take a cue from Herb Kelleher, the renowned founder of Southwest Airlines.  After countless complaints from a frequent flyer, the customer support staff could no longer take it and forwarded one of her many complaints to Herb. Realizing the toll it was taking on his employees and most likely other flyers, he decisively wrote back: “Dear Mrs. X, We will miss you. Love, Herb.”  The company never heard from her again.

Morale of the story: Don’t let the old adage, “The customer is always right” get the best of you or your extended community. Take a stand against the bad apples and let the positive energy flow!

Here are the top comical, strange and all-around hard to believe Tweet picks of the week from around the Twitterverse (do not read if easily offended by social media):

KelseyKelz_ Maureen ♡

Some people are confused on the etiquette of tweeting. Just because it says, “What’s happening?” doesn’t mean you tell what’s happening.

tinastullracing Tina Stull

My mom thinks LOL stands for “lots of love.” She texted me to say “Your Grandma just died. LOL.” #joke

WSCreations Judy

FB is a small world: I just offered to jump a car three states away.

Synders777 Cynthia

THE ECONOMY IS SO BAD: I received a pre-declined credit card in the mail #tcot #tlot #WeThePeople #teaparty #iamthemob #OKtcot #Debt #lo

SixDegreesSEO Angela Moore

Why do psychics have to ask you for your name?

TinaCook Tina Cook

Twitter excels in aligning relevance with those who understand how to filter streams to their advantage. ~ Brian Solis

Lord_Voldemort7 The Dark Lord

Best Relationship Matches: Bella & Edward. They’re perfect together because nobody else wants to have to put up with either of those morons.

From my vantage point, it’s hard to believe that social media is still in its infancy. But in actuality the industry, applications and principles are still in their early days of evolution. As a result, people are making mistakes – BIG mistakes when approaching and engaging in social media marketing.

If you’ve been active for quite some or just venturing onto the social media playing field, here are the top 5 issues to be aware of:

Using social media to promote and sell, rather than engage: Social media is not about me or even we (okay – maybe to some extent), but, rather, about them – your audience. Yes, you are using social media to create a presence for your brand. And yes you are using it to reach new markets for your products and services. But your two primary goals here are to engage your audience and encourage conversations – to build a community around your brand.

Not acknowledging or responding to comments, direct messages and so on: Imagine trying to have a conversation with a person who is obviously not listening or simply letting what you say go in one ear and out the other. No matter how you cut it, one-way conversations suck. That’s why it’s important to create two-way conversations when utilizing social media. Make sure to thank people for their posts, acknowledge comments and respond to messages in a timely manner. Timely is NOT two months after the fact.

Sounding “fake” or “forced”: You’re human. Not a robot, so please don’t act like one. Be real, be genuine and make sure that your social media voice is representative of your brand.

Failing to update regularly: Regular, consistent participation is vital for both short-term and long-term social media success. If you suddenly drop off the face of the planet, or go long stretches in between updates, chances are you’ll lose some folks. You build momentum and engagement through active participation.

Trying to maintain too many social media profiles: Don’t get involved in too many social media sites or you’ll start to feel overwhelmed. A good rule of thumb is to focus on the dynamic trio – LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter — plus one niche social media site depending on your target audience. Once you are comfortably up and running and seeing results, you can try adding others. Again, don’t overdo it.

It just occurred to me that there is actually a sixth and potentially more critical social media marketing mistake that is being made each and every day – failure to execute – believing social media is a passing fad. Social media is here to stay and is much too powerful to ignore. So what are you waiting for? If your business has been quietly standing on the social media sidelines, it’s time to get in the game.