My Targeted Self

The dilema of how to carve up my output on the Web

The ways I choose to spend my cognitive surplus are diverse. The work I do when I’m not “at work” can be roughly divided into two categories: (1) Writing about product development, and (2) drawing conceptual mazes (like the one you see above). In choosing how to present my output, I am faced with a conundrum: Should I…

A. Present everything I do in a unified stream? This means presenting everything I produce, from product development writing to maze drawings through one, unified channel.

OR

B. Create separate streams targeted to specific audiences? This means creating one avenue for my product development writing and a separate one for my maze drawings.

For much of my life I’ve applied approach A, fantasizing that there is an audience out there that could see and be fascinated with the common threads that connect everything that I’m interested in. If I could only find this audience I will have found my true, singular home on the Web.

But, from working on the Web for my entire adult life, I’ve come to understand the difficulty with trying to entice people who are interested in one thing to become interested in something different. The overwhelming noise on the Web has fostered very rigid filters in its explorers. The cosmetic appearance of irrelevance quickly leads to invisibility. This is why some of the most successful online ads are the ones that “retarget” based on established interest, not creation of new interest.

Perhaps promoting my maze drawings to folks who follow me for my product development writing is me adding more irrelevant noise to the Web. Or, even worse, it could lead to someone evaluating me for my product management insight to question my seriousness or dismiss me all together.

So, for the time being, I’ve committed to approach B. I now have two primary streams on the Web:

1. Product Logic where I present my writing on product development.

AND

2. Maze Structure where I present my maze drawings.

The theory is that, if I don’t distract readers in one domain with work from the other, each stream will have its best shot at growing an audience. For that reason, I almost decided to not publish this post on Medium. Since most of my Medium followers know me in regards to product management, I am once again giving in to the temptation to contaminate my stream with mention of my maze drawings.

I guess this means I’m not ready to entirely give up on approach B. One my writing hypotheses is that I can build a following through writing self-reflexive posts about my own thought process. While this path is the hardest and maybe even self-defeating, my instinct is that it is the way to build the deepest relationship with readers. So, while separating my representations is my primary strategy at this point, from time to time I will experiment with posts such as this to see if I can stumble upon the right mutation. If I can see my readership statistics soar for one of these posts, my whole strategy will shift back to my preferred approach: plan A.