Measuring popularity for a particular post?

I'm trying to measure the popularity of a post but there's no current system in place that can do that so that means I have to create one. Can anyone guide me on creating a heuristic that measures popularity for a post? I'm assuming factors such as # of replies, # of views, age of post, sticky vs. non-sticky, etc. should play in as a factor. I know i'm asking a lot because it's not an easy question to solve but if someone can refer me to an online resource to help me on this task, that would be much appreciated.