In what I see as a central message, I think you’ve captured the essence and value of a personal brand: it is a by product of what you deliver, and the greater the value, the stronger the brand – or reputation. Clearly you have wonderful reputation for delivering great value.

In fact, I think what truly sets you apart on the issue of personal brands, is that you draw a clear line between earned reputation and contrived images. In your own case, as long as that remains crystal clear, I don’t think you’ll ever eclipse or harm a client or your company. You most definitely get that what matters is not personal fame, but the pursuit of value in service to others.

And of course, if you show some personality in the process, it wonderfully underscores your humanity!

Great priorities! Great post!

Personal branding isn’t even in the equation. Its the reputation of the company that you serve.

So perhaps all of this personal branding is simply reputation categorized incorrectly?

Geoff, here’s a perspective from someone who recently discovered you. Of course I’ve heard of you, what you do, and why I should follow you. And though your name may have attracted my immediate attention, it’s the wealth of helpful information you have shared that I find valuable. So your reputation proceeds you. I didn’t hear about you because of your personal brand.

Take that for what its worth.. its late for me and I’ve been drinking some sort of orange beverage that was one Iced Thai Tea, so I may be bit off…

The people who are thinking like you and Geoff are thinking about it correctly. However, there will always be the segment fascinated with how many people are following them, or how often they’ve been retweeted, or even their grade on any number of Web sites.

When Geoff shares things that interest him and he thinks will help others, he is being a human.

When Geoff cultivates and shares particular items and shuns others because he wants to develop a specific following, that is Personal Branding.

Some people are famous because they are just really cool and interesting.

Some people try to be famous by being something they really aren’t.

Being famous for the sake of being famous is shallow. It is this bass-ackwards approach that Geoff and I (and others) abhor.

However, the idea of “personal brand” seems to be an inevitable byproduct of a sharing environment. When you share content that people find valuable, it is inevitable that they will gravitate to you. Not only that, but they will tell their friends about you. Before you know it, you have a large following of folks who are looking for you to deliver quality content time and again.

You’d like to just be you, but we all look to you (and others like you) to keep us educated. Heavy burden to be sure…

As they say, that’s life in the big city.

Just my $0.02.

My POV is that reputation is much more important than personal brand. Personal brand is what you say about you, while reputation is what others say about you. The second seems more important, it certainly is to the enterprise.

I will share this post on the Houston Social Media Breakfast Facebook page.