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5 Tips On How To Choose The Right Layout & Design For Your New Blog

August 29, 2013 by Rosemary 7 Comments

By Reena Cruz

Everyone has a reason for starting a blog: passion, hobby, business, information sharing, you name it. Whatever compels you to the blogging dashboard, you’ll find yourself wondering how your blog layout and design can best attract your target niche.

Different themes and layouts will work well with certain goals, for example, and some won’t. Thus, you need to decide on the best blog design that will work with and emphasize your main goal. It may sound easy, but any veteran blogger can tell you that it isn’t.

Visually and technically planning out your blog’s design requires a lot of testing and refining. So to help ease the process for budding bloggers, we offer some basic advice to help you start achieving your blogging goals effectively.

Blogs Focusing On Sales & Ads

For most, blogging will be considered a business first and foremost. Or your blog could be a business, itself, selling services and information. As such, affiliate links, sponsorship ads, Adwords and advertising are all things you’ll be aiming to fit onto your pages. Though many people are turned off by these, if you’re discreet and highly selective, you can work these into your layout.

The location of ads is crucial to a user’s reading experience. It’s everything. Take a look at the home page of TechCrunch.com for instance. Their blog contains ads and sponsored links, but only features them in five visible places and in two spots on the side bar. No more.

In the posts themselves, ads are located in secondary places (the header above the title and below the article before the comments section). These locations don’t interrupt your reading and actually catch your eye in logical places as it naturally moves across the page. So carefully consider where you should put your ads or sponsors and how many you should have in direct visible competition with your written content.

Blogs On Design, Graphics & Images

The design and image oriented blogger should consider a clean, minimalistic approach to put more emphasis on the visual content and eye-catching artwork. After all, if you’re showcasing graphic design work and high-res images, you don’t want to bury it in text or have it compete with other content elements.

For this, try picking themes that are highly customizable and allow for easy image viewing, like ones that offer the ability to add image sliders or ones where you can specify the size of posts on your home page. Keep content on the sidebars to a minimum, as well. And don’t forget the social media sharing buttons to popular image sharing networks like Flickr or Pinterest. Check out sites like Abduzeedo and Colossal, popular design blogs that put these tips into practice.

Social Media Oriented Blogs

Social media blogs are all about sharing, networking, interacting with multi-media, and spotting the latest viral post. You can get the same interaction on your blog, but with a few careful decisions.

We know that you want all the social media extras, but select ones that effectively serve a purpose for your readers. For instance, you may want to include social sharing widgets that indicate the virality of the post, allowing users to easily fish out popular posts. Or, to spark some social interaction, choose commenting systems that include ranking, pingback, and replying features.

Social media and pop culture blogs like Mashable.com or The Verge are great examples. Notice that their sharing options are carefully chosen to include one-click sharing to certain social networks—not every single one out there. In addition, their content is laid out Pinterest-style, encouraging users to visually pick out what they want to read. How your content attracts the user’s eye and lets them interact with it will play a big role in your blog’s design.

Professional Company Blogs

These kinds of blogs are great as they can act as a built-in platform for customer interaction, sharing helpful information, and promoting services. As such, you want to keep your blog professional looking.

Eliminate ad elements like Google ads or sponsored links, that is, unless your company is in partnership with some of them. Keep social media buttons available for easy sharing. To convey a sense of professionalism, your blog’s theme should work with the same layout and colour palette as your company’s website. Also, consider adding subscription buttons to update your customers automatically.

In short, be sure that your blog is in line with your company’s overall message and goal. Companies like Intuit and Hubspot have blogs that are good examples of this. They’re businesses with blogs that tie in professionalism, social sharing, and related content (both in posts and sidebars). In short, each blog element works to tie in the company’s brand and services.

Blogs Geared Towards News Sharing

It’s common for bloggers to want to share the latest news in their niche. For this, you may want to consider adding a feature that keeps buzz worthy news stories highlighted. Related ads to quality services will also be a good element to add if your readers welcome the resources. Interaction with posts via comments is also a necessity. And make good use of your web real estate by keeping it organized.

Big tech news blogs like Macrumors.com and GigaOM take different approaches. In both cases, each has some of the same elements. They highlight recent articles and have trending content in the sidebar. For comments, Macrumors uses a forum community for lengthy discussions; GigaOM gives users the ability to share their comments on social networks. Lastly, because news can cover so many topics, each blog breaks the content down into different categories. So decide how you want to handle the never-ending onslaught of daily news, first. Then you can decide on the easiest way your community can consume it and form discussions around it.

Conclusion

It’s ultimately up to you to decide which layout and design works out best. No matter which direction you choose for your blog, ensure that its theme is practical for presenting content, interacting with it, and achieving your main goal.

As bloggers and blog readers, what advice do you have?

Author’s Bio: Reena Cruz writes for the Investintech.com blog, where she shares tips about PDF converter technology and software in general. As a tech-geek, she enjoys learning about new tech trends and sharing productivity tool tips online. You can find her on Google Plus.

Filed Under: Design Basics Tagged With: bc, blogging, Design, layout, usability

3 Point Website Usability Checkup

August 27, 2013 by Rosemary Leave a Comment

By James White

When it comes to Internet marketing, many people get so caught up with how to bring visitors to their site that they forget about what to do with them once they arrive. Since traffic isn’t all that useful unless it can be converted into leads, registered users or customers, you want to ensure that every visitor has the best experience possible.

If you’re interested in improving your site but simply don’t have time to go through the process of a complete redesign and overhaul, the good news is that’s not necessary. Instead, there’s plenty of low-hanging fruit that you can knock out. And even though the changes may not seem huge, they’ll have a significant cumulative impact.

To get a better idea of what usability changes you can handle on your own, here are three options for getting started:

Break Up Content

Having lots of useful content on your site is definitely a good thing. The only problem is if most of that content is in the form of big blocks of text, the majority of your visitors may click away before ever reading any of it.

Luckily, there’s a simple remedy to this common problem. All you need to do is break up your content into shorter paragraphs. Include images or graphics to get your point across. And since usability studies from different sources have all shown that online readers do a lot of scanning, use subheadings so they can get the key points before diving in any farther.

Make Everything Easy to Read

Small font sizes can look cool and sleek. And while you want people to think that your site looks good, it’s even more important that they’re able to read your content. If you’re currently using very small font sizes on your site, strongly consider updating your CSS style sheet to utilize larger fonts that are easier for people of all ages to read.

It’s especially important that all your tabs and links are obvious that they link to another relevant page. Easy to read font also means color consideration. Create attractive contrasts with your text and background but remember not to go too crazy. Lime green or similar bright colored backgrounds will turn people off to your site. Use calming colors that reflect the style of your brand.

Rethink Your Navigation

There’s a chance that your site may already have the perfect navigational structure. If that’s the case, feel free to give yourself a pat on the back. But the reality is most sites have room for improvement. Even if there’s not a major problem, small tweaks can make it easier for your visitors to get where you ultimately want them to end up.

If you’re not sure where to get started with this change, looking for patterns in your Google Analytics data can give you an idea of how visitors are getting around your site and if there are any parts of your navigation that don’t fully address your visitors’ habits.

Another way to decide on navigation is to look at websites you like. For example 12 Palms addiction rehab center has an excellent navigation system that only goes three layers deep and their interlinking is perfect.

If you have the money or talent to go big, Coca Cola’s revamped site is a great example to follow if you are looking to push your content marketing. For more e-commerce sites, check out Empire CAT for how they organize and group their products without having the site cluttered.

You’ll notice in all three examples, there is a simple and clean feel to the design. It also has just a few links on the homepage to help you get started finding what you want. Study your favorite sites and then apply what you learn to your own.

Author’s Bio: James is a freelance writer and founder of InfoBros. In his free time, he enjoys hiking, cooking, and blogging about health, tech and communication. Connect with him on Twitter at @JGtheSavage.

Filed Under: Successful Blog Tagged With: bc, navigation, UI, usability, website design

How to Enhance the Usability of Your E-Commerce Site

July 2, 2013 by Guest Author Leave a Comment

By Charles Mburugu

Usability is a very important factor for the success of any website. When designing your ecommerce site, your aim should not just be to have an online store which looks good on the eye. Instead, work at building a site that makes it easy for customers to find information and complete the checkout process. If visitors have a hard time finding what they are looking for, they will simply leave and go elsewhere.

Here are some tips that will help you make your ecommerce site more user-friendly.

1. Offer contact information

Besides enhancing sales, an ecommerce site can be a very powerful tool for attracting new leads and building new bonds with customers. It is therefore very important to have a dedicated page in your site that contains your contact information. In addition, these details should appear clearly on all your site’s pages. Besides the usual email address, include links to your social media profiles. This will enable visitors to reach you through the medium that suits them best. If possible, you could also offer telephone contacts.

2. Make your navigation clear

Most ecommerce sites have many pages with lots of information about a wide range of products. As a result, visitors are likely to lose their way. This is why a good navigation system is absolutely essential. At any one time, visitors should know exactly where they are, where they have come from and where they can go. A breadcrumb navigation system is very helpful. In addition, make sure your pages have clear headings and subheadings which show the subject of the page.

3. Add a search feature

A native search feature makes it possible for visitors to find what they are looking for without having to go through numerous pages. Make sure the search bar appears prominently on your pages in a place where visitors can easily find it. You could place it on the top of the page or on the right sidebar. Whatever the case, make sure it is ‘above the fold’ (can be viewed without scrolling). To make the search function more effective, you could break it down into filters such as color, size, price, availability and type. This search filter will offer your visitors a more pleasant user experience.

4. Show related products

When designing your product pages, place related products in a common group. When a customer purchases a particular product, you could suggest a different product in the same group. This enhances the likelihood of the customer buying another product, even if they had not planned to.

5. Add a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section

When visitors land on your pages and read the content, they might still be left with a wide range of questions. It is therefore vital to have a dedicated FAQ page on your site which seeks to answer some of the concerns customers are likely to raise. However, allow your customers to contact you in case they need further clarification on anything.

6. Make registration optional

If you require visitors to sign up before accessing your site, they are likely to get put off and simply go away. Therefore, I recommend that you make registration optional. Allow customers to shop even if they are not registered. This will attract more people to your ecommerce site and ultimately enhance customer loyalty.

Author’s Bio: Charles Mburugu is a HubSpot-certified content writer/marketer for B2B, B2C and SaaS companies. He has worked with brands such as GetResponse, Neil Patel, Shopify, 99 Designs, Oberlo, Salesforce and Condor. Check out his portfolio and connect on LinkedIn.

Filed Under: Web Design Tagged With: bc, Design, e-commerce, usability, user experience

Technorati Has a Birthday and We Get the Present!

July 24, 2006 by Liz 14 Comments

Customer-Centered Technorati!

In honor of their third anniversary as a company, Technorati has rolled out a major upgrade. The billboard that Technorati has changed their view to customer-centered is that when you sign in, you’ll find the home page is about you, your blogs, and what you might find interesting — not about Technorati.

I’m already liking these changes.

  • The Home Page brings what I need together. Everything I use daily is there. I love that the ping is right on top. I can click directly to my indexed posts.
  • The link counts are a lot more accurate. Thank you.
  • Favorites makes sense and is easier. I’m MUCH more likely to use Favorites Now.
  • Technorati Browser Buttons are one reason I’m more likely to use Favorites now.
  • The Search function is faster and has more filters. I very much like that I can filter by language.
  • The Search results have extended excerpts. (Show details.) I can take a closer look without having to click through.
  • The support text is written clearly. That’s a BIG deal to me. Thanks Technorati for getting a great writer to write these bits and pieces. No confusion or ambiguity whatsoever in anything I’ve read so far.
  • I also love the quieter new layout.

Check out this tool for business blogging, blog promotion, and branding. You can read about it and see a video of the features at Sifry’s Alerts by clicking on this title.

Technorati turns 3

Happy Birthday, Technorati! Thank you, David and Technorati, for the present!

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related articles
Technorati — Hollywood and International
A Tale, Sister Marlene, Stephen Covey, Mike Sigers, & Power Linking

Filed Under: Business Life, Successful Blog, Tech/Stats Tagged With: bc, blog-promotion, business-blogging, David-Sifry, personal-branding, Sifry-Alerts, Technorati, usability

SOB Business Cafe 7-21-2006

July 21, 2006 by Liz 4 Comments

SB Cafe

Welcome to the SOB Cafe

We offer the best in thinking–articles on the business of blogging written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the title shots to enjoy each selection.

The Specials this Week are

Creating Passionate Users makes the point that if you’re not having fun, you’re just not doing it right somehow.

 Usability through Fun

Solo Marketing offers some advice on how to deal with spousal distractions. These aren’t just tips for holidays.

 How to Avoid Spousal Distractions

Symplebyte shows us how to make smaller PowerPoint files in five easy steps. Maybe then we can actually send them to clients via email.

5 steps to Smaller PowerPoint Files

Service Unlimited has some customer service tips for freelancers. They really apply to any business that has clients.

 Customer Service Tips for Freelancers

Related ala carte selections include

Scrappy Marketing Solutions reminds of the qualities that make an effective business blog.

What Makes an Effective Small Business Blog

Sit back. Enjoy your read. Nachos and drinks will be right over. Stay as long as you like.
No tips required. Comments appreciated.

Have a great weekend!

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Filed Under: Business Life, Personal Branding, SOB Business, Successful Blog Tagged With: bc, business-blogging, Creating-Passionate-Users, freelance-customer-service, PowerPoint, Scrappy-Marketing, Service-Unlimited, Solo-Marketing, Symplebyte, usability, working-at-home

Business, Blogs, and Niche-Brand Marketing

February 21, 2006 by Liz 11 Comments

Just the Facts

These are the facts.

  • The blogosphere is doubling in size every 5 and a half months.
  • On average, a new weblog is created every second of every day.
  • Municipal Wi-Fi Networks are becoming a reality. Anaheim, CA; Arlington, VA; Brookline, MA; Chicago, IL; Denver, CO;, Miami, FL; Minneapolis, MN; Grand Rapids, MI; New York, NY; Philadelphi, PA; Pittsburgh, PA; San Francisco, CA; Tempe, AZ; and others are already planning or building Wi-Fi networks to be ready in the next 2-3 years.
  • The Technorati Filter By Authority slider gives readers the power to filter out all but the most important blogs in any niche. Will other Search Engine follow?

Business Meet Blogs, Blogs Meet Business

Sounds great. Doesn’t it? Bloggers read blogs. I’ll have more readers. Right? But those readers will have more blogs to read. With new blogs coming at such a stunning rate, it’s reasonable to think that blogs in the Magic Middle might be pushed aside as younger, shinier blogs appear. It’s also fair to assume that readers will limit the searches to only important blogs, leaving me out. What’ll I do to capture their attention?

Niche-Brand Marketing

The wisdom of the Long Tail–that as business moves on line, less and less of what is offered needs to be “one size fits all” and delivered via giant outlet–leads me to niche-brand marketing. I review this list often for my blogs and for my business, or Liz Strauss Consulting wouldn’t be consulting much longer.

  • Define a niche for your business. Choose a niche you truly care about. Find a place to stand. Don’t try to be all things to all people. Do one or two things that play to your strengths and passions. Do those things better than anyone else.
  • Find out everything about the customers in your chosen niche. First and foremost, make sure that said customers exist. Then don’t just get information. Fall in love with everyone of them. Figure out how to crawl into their skin and feel their pain. Know their loves and their wishes. Find their needs and desires. Learn to read what they’re not saying.
  • Define your brand through your customers’ world view. In reality, you don’t define your brand, your customers do. When you understand your customers intimately, find a way to state your brand–what you and your customers stand for–in less than one sentence. Write those words everywhere your customer will see your name, your blog’s name, or your business name. Let them know you mean it.
  • Use your brand to test every decision you make–large or small. Be your brand. Live it. Make your brand show in every detail, every action, every move you make. If you live your brand, and test every decision against it by asking, Will this help my customers see my brand? your customers are more likely to buy into the brand you’ve chosen on their behalf.
  • Be authentic; never skimp on quality; never go against your brand; and you will set the standard. You won’t just be different; you will be unique, irreplaceable. Authenticity cannot be “knocked off and done more cheaply.” Attempts to copy you will only be poor facsimiles. Quality and authenticity are the birthplace of brand loyalty. Customers will know where to find the real thing. Once they find it. They stick with it.
  • When your customers recognize that you care about their needs, value them and the relationship that you have with them. Relationships will always be everything in any human endeavor. Never lose sight of the fact that you and they are people–not users, not clients, not numbers–but folks with thoughts, feelings, and ideas that make you and your business better.

Why Customers Love Niche-Brand Marketers

We are a fascinating species. When we don’t know where to go, we’ll go where everyone else goes. But give us one reason to come to you, and you’ve made a customer–a reader–possibly a friend forever.

We think that people who think the same way we do are smarter than other people. So when you choose a niche that we care about, we think that you’re highly intelligent. We trust your judgment in other things too.

When we find someone who tries to solve our problems and who values us. We’ll go out of our way to do business with you. It’s just not that often that we get that kind of service.

That’s how small niche-brand marketers get to be great niche marketers one customer at a time. That’s how I plan to make this a place where I can put down roots. I want want to be here for a long, long while, making relationships with some really great people.

How about you?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related articles:
Chicago Goes Wi-Fi . . . What Does that Mean to Business?
Marketing Strategy ala Mickey Mouse
GAWKER Design: Curb Appeal as Customer-Centered Promotion
Why Doesn’t Pete Townshend Need to Do Promotion?

Filed Under: Blog Basics, Marketing /Sales / Social Media, Personal Branding, Successful Blog Tagged With: bc, blog_design, blog_promotion, customers, niche_brand, niche_marketing, personal-branding, promotion, quality_content, usability

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