I’m sure you’ve noticed that I finish all my posts with the same logo, a wolf encircled by my name and the words “moonlit imagination.” I’m also guessing that you might have wondered why I do that and where it came from.
The history behind it isn’t really complicated or extraordinary. My high school offered Yearbook as an elective and I took it my junior and senior years. This elective, along with compiling and selling the school’s yearbook, taught us about graphic design and layout. One of the assignments we got was to design business cards for ourselves. I came up with a handful of designs and this logo was my favorite.
The howling wolf represents my dual nature as a lone wolf but also a pack animal. Wolves are also strong, majestic, and misunderstood, much like writers often are. The words encircle the wolf in order to follow the same visual path created by the full moon at which the wolf howls. “Moonlit Imagination” is a slogan I gave a potential freelancing business long ago because I am a nocturnal being and my best work is done at night. The “S” and “H” are just my initials. You can probably figure out why my name is there.
After all these years I still have a file of each of the business cards and logos, and after all these years this logo is still my favorite.
When I first started writing posts for this blog, I felt like they were incomplete even with images and a sort of “conclusion” at the end. I didn’t like the white space underneath the last of the text. I had been looking for a way to use this logo for a while and I figured that, in addition to making business cards, I could use it as my signature at the bottom of my posts. So far it seems to be working fairly well.
As I’ve been looking into using VistaPrint to make some business cards, I realized that this logo would look good on other products as well: shirts, tote bags, hats, etc. This realization gave me an idea but I want to run it by my readers before I make a decision.
You probably know that running a quality blog isn’t always free. Between the money for the domain and the time spent writing, it does burn a small hole in your pocket before it truly lifts off. My most prominent sources of income are Swagbucks and my book reviews from Fiverr, but I’m still looking for more ways to raise money. I’ve placed a couple ads on this blog but I don’t want to overwhelm my readers and I’m still working to build up my writing, editing, and book review freelance jobs. I have also entered some writing contests and plan to focus more on getting published but we all know that will take some time and a lot of submissions.
My idea is to offer you, my readers, the chance to buy some merchandise with my logo on it. This will be accomplished either through an online store or, preferably, with pledges through an account on Patreon. I will also be offering these products from time to time as free monthly giveaways for my newsletter subscribers.
First, however, I would like you to answer this poll.
Mind you, this idea may or may not come to fruition. I want to see how well my readers receive it before giving it a try. Thank you for providing your opinion on this matter.
If you have any comments or suggestions about this idea, please leave them in the comments section below.