ProBlogger: How Design Impacts Blog Readership

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How Design Impacts Blog Readership Posted: 14 May 2015 07:00 AM PDT This is a guest contribution from Damion Wasylow. You have things to say, ideas to spread and concepts to share. That's why you're a blogger. But, if you're like most bloggers, you're much better with words than visuals. As a result, many bloggers' sites are poorly designed or rely on simple templates. Your content may bring people to your blog, but poor design and usability can seriously limit your readership. First Impressions are Everything Studies show that new visitors develop an opinion of your website within 50 milliseconds. That's 0.05 seconds. In that time, they make judgments about credibility, professionalism and quality of information – all without ever reading a single word you wrote. If the first impression isn't positive, they'll almost certainly bounce away, and it's unlikely they'll ever return. It's human nature. Picture a restaurant with a rusty door, broken sign and trash in the parking lot. The food could be incredible, but you'll likely never venture inside to see the menu. Get Real Feedback It's nearly impossible to honestly review your own site's design. You're biased, and so are your friends and family. After all, they don't want to hurt your feelings and your dad probably isn't your target audience. So, turn to a third party. UserTesting.com is an excellent resource for gauging user experience. I often use UserTesting.com's Peek Tests to gather initial feedback. Peek allows you to watch and listen to five-minute videos of real people encountering your site for the first time. Testers answer three questions: 1) What is your first impression of this site? 2) What is the first thing you want to do on this site? 3) What stood out to you and what frustrated you about this site? While this feedback isn't comprehensive, it should at least offer some insight into whether your site's design is on the right track or completely off-target. Design Changes to Consider You don't have to be the world's most talented web designer to create a visually impressive site that retains users. You simply have to understand the core elements of design and how they work together. Color – Your color palette should be simple, consistent and reflect the overall tone of your content. Too many colors can be overwhelming, and the wrong colors can confuse your audience. Use standard color theory to select a palette that matches your blog's personality. Images – Users embrace photos and illustrations as a way to quickly get the gist of a story without investing too much effort. Effective images therefore leverage white space, contrast, color, interruption and other techniques to intrigue and draw the reader in. Images may not be worth 1000 words, but a recent study by Blog Pros showed that the 100 highest-ranking blogs on the Internet use at least 1 image for every 350 words. Shapes – Chunky, square design elements evoke dramatically different feelings than free-flowing organic shapes. Circles are soft and inclusive, while angles can help carry a reader down the page. Partitioning content within shapes is a valuable way to help users segment information into digestible sections. Typography – Typeface, font size, leading, kerning and placement all play significant roles in affecting user experience. Great typography conveys emotion, while also allowing users to focus on your message instead of struggling to interpret the structure of the letters before them. Note: never use Comic Sans or Papyrus. Highlight Your Call-to-Action You created your blog for a purpose, presumably beyond simply having individual visitors read your articles. Perhaps you want them to share your writings with others, purchase your product or service or download your e-book. Whatever the goal, design your site to highlight that call-to-action (CTA). Use color, contrast, whitespace and size to make your CTA standout from the rest of the page. But keep it classy. Nothing undermines credibility faster than a flashing rainbow starburst. Here are some great examples of web pages with effective CTA designs. Make it Mobile-Friendly Mobile traffic accounts for nearly 60% of all web traffic, so you're missing out on a lot of readers if your site isn't designed to accommodate mobile visitors. And, really, even more if you count on social or email sources. When a mobile user lands on a site that offers a standard desktop design, they are far more likely to bounce away. Ideally, your blog should be responsive, meaning that elements restack to match mobile screen dimensions when the site identifies a visitor on a mobile device. This makes your content easier to read and navigate on mobile screens. Google recently announced that mobile-friendliness will be an increasingly important ranking factor. If your site isn't mobile-friendly, there's a good chance it will dramatically drop in search engine results. The importance of blog design cannot be overstated. Take the time now to improve your site's aesthetics and usability. You'll attract more visitors, keep them engaged and drive them to actions that match your goals. Damion Wasylow writes for University of Florida's Web Design and Online Communication master's degree program. He has more than 20 years of experience in graphic design for publications, agencies and non-profits. Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger How Design Impacts Blog Readership

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Shoemoney - Skills To Pay The Bills

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The Dirty Make Money Online Space & Giving People True Value Posted: 13 May 2015 01:23 PM PDT A month or so ago I was watching this video on YouTube with John Reese,  Frank Kern, and Tony Robbins were talking about their frustrations in that people who buy their training programs rarely take action.   The really interesting thing is when they talked about how the SAME people keep buying products  for thousands of dollars and then email them email them saying they don’t know how to get started. That video really got me thinking.  After all – I have sold over 25,000 units of my 2 training products  (over ten million dollars worth) focused on educating people on how to make money online.  But my price points are not thousands… they are at most $200 so that can’t be the same with me?  Right? So I started crunching numbers.  And this blew me away – less than 1% of the people that purchased these products ever logged in more than 3 times. In that video Tony Robbins suggested it was a lack of confidence to get started but more so the lack of instant gratification. He asked John and Frank how they started and they all brought it back to making their first dollar on the internet. I can tell you for me it was an unreal experience.  In fact to be perfectly honest,  making my first dollar online was more exciting to me than when I made my first million dollars online.   Making your first dollar online gives you the confidence to move forward – and sky’s the limit. But that’s kind of how it goes with anything.  I digress a bit but I sucked at baseball until I hit my first home run.  That first one was MUCH more more exciting than when I hit my 100th… But when you goto the plate 3 times in a row and strike out… you’re done.  You never got to first base.  You don’t want to play anymore. Between that video,  my eye opening stats,  and thinking about how I got started it became clear that in order to make something to give people real value they needed that same confidence to go forward.  I needed them to make their first dollar online in minutes. But instead of selling them a product.  I wanted to do it for free.  Better yet…  I wanted to actually pay my students when they completed the key tasks to learn how to make money online. So reached out to companies in the industry that provide services and told them my idea… and vision.  To my surprise they quickly got on board. And the ShoeMoney Network was born. You sign up for free and make your first dollar online in less than 5 minutes.  AND its sent in real time.  No strings no catches.  In fact, throughout the entire training course, I never take one dollar from you.  Ever. This is a high level view of the course but the initial chapters are: Set up your website – make it look good, make it social and mobile friendly, and install the key plugins to be successful. Build your Facebook page – design tips and tricks, and ninja ways to get quality “likes” for free. Setup up your email list – plug and play prewritten autoresponders and ninja copywriting techniques to captivate your audience and get them to take action Implement a high converting squeeze page with his provided and proven plug and play templates. Then we tie it all together so it works like an automated cash machine. And again, I pay you each time you complete a key step. After you have completed the groundwork, (and been paid to do it),  you graduate to the ninja training where we take it up a notch. Again a high level overview: Researching high converting offers. Split testing and optimizing Cutting edge conversion techniques. And the list goes on and on. Once you reach the rank of black belt I even give you $5 to do your first Facebook campaign.  Again – no strings attached.  I never take $1 from you. The results have been amazing.  Not only have we paid out tens of thousands of dollars to students but they have actually done it… and have something of value.  I look at their sites and honestly am blown away. It’s not been perfect.  Because I pay people out in real time through Paypal its obviously very attractive to fraudsters.  Its a constant battle but something I invite you to try it and please give me real feedback below on what you think of it. Go here to sign up – http://www.shoemoney.net

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