On the 19th, I asked readers whether I should branch off into my own blog.
   I thank Hugh and John for their responses, and Kris for phoning me about it. You guys are quite positive about my doing a blog independently of Beyond Branding.
   I continue to hesitate, and it’s not because I don’t value your input. I wouldn’t have asked otherwise. But here are the reasons for staying here: (a) a high Google ranking for branding—I’d like my posts to be seen; (b) a sense of continuity; (c) each time one of us spins off into an independent blog, this one gets hit somewhat in terms of traffic; (d) John, Hugh and people like that have something valuable to say whereas if I had the luxury of my own blog, I could become a right tosser, ramble and go off-topic; (e) unless I could be sure that others would link to me and read it, then it would take a long time building up traffic.
   Just yesterday, someone at my bank referred to me in introduction as ‘Jack Yan from Beyond Branding’. This book, more than any other, is connected with me. It even has its own Blogshares entry. No one says ‘Jack Yan of Typography and Branding’.
   Here’s why I should do my own: (a) the many different voices here must mean some of us are coming in to read Chris, and others to read me, so I am the comic relief as far as his readers are concerned; (b) I’d like to promote my other books; (c) it might just enhance jackyan.com—which is hosted on the same server anyway; (d) I know that at least John and Hugh would probably link to me unless my posts go stark raving looney. And I know that only makes four points versus the earlier five, but the feedback from the 19th counts very heavily—I really value it.
   Maybe another collaborative blog is what I need. I have been blogging—and in most cases repeating posts, whether that’s good blogiquette or not—at Kiwibranding, which was actually set up by Errol Saldanha of Canada. However, even there it’s “not me”. Or just cross-post between these but go off on my own little tangents at “my blog”.
   I’ll have to think on this some more, and see what need a ‘Jack Yan blog’ would meet for readers. In addition, is a personal blog the right image for me? Johnnie seems to think so, and that counts for an awful lot. posted by Jack Yan, 10:41 PM  permalink