Today’s post is all about little ways you can improve your design. For the ones with coding, I’m just directing you to posts that tell you how. There are already so many posts out there on doing the same thing that it seems silly to add another one.
GET RID OF THE SHADOW ON IMAGES
Use this post for removing shadows to learn how! When you have the default shadows on your blog, people will automatically know you are using Blogger as your blogging platform. There isn’t anything wrong with Blogger (it’s the platform I use), but it’s always the first thing I get rid of when I’m designing someone’s blog.
MAKE SURE EVERYTHING IN YOUR SIDEBAR IS THE SAME SIZE
Everything in my sidebar is 250px besides a few things like my “Need Another Size?” image and my social media. All my sponsor buttons are also 250px wide with each of the heights changed. If you don’t want certain ad spaces to be a lot smaller, make them half the size of your sidebar. This will make them side by side and will make them the same width as the bigger ad spaces.
ADD A BACK TO TOP BUTTON
Use this post to learn how to add the button! Her tutorial shows you how to create the button with just coding and how to use and image like how I added mine. It’s pretty easy to do and just adds a little something extra to the design.
USE DISQUS COMMENTS
This one is more of a preference, I think it looks a little cleaner/more professional than the Blogger comments, plus it eliminates the whole no-reply blogger issue. I’ve also noticed there are a lot fewer spam comments on my older posts.
REMOVE CLUTTER
Decide what you actually need on your sidebar. I used to have a snapwidget with an Instagram slideshow even though I really don’t update my Instagram as often as I should. If you have a google+ button with your other social media, do you need to have a widget showing your followers? Sometimes it might be necessary to have both if you want to direct more attention to that platform.
MAKE IMAGES FULL WIDTH OF A POST
I always have my photos set to 640px (Or extra large) which is the full width of my posts. I wouldn’t do this if you are using a lot of vertical photos because they can take up way too much room. Too many of the vertical photos will make the post harder to read because the reader will have to scroll a lot to read your full post. You can either group photos together or just keep them a little smaller.
REMOVE THE BLOGGER NAVBAR
If you look at the top of a blogger blog, you can see the default navbar that is on the top which I haven’t ever had a use for since I’ve been blogging. Plus getting rid of that navbar gives room for other things like the Hello Bar, which you can use to promote things that are happening on your blog (sponsorship promos, new products, a post you want more traffic on, etc.)
PICK A READABLE FONT FOR YOUR POSTS
Yes, a cursive/script fonts might look good or fun, but it makes posts a lot harder to read if it’s used in the body of your post. Save the fun font for your post titles and widget titles.
USE 2-3 FONTS
I have the font I use for my header, a font for my sidebar, navbar and title and then the font in my posts. An exception to this is if you are using variants of that font (bold, light, italic, etc.) those still count as one font.
KEEP IT SIMPLE
If you want your blog to look more professional, it’s better to have more white space (or in my case gray space). I’m not saying you shouldn’t have fun with the design or that there shouldn’t be a pattern in the background, but you should make sure that the pattern isn’t overpowering the rest of your blog
TURN OFF AUTO ENHANCING FOR PHOTOS
If you’ve ever had a photo with a white background that looks gray it is from Auto Enhance. All you have to do that to change it is go to the google+ settings and turn it off.
KEEP THINGS CONSISTENT
Try to keep everything in your posts similar. If you add text to your first image in your post, make sure each one is similar. I know I’ve looked at images in my Bloglovin feed and automatically knew exactly who’s post it was and what it was about just by their image. Also, if you break up your posts with headlines, make sure those stay consistent too. This is something I recently started doing and I think it helps break up the text. I have my question or call to action the same as my headlines except bigger.
I hope this helped you in some way! If you ever get stuck with anything design related feel free to email me! Or if you are completely stuck and just want me to do the work for you, I do offer design services. (My prices will be raising pretty soon if you want a cheaper design get it now!)
