The document provides guidance on building a personal digital brand in 10 steps: 1) assess your expertise, 2) expand your network through social media engagement, and 3) consistently provide valuable content across multiple channels. It outlines 5Cs for an effective personal brand strategy, including curating quality content and communicating through established channels. The document also lists daily themes and tools that can be used to engage audiences and strengthen an individual's personal digital brand over time.

1. How to Build Your Personal Digital Brand
Stan Garfield, stangarfield@gmail.com
Knowledge Management Author & Speaker
Founder, SIKM Leaders Community
Midwest KM Symposium, August 10, 2018

2. 1. 5 Cs
2
• Content – ideas, information, insights, tips, opinions,
compilations, curation, synthesis, and compiled search results
• Channels – platforms for publishing and interacting
• Contacts – audience who pays attention to what you
communicate
• Communication – interacting with your audience by sharing and
responding
• Cadence – predictable schedule of communication

3. 2. 3 Basics
3
• Expand your network of contacts and followers
• Provide content to your network, communities, and other
channels
• Respond to others in your network, in communities, and
through social media

4. 3. 5 Actions
4
1. Join and participate
• Social networks
• Communities
• Groups
2. Ask questions, for help, and for
advice
• Contacts
• Communities
• Social media
3. Answer questions and respond to
requests
• Communities
• Social media
• Quora
4. Post, publish, and be interviewed
• Articles
• Blogs
• Social media
5. Lead, help lead, and present
• Communities
• Groups
• Chats, webinar, and video hangouts

5. 4. 10 Ways
5
1. Assess yourself against the specialties in your field
2. Read books, blogs, periodicals, and sites
3. Join, participate in, and help lead communities
4. Attend conferences, webinars, and community calls
5. Tweet, retweet, and follow
6. Present, speak, lead discussions, and deliver training
7. Post, write, and publish
8. Attend training
9. Learn by doing
10. Find a mentor and/or serve as a mentor

6. 4-1. Assess yourself against the specialties in your field
6
• You need to be perceived as having expertise and useful
information about a specialty
• If you were asked to meet with a client, present at a
conference, or be interviewed for a publication as an expert in
the specialty, would you be comfortable doing so, and would
the client, audience, or interviewer be pleased with you?
• Choose one or more specialties in which you are an expert,
you would like to become an expert
• Focus your personal development on those specialties
• Follow the following suggestions for increasing your expertise
in those specialties

7. 4-2. Read books, blogs, periodicals, and sites
7
• Increase your knowledge about your specialty
• For the ones you like
• Review
• Write about
• Link to
Knowledge-Letter

8. 4-3. Join, participate in, and help lead communities
8
• Increase your knowledge about your specialty
• Connect with others in the specialty
• Subscribe: Get email or notifications and
regularly read the threaded discussions
• Post: Start a new thread or reply in the threaded
discussions
• Attend: Participate in community events
• Contribute: Submit content to the community
newsletter, blog, wiki, or site
• Engage: Ask or answer a question, make a
comment, give a presentation, and/or help lead
SIKM Leaders

9. 4-4. Attend conferences, webinars, and community calls
9
• Increase your knowledge about your specialty
• Connect with others in the specialty
• Live tweet
• Recap the best sessions

10. 4-5. Tweet, retweet, and follow
10
• Follow thought leaders in Twitter
• Like, reply, and retweet when you are moved to do so
• Participate in Twitter chats
• Search Twitter using hashtags relevant to your specialty
• Ask questions on Twitter using relevant hashtags
• Use daily themes – helps answer these questions
• Why should I post?
• When should I post?
• What should I post about?
• Which content should I save for future posts?

11. 4-6. Present, speak, lead discussions, and deliver training
11
• Present regularly within your organization, to other firms, at
industry conferences, on con calls, in community meetings,
and in client meetings
• Benchmark your efforts, incorporate the good ideas of
others, and evolve your thinking
• Ask an established expert to allow you to co-present
• Offer to help facilitate a panel discussion
• Develop and conduct training
• Offer to present on a webinar sponsored by a company or
organization relevant to your specialty
• Upload videos of presentations, tips, and training to YouTube
• Start a podcast

12. 4-7. Post, write, and publish
12
• Post to a community threaded discussion, solicit feedback, ask
questions, and reply to the questions and comments of others
• Write a blog post, e.g., using LinkedIn
• Publish a document, e.g., using Google Docs
• Upload a presentation to SlideShare
• Create a website, e.g., using Google Sites
• Write an article for a publication
• Use writing to test your ideas, solicit comments, and refine
your thinking about a topic
• Publish a book about your experiences, philosophies, and
insights

13. 4-8. Attend training
13
• Increase your knowledge about your
specialty
• Connect with others in the specialty
• Online
• At a university
• Before or after a conference
• From a specialized vendor

14. 4-9. Learn by doing
14
• Increase your knowledge about your specialty
• Connect with others in the specialty
• Try things out
• Interact with others
• Attend different events to see which ones are
the most useful
• Use the tools of your profession, including
new ones
• Write about your experiences, both the good
and the bad

15. 4-10. Find a mentor and/or serve as a mentor
15
• Increase your knowledge about your specialty
• Connect with others in the specialty
• Post in a community to request one or to offer to be one
• Contact a blogger
• Reply to a tweeter
• At a conference, ask a presenter to be one, or offer to be one
• Visit the site of a thought leader and send an email message
• Ask a LinkedIn contact or request a referral

16. 100 KM Specialties
16
1. Sharing, culture, organizational design, and change
management
2. Innovation, invention, creativity, and idea generation
3. Reuse, proven practices, lessons learned, and knowledge
retention
4. Collaboration and communities
5. Learning, competency development, and training
6. Goals, measurements, incentives, gamification, recognition,
and rewards
7. Social networks, organizational networks, value networks,
and network analysis
8. Expertise location and personal profiles
9. Communications
10. Facilitation and knowledge transfer
11. User support and Knowledge-Centered Support
12. Content management, document management, and records
management
13. Analytics, text analytics, visualization, metrics, and
reporting
14. Project management, process management, Agile development,
workflow, planning, decision making, and checklist
15. Knowledge audit, knowledge mapping, knowledge modeling, peer
assist/retrospect, After Action Review, sensemaking, and ritual dissent
16. Appreciative inquiry, positive deviance, and Most Significant Change
17. Storytelling, narrative, anecdote circles, BarCamp/unconference, and
World Café
18. Information architecture, usability, user interface, and user experience
19. Search, findability, taxonomy, ontology, metadata, tagging, and
semantic web
20. Portals, intranets, and websites
21. Big data, databases, repositories, business intelligence, data
warehouses, and data lakes
22. Competitive intelligence, customer intelligence, market intelligence,
and research
23. Digital workplace, social business, and social media tools
24. Cognitive computing, artificial intelligence, natural language
processing, machine learning, and neural networks
25. Wisdom of crowds, crowdsourcing, collective intelligence, and
prediction markets

17. People
culture & values
knowledge managers
user surveys
social networks
communities
training
documentation
communications
Technology
Process
methodologies
creation
capture
reuse
lessons learned
proven practices
collaboration
content management
classification
metrics & reporting
management of change
workflow
valuation
social network analysis
appreciative inquiry &
positive deviance
storytelling, narrative, &
anecdotes
blogs
wikis
podcasts & videos
syndication & subscription
social software & media
external access/extranet
workflow applications
process automation
gamification and badges
e-learning
analytics & BI
cognitive computing
& AI
user assistance & knowledge
help desk
goals & measurements
incentives & rewards
user interface, UX, & usability
intranet
team spaces
virtual meeting rooms, web/video/
audio conferencing, &
teleprescence
portals & digital workplace
repositories & knowledge bases
threaded discussions & ESNs
expertise locators/ask the expert
metadata & tags
search engines/enterprise search
archiving/document management
& records management
50 KM Components
17

18. 5. 10 Types of content to share
1. Compile useful links
2. Rebroadcast and comment on the posts of others
3. Do a search and curate the results
4. Ask others to weigh in and summarize the responses
5. Express your opinion
6. Narrate your experience
7. Inform about what you are planning to do or what
you are working on
8. Analyze empirical data
9. Start a discussion
10. Take notes during a call, meeting, or conference, and
summarize them
18

19. 6. 5 Types of Tools to Use
1. Profile
• LinkedIn
• About.me
2. Connection
• LinkedIn
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Community
19
4. Event
• Chat
• Tchat.io
• Wakelet
• Podcast
• Video
• Webinar
• Conference
5. Content
• Pin board – Pinterest
• File share – SlideShare
• Q&A – Quora
• Subscription – Blogtrottr
3. Publication
• Periodical
• Book
• Blog
• LinkedIn
• Medium
• Quora
• Tumblr
• Blogger
• Typepad
• WordPress

20. 7. 10 Tools to use
1. LinkedIn
2. SlideShare
3. Twitter
4. Tchat.io
5. Wakelet
6. Facebook
7. Google
8. About.me
9. Quora
10. Medium
20
tchat.io

21. 7-1. LinkedIn
• Let others check you out
• Search for people (e.g., colleagues in a city you will be
visiting) and send messages to them
• Join groups (communities) of personal interest
• Participate in and monitor group discussions
• Receive comments on posts
• Provide links to other personal sites
• Achieve 100% profile completeness
• Add skills
• Link to your resume, blog, website, etc.
• Connect with everyone you meet
• Ask for recommendations and reciprocate
• Endorse others if you can actually vouch for a specific skill 21

22. 7-2. SlideShare: Upload your presentations
22

23. 7-3. Twitter
• Start by following just 10 people
• Create lists to sort people you follow into categories
• Set email notifications for when you are mentioned
• Add your Twitter ID to your LinkedIn profile
• Tweet about topics about which you are passionate on
a regular schedule, either daily (using theme of the day)
or weekly
• Search on a few hashtags to see which ones are most
popular and view trends
• Always include a popular hashtag to allow others to
discover you
• Retweet those tweets which you especially like
• Reply to others to agree, ask a question, or answer a
question
• Observe a regular chat and then join in 23

24. 7-4. 10 Tchat.io: Follow and participate in Twitter chats
24
tchat.io

25. 7-5. Wakelet: Post the transcripts of Twitter chats
25

26. 7-6. Facebook
1. Profile – promote yourself
2. Post – share and comment
3. Group – community
4. Page – publish content to
followers
5. Live – video presentations to or
conversations with followers
26

27. 7-7. Google
1. Google Docs – publish documents and
collaborate on editing them
2. Google Sites – create and maintain your
own web site
3. Google Hangouts – group video chat
4. YouTube – follow and publish videos
27

28. 7-8. About.me: Promote yourself, your expertise,
and your social channels
28

29. 7-9. Quora: Ask and answer questions
29

30. 7-10. Medium: Blog
30

31. 8. 10 Ways to start
1. Live tweet during an event using a chat tool such as Tchat.io or Twubs
2. Enhance your profile: LinkedIn, Twitter, Quora, About.me
3. Connect LinkedIn to Twitter
4. Post: LinkedIn (brief update or longer post), Twitter
5. Join: Facebook Group, LinkedIn Group
6. Post to a community: share, ask, find, answer, recognize, inform,
suggest – or start a discussion
7. Subscribe to a blog using Blogtrottr
8. Create: Twitter list of your favorite tweeters, Facebook list
9. Ask or answer a question or follow a topic in Quora
10. Upload or favorite a presentation in SlideShare
31

32. 9-1. 30 Daily themes: Monday #MM
1. Meeting: Promote events, conferences, community
meetings, calls, and Twitter chats which are upcoming
in the week
2. Meet Me: Inform about an upcoming meeting, event,
call, or location where you will be or in which you will
participate in the coming week
3. Metrics: Share useful analytics
4. Marcom: Post about marketing and communications
5. Methods: Link to proven methodologies
6. Mention: Give a plug or a shout-out to a cause or a
colleague
7. Maxim: Share an insight or principle
32

33. 9-2. 30 Daily themes: Tuesday #TT
8. Trackback: Link to blog posts
9. Tip: Share a tip, trick, or proven practice
10. Training: Link to a course
11. Talk: Start a chat
12. Technique: Share a useful technique
33

34. 9-3. 30 Daily themes: Wednesday #WW
13. Website: Link to a good web site or other web
content
14. Words: Share word usage examples
15. Wish: Suggest an idea, request an enhancement, or
let others know what you are wishing for
16. Wisdom: Share a quote or piece of advice
17. Win: Promote a success story
18. Writer: Publicize an author you like
34

35. 9-4. 30 Daily themes: Thursday
19. #TiTh Title: Recommend books
20. #ThTh Thankful: Recognize a colleague, show
appreciation for an accomplishment, or let others know
what you are thankful for
21. #ThTh Thoughtful: Share a deep thought or insight
22. #ThTh Thought: Share an idea or suggestion
23. #TTL Thought Leader: Link to a thought leader
24. #ThTh Throwdown: Challenge a colleague to respond to
a suggestion, insight, or question
25. #TTTA Things To Avoid: Warn others of a common
problem
26. #TBT Throwback: Remember a moment from the past 35

36. 9-5. 30 Daily themes: Friday #FF
27. Follow: Recommend people to follow
28. Feedback: Provide or request feedback
29. Find: Ask for help in locating a needed resource, or
share something you found
30. Fun: Share a joke, pun, or humorous link
36

37. 10. 15 Resources
1. Seth Godin’s 7-Point Guide to Bootstrap Your Personal Brand by Pete Kistler
2. The Personal Branding Post Seth Godin Should Have Written by John Doherty
3. Personal Branding with Seth Godin – Doing work that Matters interviewed by Bernard Kelvin Clive
4. The Brand Called You and Brand You posts by Tom Peters
5. Create an Unstoppable Personal Online Brand by Digital Marketing Institute
6. The 10 Pillars To Creating a Personal Brand in a Digital World by Jeff Bullas
7. 5 Do’s For Building Your Personal Brand by Laura Armbruster
8. Brand Reputation: Why Your Personal Digital Brand is Not the Same as You by Allison Boyer
9. Why Looking After Your Personal Brand in the Social Era Still Matters by Luis Suarez
10. 7 Rules for Building a Distinctive Personal Brand (and a Bonus to Get You Started) by Deep Patel
11. The Personal Branding Blog by William Arruda
12. Developing your personal digital brand by Diana O’Brien
13. 101 Guide for Beginners to Build their 'Personal Digital Brand' and How to Build your Personal Digital
Brand by Kanika Agarwal
14. 7 Things You Can Do To Build An Awesome Personal Brand by Shama Hyder
15. The 7 Secrets Of Successful Personal Brands by Jayson DeMers 37

38. Managing the ROI
of Knowledge
Management
(chapter author)
The Case against
ROI
Implementing
a Successful
KM Program
(author)
Successful Knowledge
Leadership:
Principles and Practice
(chapter author)
The Modern
Knowledge Leader:
A Results-Oriented
Approach
Gaining Buy-in
for KM (chapter
author)
Obtaining
Support for KM:
The Ten
Commitments
Proven Practices
for Promoting a
Knowledge
Management
Program (author)
• Join the SIKM Leaders CoP https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/sikmleaders
• Twitter @stangarfield
• Site http://sites.google.com/site/stangarfield/
• LinkedIn Articles https://www.linkedin.com/in/stangarfield/detail/recent-activity/posts/
For additional information
38
Knowledge
Management
Matters
(chapter author)
Communities
Manifesto