This document provides guidance on curating an effective digital research footprint. It discusses starting with defining goals and intended impacts. Understanding target audiences and their preferences is key. Social media can help make work more visible and build networks. The document recommends starting small, being pragmatic about time and skills, and provides examples of digital strategies used, including maintaining websites, engaging on social platforms, open publishing, and public events. Overall it emphasizes focusing content, knowing audiences, amplifying existing work, and measuring impacts.

1. Curating an Effective Digital
Research Footprint
Nicola Osborne
Digital Education & Project Manager, EDINA
nicola.osborne@ed.ac.uk
@suchprettyeyes

2. If a research paper sits in a journal,
and no-one hears about it…
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4. What is an effective digital
research footprint?
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It’s about making your work visible, findable,
coherent and accessible to your audience(s).
And it’s about curating and sustaining key
partnerships, relationships, and building new
opportunities.

5. There are so many shiny tools, ideas,
spaces, endless “opportunities”…
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Where do you start?

6. Start at the end…
What would success look like?
• What are you trying to understand in your research?
• Who does your work effect, engage with or matter to?
• How do you want your work to change the world?
• Who do you need to reach, listen to, collaborate with, persuade,
influence to make that happen?
• What do you want the impact* and legacy of your work be?
• How long do you want to engage for?
*REF2014 (and likely REF2021) definition of impact:
‘an effect on, change or benefit to the economy, society, culture, public policy
or services, health, the environment or quality of life, beyond academia’.
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7. Find your focus: what matters most?
Draw out what makes your work unique, interesting, exciting,
and think about what your audience expectations are, what
they will enjoy and find enticing
Public engagement of any type (including social media) need to
be , engaging, respond to audience needs and be about building
relationships and dialogue. What’s in it for your audience(s)?
Why should they bother engaging with your work?

8. Get to know your audience(s)
and/or project partners
• Where do they hang out?
• What matters to them?
• What motivates them to engage?
• What are their expectations?
• What does it mean to be authentic and
credible in their community?
• Are there existing channels you can
contribute to, engage with?
• What style, voice, format does your
engagement need to adopt to reflect
your audiences’ needs?

9. Why use Social & Digital Media?
• Go-to spaces for expertise and advice.
• Authentic spaces for communities and information
exchange.
• New forms for storytelling, and for engaging in dialogue
with your audience(s).
• Rank highly on Google, Bing, etc.
• Brilliant for building and sustaining your contact network.
• Can generate media interest in your work, new
collaborations and other unexpected opportunities.
• Inexpensive ways to raise profile for you and your research.
• Amplify and publicise your work, activities, and other
research outputs…

10. “Social Media’s relationship with Open Access has to be
part of the continuum of research activity. You can
spend years producing a research paper, why would you
not spend the time it takes to deposit it in an open
access repository, and the seconds it takes to share that
copy online with as many people as you possibly can”
Melissa Terras (2012)[1] speaking about her work on
the impact of tweeting research papers [2].
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[1] http://www.oastories.org/2012/10/dr-melissa-terras-open-access-and-the-twitter-effect/
[2] http://melissaterras.blogspot.com/2012/04/is-blogging-and-tweeting-about-research.html

11. Be pragmatic
• Start small….
• What are your skills and capabilities?
• What assets do you have – publications, resources,
materials to support your engagement?
• What budget or support do you have?
• What tech kit/software do you have to work with?
• How much time do you (realistically) have?
• Evaluate success: measure against SMART goals and
KPIs; reflect on your practice.
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12. Reality check time…
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13. Some approaches I’ve used to make (my own
and others’) research more visible…
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14. Ensuring authoritative web presence(s)
represent your research…
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15. Being present, visible, networked, develop your
public profile, reach out and build new relationships…
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16. Engage with communities, creative events, etc. - building
networks and sharing (appropriate) data for remix
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17. Make code available, publishing openly,
sharing under open license
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https://openresearchsoftware.metajnl.com/art
icles/10.5334/jors.aq/

18. Amplifying and extending reach of events
through tweets, blog posts, video, podcasts etc.

19. Making consultancy and commissioned work visible
through online resources & social media sharing

20. Press releases with planned digital and in-
person content to share & build on interest

21. Creating apps, digital tools and online presence
for in-person crowdsourcing & citizen science
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22. Commissioning parallel physical and open digital
publishing; behind the scenes blogging of process
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23. What are others doing?
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24. Engaging publics via Wikipedia contribution
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:University_of_Edinburgh#Case_studies

25. Playful blogging bridging academia and pop culture:
e.g. Colin Yeo on the Free Movement blog
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https://www.freemovement.org.uk/an-immigration-lawyer-reviews-paddington/

26. Being awesome on Twitter, e.g:@melissaterras, @katecrawford,
@OrkneyLibrary, @warholmooc @praymurray
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27. The Tip Off: making investigative
journalism processes visible (audible)
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https://www.acast.com/thetipoff

28. Curated guest blogs/spaces
e.g. UoE Dangerous Women Project, LSE Impact blog
http://dangerouswomenproject.org/

29. Walking tours, dead authors and other wacky
offline events to promote digital research
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30. Q&A
Over to you: what do you want to do with your
research?
Further comments and questions welcome:
nicola.osborne@ed.ac.uk

31. And finally… A shameless plug!
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32. Further Reading
• Digital Footprint research:
https://www.research.ed.ac.uk/portal/en/projects/managing-your-
digital-footprint-research-strand(239b8e5b-c052-4681-9568-
77aa02fa44fa).html
• Digital Footprint MOOC: https://www.coursera.org/learn/digital-
footprint
• Find more resources on social media in research, impact and
teaching contexts at: https://www.wiki.ed.ac.uk/display/SMFE/
• REF Impact: http://www.hefce.ac.uk/rsrch/REFimpact/
• Edinburgh Local: https://www.ed.ac.uk/local
• Beltane Public Engagement Network:
https://www.beltanenetwork.org/
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33. What research and content
can/should you share?
• What your research is about and what it aims to achieve.
• Processes, updates, changes of approach – to the extent that such
transparency is appropriate and acceptable.
• Research findings, impact, relevance – be realistic, don’t overpromise.
• Quirky, playful and accessible content around your work and research area.
• Publications, presentations, press mentions and materials that reflect
research outputs and expertise.
• CHECK ANY EXISTING PROFESSIONAL BODY GUIDANCE, PRIVACY, NON-
DISCLOSURE OR SOCIAL MEDIA POLICIES AND ENSURE YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA
PRESENCE OR ACTIVITY COMPLIES.

34. What should not be shared
• Commercially sensitive data or other material your employer/PI would
not want shared or that might breach guidelines.
• Personal information about colleagues, participants, those at partner
organisation that might breach Data Protection law or ethical guidance.
• Similarly do not share location information that might compromise your
own safety or that of your colleagues.
• Material (images, discussion board posts, tweets, etc.) that might
impact on your own professional reputation or the credibility of your
research.
• Anything you would not want a funder, professional peer, project
partner, or future employer to see or read.