How do DJ rankings work? What makes someone a top 10 or top 100 DJ?

Before I got into electronic music, I've had issues with all "Top whatever" charts when it comes to music. If you are really on the quest to determine the best musician or artist, I use the following steps: 1) Find a bunch of DJs/musicians/artists. 2) Find who they cite as their influences. 3) Repeat step 1 with the influences they cited until you find no more new ones. In other words, those proficient in a skill are often best judges of who is more proficient. One caveat is that "influences" implies older artists, so all rock bands will cite Beatles as influences, or DJs Carl Cox, etc. With the advent of the internet (as opposed to print interviews), it became easier to track not just claimed influences of artists but their current and upcoming favorites, so you can usually find fresh stuff that's blessed or approved by good musicians. Example: Caribou and Thom Yorke love Burial and Four Tet, who love Kode9, who approves of Ikonica, therefore I should give Ikonica a listen. And indeed it's good. For DJs I'd look for which DJs play with which DJs on festivals, who do they approve for their record labels and podcasts. Electronic music has a lot of "hierarchy" and genuine authority, I find. So I'll take Grooverider's approval of a DJ over any "Top X" poll.

To have a understanding for DJ ranks, the best way is to watch Top 100 DJ Music Festival. The leading artist this time is the Top No1 DJ  Dimitri Vegas and Like Mike. The super popular new Emperor Andrew Rayel will take part in the music festival's launch party. Tom Swoon, Tenishia, MATTN and more DJ will come to Shanghai in 2016. For more details, http://en.damai.cn/event/tickets_98301/.

According to The Official Global DJ Rankings (http://www.dj-rankings.com) is calculated according to an advanced algorithm, compiled to give an accurate, independent and fair ranking of all DJs. We consider the following data and information.. - DJ fess and salaries. Where available we look at individual fees for single events as well as accumulated annual earnings. - Ranking preferences provided by our own users and our DJ community. - Media presence and fame. We look into how much press coverage a DJ has and how much public interest there is about the person. - Chart data from music releases and remixes. - Airplay data from radio stations. - Public data about fees and royalties collected from copyright associations such as CISAC, GESAC, IFPI etc. - Followers on major social networks, such as Facebook, Twitter etc. - Polling and rating data from various polling agencies and rating sites, such as our cooperation partner http://dj-rating.com and http://djmag.com - Our own expert jury team gives a final review of the results and makes adjustments, considering  DJs' technical skills and craftsmanship. New jury members are recruited from our online community. Our jury works similar to the Michelin Star rating system for restaurants. A DJ never knows when a jury member is present at a gig and the jury member makes an unbiased review of the performance.

Marketing and money basically.. What's in the charts isn't always the best..

their creativity in music & popularity...... & most importantly how they present it.