Help Me Help My Blog! (June/July thread)

[Trish Collins]

Since the Help Me Help My Blog threads are slowing down, I'm going to start grouping them 2 or 3 months at a time. We're still happy to help! You don't have to have a new blog to ask for help. :)

This thread is a place for us to ask specific questions about our blogs and get your input! So if you would like your blog critiqued, then feel free to post here your url, your goals, and what type of input you are looking for. The more specific you are the more we can help. I'm sure we'll all be nice! And remember, it's your blog. Just because somebody mentions something doesn't mean it will be right for you.

There are a lot of tips and helps found within the blogging tips group. I'd also suggest you take a look around.

Keep the comments threaded underneath each blog that is getting reviewed, that way it's easy to figure out the conversation. Thanks!

[Dani ~ aka The Romance Book Addict]

I'm looking for any ways to improve my blog, Confessions of a Romance Book Addict.

I started the blog on January 1st this year and have had some rough spots in between where I didn't post for awhile because of my computer crashing and some personal family things going on. I'm just now getting back into posting almost everyday.

The goal of my blog is to share with others about how much I love to read and to spread the word about authors and their books that are out there.

I'd really like to get some more commentors. On average I get about 40 viewers a day, but hardly any commenters.

Any tips, input, or suggestions would be most helpful!

[Britt C.]

Your header is really cute! And your layout and style are really easy to read.

If you can, I'd put the "pages" links across the top and I'd probably add another sidebar so that you have a little more room to work with. I'm not sure how much flexibility you have in Wordpress, though. But then your "subscribe" "contact me" and "attention authors" would be more above the fold. You've also got a couple of things escaping your sidebar-- they hang off to the right.

As far as comments go... not sure what to say. It looks like you're asking questions to engage readers. And if you're getting that many viewers then you're ahead of me. (Sorry, not much help!)

[Dani ~ aka The Romance Book Addict]

thank you Britt for the input!

Yes, wordpress isn't that flexible and I REALLY would like to get a 3 column layout with the "pages" links across the top, but I'm going to have to wait until I get money saved up to get a domain name so I can get a layout made for me which will cost me more money. All of the layouts that are currently available through wordpress aren't that good at all, I'm honestly stuck with the one I have for now.

[Britt C.]

Can you tweak the html of your layout?

I know Bookscoops has three columns and it's a wordpress. I'm not sure how they did it, though.

[Dani ~ aka The Romance Book Addict]

I have no idea how to "tweak" the html of my layout and I don't even think I can touch it until I get a domain name.

From the looks of it, it looks like Bookscoops has only 2 columns... well at least to me anyway. Plus, they have a domain name.

[Britt C.]

Okay, sorry, I could have sworn they had two.

Now I'm feeling very confused.

Really we need someone on Wordpress to jump into the discussion, don't we? If you were on Blogger I could tell you exactly what to do.

[Dani ~ aka The Romance Book Addict]

lol it's okay I didn't mean to sound rude, sorry if i did :/

I agree it seems so many people are on Blogger but not enough are on Wordpress... hmmm maybe someone will jump in on our conversation... :)

[Britt C.]

Nope didn't sound rude I'm just wondering if I'm really THAT much more tired than I thought I was!

Maybe they used to have three.

Or I'm losing my mind... wouldn't surprise me. ;)

[Trish Collins]

Dani, I don't think you have to have your own domain name in order to get a layout made for you. Frankly, the problem with WordPress is that you can't tweak the coding hardly at all. So with my template, when I was with wordpress.com, I was able to pay something like $15 a year and that meant I could add some coding to make sidebar widgets into scrolling menus, and I was able to hide a few things I didn't like.

I would recommend that you stick with WordPress and either work with the template you have or find another one. The page tabs across the header are on some of the templates, but not all. Also, some of the templates do have three columns. For example, check out the template Books on the Brain uses.

Let me know if you have any questions!

[Nicola O.]

I think it just takes time. I didn't get hardly any comments for close to a year, and if you stopped blogging for awhile you probably lost ground with readers you had before. You have a great blogroll which helps a lot-- how often do you comment on others' blogs? I think that's perhaps the single biggest thing you can do to find readers and make them want to come see what you have to offer. I've also had some good results in participating in a select few memes-- I like Thursday Thirteen. I also post a link on my facebook page when I put up a new blog post.

[Dani ~ aka The Romance Book Addict]

I used to comment daily on tons of blogs, but then stopped for awhile and am now getting back into it again. As for memes I'm planning on joining in on a couple of those, one of them I'm starting next week called Weekly Words Challenge hosted by Pickled Beef and I'm thinking about joining in on one of the "Mailbox" posts.

[Trish Collins]

Hi, Dani!

I really like the simple layout of your blog. Very nice. The header is nice. I like the font of your title, and I like the picture to the left of the title.

I see you center your text. I would recommend making your text align left, because centered text is difficult to read. It's a small, picky thing but something that will make people not want to come back.

I would probably like to see an About Me type of widget at the very top of your sidebar. I realize that *I* don't have one of those, but I really think they help when you get traffic from search engines. Let people know if just a few sentences what your blog is about (and hopefully convince them to stay!). I don't think the Pages widget should go at the top. It should be at the middle towards the bottom of your sidebar. Minimally I would suggest a link to your About Me page.

Right below your About Me widget should be your RSS button. I see your RSS button has a border around it; that's something kooky with WordPress. Here's how you take the border off:

The html code for your pic will be this (spaces added so the html doesn't convert):

< img src= " http://url of your pick.jpg" border="0" >

What you want to add is the border="0". That will fix that problem. However, I would suggest you find a button a little more fun and flashy, but that's just my opinion. Here's a link to some free RSS icons. You can Google "rss icons" and you'll get a ton of options. If you have problems with this, let me know.

If your widgets don't have information, I would suggest removing them. It looks like you don't update often when your Currently Reading widget is empty.

Your Categories drop down menu goes outside of the margins of your blog. Is there a way for you to fix that?

Also, your very last graphic in the sidebar, that your blog is featured in the book blog directory, goes outside of the sidebar. To fix that, just specify the height and width. For example:

< img src = " http://your url of the picture.jpg" border = "0" height = "150" width = "150" > < / a >

Just take out the spaces.

I'd also recommend taking your stats off until you start getting more hits.

As far as getting more commenters, the way to get people to comment is to comment on other people's blogs and to write posts that people want to comment on. It's a lot of work, let me tell you. Also, the more traffic you get the more comments you'll get. If you want your blog to be successful with comments and traffic, you'll have to put quite a bit of time into it. At least, that's what I had to do. :)