I think my design is perhaps affecting my CTR's... not just these 2 sites... Please constructively critique the design of the sites in my signature. Hopefully, I can generalize the feedback. Thank you much!
Hi, I would move the adsense over to the right side after the first set of quotes. It might draw the readers eye a little better.
They are both very pale and has nothing designwise that makes them stand out, or makes people want to stick around to read your content. They remind me of the default theme you get on a fresh wordpress install, or the look and feel of a T:O:S-document or maybe one of those help file packages you often get when you purchase a web application. They do not look bad at all, but on the other hand, there is nothing that triggers visitors curiosity or desire to take part in the content. also, a fluid width is not a very good thing. Either you should set a fixed width that you can alter depending on the visitors viewport, or set a max width based on 1280 horisontal resoluton.
There's no attraction in your websites. Try to add some call-to-action tone and attract visitors by placing appropriate images; don't use too many images though. Plain websites (with only lots of content) usually irritates visitors and might result in less bounce-rate and traffic. Good luck,