Authority versus influence. It's an interesting distinction, isn't it? It's very common to see the two used almost interchangeably.
Someone might be described as 'an authority in her field', or 'an influential leader'.
Marketers have long talked of 'the influencers' - aka all the people we have to identify and then be extra nice to if we're hoping to persuade our audience to buy. In the 'old' media, people like journalists, celebrities & TV presenters hold sway. (And because everyone wants to influence the influencers, there are also layers of gatekeepers - but I digress.)
In other words, influencers are people with a large ready-made audience who trusts them. Are they important to marketers? Absolutely.
But an influencer isn't always an authority. A good journalist will be well researched, but that doesn't make them authoritative. Authoritative people don't just influence, they instigate change. Being an authority surely means being a thought-leader, not a disseminator of information.
