It’s that time again, PPC land!
After much deliberation (and vote counting!), we have arrived at this year’s list of Most Influential PPC Experts. We don’t want to delay the results, so scroll past the infographic for more information about how we arrived at the final list.
One important disclaimer: To avoid a conflict of interest, no PPC experts from Hanapin Marketing were eligible for this list (although we are very happy to see many Hero Conf speakers made the list this year!).
The Results
As you can see by the scores, it was a very close race this year! There was a difference of only one point between the first and second most influential PPC experts, as well as between the second and third.
We did a few things slightly different this year (see below for details), but overall we remained true to the methodology used in last year’s list. Hopefully our careful calculation of “influence” is obvious from the results, where independent consultants like Bryan Eisenberg and Brad Geddes mingled with community leaders like John Rampton. We’re proud to produce a list that truly measures impact, not title or company, so CEOs like David Rodnitzky can be seen alongside indie pros like Pamela Lund.
One thing that is missing from this year’s graphic compared to last year’s are stats like Twitter followers and Google+ stats. That’s because far more than simple follower tallying went into our formula. To learn what we did exactly, read about our methodology below.
The Methodology
As you know, this year we allowed our readers to vote for the most influential PPC expert, and hundreds of votes came pouring in for many of the more than 130 names on our list of nominees (and we’re guessing a few people voted for themselves as well).
Like all of the metrics we measured, those vote totals were normalized into a standard scale so that they could be compared and tallied using the same rubric. The metrics we measured can be roughly defined as belong to three categories: Social influence (Twitter followers, Google+, etc), traditional influence (speaking engagements, books published, channels reached, etc) and vote totals (provided by you the reader!).
In addition to normalizing the metrics in each category so that no single runaway attribute (like some of these folks’ massive Twitter followings) could outweigh any of the others, we also weighted the categories themselves.
This is the weight each category was given:
- Social Influence: 25%
- Vote Totals: 25%
- Traditional Influence: 50%
There is plenty of room for debate (we have certainly learned that much), but know that we did our very best to ensure that the scores were objective and that they relied on actual data, not opinion.
The Reaction
We want to hear from you! Love the list? Tell your friends! Hate the list? Tell your friends! But most importantly, tell us. Leave a comment with any questions, kudos, congratulations, complaints or commentary.
