What’s more important, influence or popularity? Many people think both are interchangeable, but in fact they are not as shown by Onalytica, a UK-based analytics firm who proves that popularity and influence aren’t always in line with each other, at least on the topic of blog marketing.

A general example: Take Google and link popularity for instance. Google is going to rank a site higher that has more quality (influence) links than quantity (popularity), because on the Internet it isn’t about how many links or how much content you have, it’s about the quality. It’s the quality or influence that keep bringing people back.

The report goes on to show the top 20 most influential sites on blog marketing, and then the top 20 most popular sites on the same topic. It is interesting to see that many sites that rank in the top 20 in popularity, do not rank in the top 20 for influential. Sites such as the Wall Street Journal, ZDNet & Forbes are all very popular (and influential in their own right), but in terms of blog marketing, they aren’t in the top 20 at all.