Dane Morgan launched a The Blog Improvement Zone Meme. We are supposed to discuss how we plan to improve our blogs, point to five bloggers people who those things well and then tag them.
Not knowing how terrible I am at memes, Dane tagged me. I felt guilty when I saw Andy Beard had already fulfilled his tagging assignment; now I’m finally fulfilling my obligation to tag people.
Strangely enough, I share some of Andy’s; he talks about improving his blog theme layout. Needless to say, I have the same problems and more. The main reason for my crummy template that I decided to work on pillar content first, and blog layout later. I also initially overlooked social networking (probably because I am slightly anti-social?) Andy does that very well; I’m working on that- but I already blogged about some of my efforts.
Here are blog problems I’m thinking about I want to improve in October:
- Speed up Sidebars: My content seems to load fairly nicely. To maximize traffic and revenue, I need everything above the fold to load quickly. This includes content, navigation and ads. Unfortunately, my sidebars are often pathetically slow. This was partly due to Bumpzee which frequently bogged down. Other widgets often loaded slowly: I’ve moved all suspect slugs to the footer for now until I find a better solution.
Who does this better than me? Every one
- Archives by time and topic.I generally prefer topical archives. However, some monetizing programs like Pay Per Post and some blog visitors want temporal archives. I’m going to seek out a calendar to minimize the amount of space devoted to temporal archives.
Who does this better than me? I don’t know! I think archives are just a problem.
- Not enough posts linking out. Specifically, I don’t link out to good posts I find and read often enough. Blog readers generally find out-links to valuable content a service: it helps them find solutions to problems. That’s one of the reasons “list” posts are popular.
Everyone knows who does this well: Pro-blogger, Darren Rowse, who solicited links to focus articles throughout August. He then posted articles like: 113 Must Read Blogging Tips!
- Layout needs space for more ads Sounds odd, right? But this blog is intended to talk about monetizing. Though I do not intend to focus solely on making the most money, I need space for ads in the sidebar, while still providing clear navigation. I’m also working on a plugin for affiliate ads- but I’m experiencing some mental blog issues.
Who does this well? Maurice of Cayman Host has a nice four column theme. I can navigate and find posts, I can read the post without distraction. Yet, Maurice has plenty of ads with some appearing on both above the fold and as I scroll down. I think the layout doesn’t look spammy. So, that’s a candidate.
- I need products to promote. After I create the perfect layout, I need products right? Well, I know who explains where to find them! That’s Josh Spaulding of Make Money Blog., though, the products are often on other pages he hosts.
We are supposed to tag the people who do this better than we do. I picked 5 areas for improvement and named who did this better than I. So I guess that means I’ve tagged: Maurice of Cayman Host, Josh Spaulding of Make Money Blog., Darren Rowse of Problogger, “everyone” and “I don’t know”.
Will they all pick up the baton?
Well…. I suspect “everyone” and “I don’t know” are unlikely to rise to the challenge. Darren is an awfully nice guy; he’s also probably a bit busy. With luck, Maurice and Josh will continue the meme and keep it from dying!
Here’s another example of the “content loads last” blooper I found at 