Hi guys, thanks for hitting my thread! I'm looking to have my blog http://www.sinminx.com/blog reviewed. I want to be specific about the feedback I'm seeking, though. First off, I'm not a graphic designer in any way. I can put plugins into to WordPress, alter the php files a little and that's about it. The purpose of my blog is to get my poetry (each poem is for sale) out there for people to read. If you'd like more explanation on the Million Dollar Poetry Project itself, you can check the 'Explanation' section which is on the right-hand sidebar. What I'd like to know is any ways you think I could make it function a little bit better. I've spent as much as I can just setting it up so I need no-cost solutions for right now. I've done a press release and I bought some SEO work for it, also. The traffic's super low but I'm not expecting an overnight miracle or anything like that. That about sums it up! If you see any things I can do to help it out I'd be grateful for the tips. Thanks again!
Well, being a sales person, I can say that title haveto say everything. Your title says nothing. You are a poet, and it seems a good one - so be creative and create a catching title. The WordPress theme is awful! Every spammer/pill-pusher uses this particular theme. Go and get this: http://www.sizlopedia.com/tigopedia/ It will only take a few minutes to switch to this theme and some good friend to create a small logo for you 70x70 pixels to replace that stupid globe thingy. Also get rid of this social bookmark plugin because it is now much more prominent than your poetry. When I landed on your blog, my first idea was that it is a blog about social bookmarking. The new theme I told you about will let your visitors bookmark to the top five socials. Forget about the rest or if you cannot, keep the number of icons to minimum. Then, create a text widget (it will be obvious once you've installed the theme) for the new theme and place it in the top-right corner. Explain in five sensible sentences what you are about and what is this all about. A first time visitor will have NO idea whatsoever and he will just go away. - no I cannot. I did't find it... Occasional vistors will not either. Think about how could you mix in the Adsense block. I cannot tell you where to put it but you cannot leave it where it is if you want somebody to scroll past it. Good luck!!!
I just hope you will take my suggestion professionally Here's what I can say to your blog. First is the double spacing in your content (I don't know but it looks 2 1/2) maybe it will look more better if you will make it single. You can use another page for your other article. And another thing your page, it was too long to browse. You can also add some images or flash (if you like) to make it more attractive. That's all I can say about your blog by the way I like your poems those are nice.
Tankard and Cryxellis23, First off thank you very much for taking the time to review my blog! I appreciate it! I'll try and address the suggestions as clearly as possible: For the title, my reason for having it read "Stamina + Innovation = New Millionaire in X?" is to explain the use of "sinminx.com" as a domain name. I had to go with a domain that I already owned when I started this, so I felt the need to clarify that in the title. I could (and will strongly consider) changing the header, though. For the theme I really hesitate to switch from default simply because past experience taught me that when you switch from default a lot of errors crop up (like with plugins, etc) that I've not been able to fix. The support for themes seems random and so I've not wanted to switch from default. I'll take a look at that theme you're suggesting later today, tankard and see if it might work. The logo idea is good but right now none of my friends do graphic design work (for free - lol). The suggestion to social bookmarking plugin didn't work quite how I expected and yes it's rather ugly. I'll fix that for sure. Does anyone recommend a specific plugin that'd look a bit less eye-gouging? I mainly wanted to make it easy for people who might feel like bookmarking the site so I went with as many choices as possible. The widget for describing the blog is an EXCELLENT idea and I'll definitely do that one! When it comes to Adsense I've no clue how to configure it for effectiveness. I'm thinking a horizontal bar of ads would work best and I tried to blend them a bit.. but still aggravating, I see. I'll work on that later, as well. About the spacing.. I did that because since the poems are selling for $1 per line, I wanted to be clear about where each line ends (in other words, when they wrap the text I wanted people to know that wrapped text still counts as part of the line it was divided from). Maybe I should just put the price at the bottom? Might be clearer. And cryxellis, what did you mean about other pages? I'm not sure I understand. Thanks, everyone!
Your ads size is too big at between post, change it to simple size such as 468 x 60. Change font size title in small size
Wow, I really HATE your double-spacing... And with Firefox the text runs out of your logo what looks ... well, NOT inspiring.
There are so many nice-looking free themes available and yours is an artistic site. I would recommend looking up more options... all you need to do is switch to a new theme! Best luck.
I agree with some of what has been already said. I would change it to single spacing and find another theme. That will make a big difference
Your banner font goes off the banner coloring! Double Spacing! to much clutter, it's not very "clean"
Okay, everyone, I've made some changes! Not massive, but hopefully a start in the right direction. I made the Adsense to the smaller "half banner" size which should kick into effect shortly (it's still large so far).. I also added a text widget that links directly to the Explanation page at the top of the right sidebar. I reduced the social bookmarking to just a few, all in one line. I'm still not confident that a free theme's the best choice and I realize the site is ugly. I do plan to purchase a better design once I've earned a bit more. So far three poems have been paid for but that's not quite enough to afford a new template And I'd rather NOT use a free template in case it breaks and I need support to fix it. As for making the font size of the header smaller, how do I go about doing that? And is the double-spacing that troublesome? The purpose was to show distinctly where each line ends. I suppose I can eliminate it if it's that great of a burden on the eyes, though. Thank you for the pointers so far! I look forward to hearing more from you all.